Why has the UN been so ineffective in the Middle East?

Amitav Acharya
Remarks at the Conference on Emerging Powers, Global Security and the Middle East, Abu Dhabi, 8-10 February 2010. Emirates Center for Strategic Stdies and Research and Center on International Cooperation, New York University

Why has the UN been so ineffective in the Middle East? There are at least four main answers to the question, aside from the generic reasons that apply to the UN’s role in peace and conflict in any part of the world. These reasons make the Middle East an especially difficult challenge for the UN.

First, the challenge facing the UN’s peace and security role is especially daunting in the Middle East. Depending on how broadly one defines the regions, this region suffers from a wider variety of conflicts than any other region in the world:
• Enduring rivalries or protracted regional conflict: Israeli-Palestinian, Arab-Israeli conflicts
• Rising powers trying to alter the regional balance of power and seeking regional dominance: Iraq under Saddam Hussein, and Iran now
• Danger of nuclear proliferation: Iran
• Terrorism and radicalism: Yemen, Afghanistan, Pakistan
• Failed and failing states: Sudan, Afghanistan
• Non-traditional threats, competition over resources, such as water and energy


No other region, including Asia, matches the Middle East in terms of the variety and complexity of conflicts and their underlying causes.

Second, the Middle East does not have an effective or a semi-effective regional institution. Arab League and GCC are the weak. This is not to say that other regions have regional groupings that are always effective, but Asia is experimenting with new institutions and has some useful groupings: ASEAN, six party talks, Shanghai Cooperation Organization, which have moderating impact if not transforming impact on conflicts, the League and GCC do not compare at least as regional conflict management mechanisms. The OAS and African Union are also stronger examples of regionalism, despite the Taif accord on Lebanon for which Arab League takes credit.

While having an effective regional organization is not necessarily a precondition for UN’s success, it helps. The idea of subsidiarity, whereby regional groupings could act as first points of conflict management, moderate tensions, and help create the ground for the UN to play its role, is important. One example, during the decade long Cambodia conflict, from 1979 ASEAN did lot of ground work before UN-sponsored Paris Peace Conference produced a diplomatic settlement in 1991.

Why does the Middle East lack effective regional institutions? Because the League is beset by weak leadership, intra-Arab differences, while the GCC is not an inclusive organization, since it does not include two major actors in the Gulf (Arabian or Persian). The Middle East is the only region to lack a genuinely inclusive regional organization or process (even compared to OAS-Cuba). Amar Moussa, the SG of Arab League, wrote an op-ed in IHT a few days ago, which I think we should all read. He talks about creating a regional system for the Middle East. But he leaves out the role Israel or Iran will play in such an arrangement.

To compound the problem, the degree of economic integration in Middle East is low. A recent study published in the Journal of the World Economy, “provides empirical evidence that Middle Eastern countries with significant trade ties to other countries in the region do cooperate more and fight less.” According to a report by the Dubai International Financial Center, “Intra-regional trade in the Middle East has grown 28 per cent between 2000 and 2007 and now represents 19.3 per cent of all trade in the region,” http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-198978443.html. By contrast, in East Asia, intra-regional trade accounts for close to 50% of its total trade.

A third reason behind the UN’s limitations in the Middle East has to do with the role of outside powers, especially the US. Barbara Crosette, a well-known journalist, once said: “the U.N. will never be able to fix the Middle East, for the simple reason that the United States would not let it.” It has become a cliché to say that the US is absolutely critical to Middle East peace. No one questions it. At best, it deters and stifles initiatives by other countries. At worst, the role of the UN in peace negotiations remains hostage to domestic politics and changes in the US. The Obama administration pledged to be more active in ME peace process, but it has not achieved much during its first year in office, for a variety of reasons, including domestic difficulties.

But the dominance of outside powers is not in relation to the Israeli-Palestine conflict alone. Under Bush, we saw in Iraq, another dramatic evidence of US’s unilateral attempt to fix a regional security challenge with or without UN sanction and involvement. Although it tried to draw in the UN subsequent to the invasion, this has not been noticeably successful. Critics alleged that “the US intends to use the UN to push Iraqis to accept US-imposed "benchmarks" for reconciliation, including a controversial oil law and debaathification.” “the Security Council succumbed to US and UK pressure and voted on August 10, 2007 to expand the UN's role in Iraq. Only if the US occupation ends can there be a substantial – and politically viable – UN role.” http://www.globalpolicy.org/iraq/political-issues-in-iraq/un-role-in-iraq.html

Aside from individual powers, NATO is also involved in the region, which raises additional issues of legitimacy of outside countries in conflict resolution within the region.

Moreover, there is an important difference between Middle East and Asia when it comes to role of great powers. Rising great powers sometimes have a strong stake in peace and stability and genuinely want to avoid instability, in their own neighbourhood, so as to have favourable conditions for growth and prosperity. Amb Wu: “peace abroad, stability at home”, or “peace near abroad, stability and regime security at home”. China in East Asia is a good example of this. If great powers involved in a regional conflict are from outside the region, their stake in regional stability is not existential, because their vulnerability to regional instability is correspondingly less. Most great powers in the Middle East are from outside the region. Most great powers in East Asia are from inside the region. That makes a difference.

Another complicating factor is the role of emerging powers in the Middle East. The competitive instincts and roles of Russia, China and India in East Asia are constrained by the diplomatic and normative influence of ASEAN and the countervailing postures of each other and the US. But no such checks apply to their roles in the Middle East.

Fourth and finally, the UN’s Middle East role is stymied by history and recent precedent. Aside from its limited role in the Israel-Palestinian conflict, and since the 1991 Iraq war, where US-led coalition forces authorized by the UN expelled Saddam Hussein’s occupation forces from Kuwait, it has been marginalized in the principal recent conflicts in the Middle East: Iraq (2003), Afghanistan, and in the war on terror more generally. This has led to a serious loss of confidence on the UN’s relevance and its ability address conflicts in the Middle East. Does anyone trust that the UN can bring peace to Middle East? The kind of optimism that accompanied the end of the Cold War with the Iraqi expulsion from Kuwait has disappeared.

How then to make the UN more relevant to the Middle East?

The UN has limited resources. Despite Obama administration’s ostensible support for multilateralism, it has not really transformed the UN or led the infusion of resources into the UN.

Also, each conflict zone in Middle East - Iraq, Israeli-Palestine, Afghanistan, Sudan, Yemen, etc. - has its own dynamic and requires its own approach. There is no silver bullet or one size fits all. The UN must tailor its response to these individual circumstances. But some general elements of a more effective approach to the region can be identified.

The UN should encourage and support the creation of inclusive regional arrangements, and cooperate with them. Indeed, a UN-sponsored Confidence-bulding mechanism in the region will be a great idea. The UN should seriously consider it.

The UN should focus on addressing the human security and non-traditional security concerns in the Middle East. According to a recent report by the Oxford Research Group, “Food shortages are a further concern in a number of countries in the region and this situation will deteriorate over the coming decades as a result of climate change significantly reducing agricultural output at the same time as the region experiences dramatic population growth. Much of the region is already heavily dependent on food imports, which leaves it vulnerable to fluctuations in the global commodity markets. Recent years have seen violent riots in Morocco (September 2007), Yemen (March 2008) and Egypt (April 2008), primarily relating to the rising cost of wheat and the knock on effect on bread prices, together with the poor economic situation in general.” The UN and its specialized agencies should and could do more to address these problems.

The UN should seek a greater and more direct role in the Israeli-Palestinian Peace process, and not simply remain passive or play second fiddle to the US, even though it will require adjustments and changes to UN’s policies regarding Israel’s legitimacy as a state.

Finally, the UN should expand its role in Iraq and Afghanistan. Indeed, it has faced pressure from US and others to this. This could include sending a peacekeeping force to the region with the involvement of both India and Pakistan, and possibly even Iran. But while doing so, it should not compromise its image of neutrality or blindly legitimize the past approaches of the US and its coalition partners. The UN’s legitimacy is not just with the states, but also with the people of the region. And a lot of people in the region are unhappy with the recent roles of Western countries in these two countries.

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