James Traub on the the Role of the UN

James Traub is author of The Best Intentions: Kofi Annan and the UN in the Era of American World Power . In this 2007 interview, he talks with Mark Sommer on the radio program A World of Possibilites about the role of the UN (mp3).

Mark Sommer: We are staring down the gun barrel, as it were, of history and of the future, with crises converging from all corners, and the UN is in fact tracking a lot of these issues – from growing economic inequities to climate change and public health threats. It is kind of the nexus for a lot of networks, even if it can’t always act, because it doesn’t have the resources. How are we going to meet these threats, when concerted global action is what’s needed? And does the UN have any role to play, if we decided to invest more – and I don’t mean just financially – while understanding that we are responsible, and not blaming the UN as an inadequate institution?

James Traub: I think the answer is: Not on everything. There are some things that will be inherently difficult for the UN to deal with. I don't know that terrorism is ever going to be a major preoccupation of the UN, because it is so much a matter of national legal systems, national intelligence systems, national political choices. But there are so many other fields. Public health, obviously. Climate change, almost certainly. In the best of all possible worlds, nuclear non-proliferation, where it seems to me the UN does have a role to play, the UN can play a role. But we – and when I say we, I mean not only the United States, but also countries like China, which also seem to gum up the works of the institution – we, in that collective sense, have to decide to make that possible.

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