The UN Security Council: From the Cold War to the 21st Century

Abstract

Much has changed for the United Nations Security Council since the end of the Cold War. Its decisions - largely improvised and inconsistent though they may be - have, for good or ill, profoundly affected international relations. Given the centrality of individual state interests at the UN, however unpalatable to some, the question arises as to whether the Council, in terms of the perceived legitimacy of its decisions, can be more than the sum of its parts. By slicing and dicing in many different ways the Council's decisions and activities, the substantive themes of its work, and the institutional developments in its life, this volume attempts to assess its objectives and performance during the turbulent, frequently hyperactive years it has experienced in the post-Cold War era.

Keywords: United Nations, Security Council, United States, Peacekeeping, Iraq, Cold War, UN Charter, Kosovo, Somalia, Haiti, Rwanda