Revised and updated, The Law and Practice of the United Nations provides an analysis of the main legal issues surrounding the United Nations' practice, including a thorough discussion of Chapter VII of the Charter and its interpretation.
After seven decades of existence has the UN become obsolete? Is it ripe for retirement? As Jussi Hanhimäki proves in the second edition of this Very Short Introduction, the answer is no. In the second decade of the twenty-first century the UN remains an indispensable organization that continues to save lives and improve the world as its founders hoped. Since its original publication in 2008, this 2nd edition includes more recent examples of the UN Security Council in action and peacekeeping efforts while exploring its most recent successes and failures. After a brief history of the United Nations and its predecessor, the League of Nations, Hanhimäki examines the UN's successes and failures as a guardian of international peace and security, as a promoter of human rights, as a protector of international law, and as an engineer of socio-economic development. This updated edition highlights what continues to make the UN a complicated organization today, and the ongoing challenges between its ambitions and capabilities. Hanhimäki also provides a clear account of the UN and its various arms and organizations (such as UNESCO and UNICEF), and offers a critical overview of the UN Security Council's involvement in recent crises in Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq, Ukraine, Libya, and Syria, and how likely it is to meet its overall goals in the future. Regardless of its obstacles, the UN is likely to survive for the foreseeable future. That alone makes trying to understand the UN in all its manifold - magnificent and frustrating - complexity a worthy task. With this much-needed updated introduction to the UN, Jussi Hanhimäki engages the current debate over the organizations effectiveness as he provides a clear understanding of how it was originally conceived, how it has come to its present form, and how it must confront new challenges in a rapidly changing world. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.
This work aims to fill a gap in the existing legal literature by presenting a compact, concise but nevertheless panoramic view of the law of the United Nations. Today the organisation is at the centre of all multilateral international relations and impossible to avoid. And of course the UN Charter is a foundational document without which modern international law cannot be properly understood. In spite of its importance, this pre-eminent world political organisation is poorly understood by the general public, and the extent and variety of its activities is not widely appreciated. Even lawyers generally possess insufficient knowledge of the way its legal institutions operate. Assessments of the organisation and judgements about its achievements are consequently frequently distorted. This work is aimed especially at remedying these deficiencies in public and legal understanding, but also at presenting the organisation as a coherent system of values and integrated action. Thus the book presents an overarching view of the significance of the UN organisation in general, the history of its origins in the League of Nations, the aims and principles of the Charter, governmental agencies, members of the Organisation, the non-use of violence and collective security, the peaceful settlement of disputes, and the question of amendments to the Charter. This work will be suitable for students of law and international relations, as well as scholars and those interested in the work and organisation of the United Nations.
The United Nations, whose specialized agencies were the subject of an Appendix to the 1958 edition of Oppenheim's International Law: Peace, has expanded beyond all recognition since its founding in 1945.This volume represents a study that is entirely new, but prepared in the way that has become so familiar over succeeding editions of Oppenheim. An authoritative and comprehensive study of the United Nations' legal practice, this volume covers the formal structures of the UN as it has expanded over the years, and all that this complex organization does. All substantive issues are addressed in separate sections, including among others, the responsibilities of the UN, financing, immunities, human rights, preventing armed conflicts and peacekeeping, and judicial matters. In examining the evolving structures and ever expanding work of the United Nations, this volume follows the long-held tradition of Oppenheim by presenting facts uncoloured by personal opinion, in a succinct text that also offers in the footnotes a wealth of information and ideas to be explored. It is book that, while making all necessary reference to the Charter, the Statute of the International Court of Justice, and other legal instruments, tells of the realities of the legal issues as they arise in the day to day practice of the United Nations. Missions to the UN, Ministries of Foreign Affairs, practitioners of international law, academics, and students will all find this book to be vital in their understanding of the workings of the legal practice of the UN. Research for this publication was made possible by The Balzan Prize, which was awarded to Rosalyn Higgins in 2007 by the International Balzan Foundation.
Law and Practice of the United Nations: Documents and Commentary combines primary materials with expert commentary demonstrating the interaction between law and practice in the UN organization, as well as the possibilities and limitations of multilateral institutions in general. Each chapter begins with a short introductory essay describing how the documents that ensue illustrate a set of legal, institutional, and political issues relevant to the practice of diplomacy and the development of public international law through the United Nations. Each chapter also includes questions to guide discussion of the primary materials, and a brief bibliography to facilitate further research on the subject. This second edition addresses the most challenging issues confronting the United Nations and the global community today, from terrorism to climate change, from poverty to nuclear proliferation. New features include hypothetical fact scenarios to test the understanding of concepts in each chapter. This edition contains expanded author commentary, while maintaining the focus on primary materials. Such materials enable a realistic presentation of the work of international diplomacy: the negotiation, interpretation and application of such texts are an important part of what actually takes place at the United Nations and other international organizations. This work is ideal for courses on the United Nations or International Organizations, taught in both law and international relations programs.
THE UNCG is a complicated piece of international law. This book, authored by two experts on the topic of genocide, enables readers to more accurately analyze these horrific events.
The Charter of the United Nations was signed in 1945 by 51 countries representing all continents, paving the way for the creation of the United Nations on 24 October 1945. The Statute of the International Court of Justice forms part of the Charter. The aim of the Charter is to save humanity from war; to reaffirm human rights and the dignity and worth of the human person; to proclaim the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small; and to promote the prosperity of all humankind. The Charter is the foundation of international peace and security.
International Justice in the United Nations General Assembly probes the role that the UN’s plenary body has played in developing international criminal law and addressing country-specific impunity gaps. It covers the General Assembly’s norm-making capabilities, its judicial and investigatory functions, and the legal effect of its recommendations. With talk of a ‘new Cold War’ and growing levels of plenary activism in the face of Security Council deadlock, this book will make for timely and essential reading for all in the field of international criminal justice.
Mr. Asamoah's book is concerned with an area of growing importance in the evolution of contemporary international law. The traditional division of the sources of International law into custom and treaties has already been supplemented in Article 38 of the Statute of the International Court of Justice by the "general principles of law re cognized by civilized nations" and-as subsidiary sources, the judicial decisions and the teachings of highly qualified publicists. But in order to cope with the diversity of international law in our time, we have to look to a far greater variety of sources of international law, and we shall have to recognize that, in accordance with the many-sided character of international law, these sources may vary greatly in intensity. In recent years, Declaratory Resolutions of the General Assembly have been much concerned with the general princi ples of international law. Sometimes these Declarations are interpre tations of the Charter and other instruments; sometimes they are evi dence of state practice and a developing customary international law ; sometimes they formulate new principles which, in some cases will eventually lead to international treaties or new custom, or in other cases will be accepted as authorative statements of international legal principles, in circumstances where a formal treaty cannot be attained. There are many reasons--often of an internal character-which prevent the conclusion of a treaty but not the acceptance of the principles contained in it.