Monitoring Policy Making at the United Nations |
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What's on the Agenda of the Security Council? - UN Security Council - Global Policy Forum What's on the Agenda of the Security Council?
The UN Charter gives the Security Council "primary responsibility" for international peace and security. Since 1990, the Council has dramatically increased its activity. It dispatches military operations, imposes economic sanctions, mandates arms inspections, and more. This section monitors the issues on the agenda of the Council, in a country-based approach. We also look at general topics such as sanctions and peacekeeping. We analyze the internal dynamics and politics of the Council as well as actions the Council takes in response to crises.
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Also see: Basic Information | How the Council Works
Security Council Reform | Veto | NGOs and the Council | Tables and Charts | Resources
Index of Countries and Territories
This index provides links to all pages on the site about countries and territories in crisis. Some of these pages are very extensive and cover major developments in UN peacekeeping operations and sanctions. Those dealing with current crises are updated frequently, while others pages concerning past crises remain on the site for historical interest.Afghanistan | Angola | Burma/Myanmar | Burundi | Central African Republic | Democratic Republic of Congo | East Timor
Eritrea | Ethiopia | Haiti | India | Iran | Iraq | Israel-Palestine | Ivory Coast | Kosovo
Lebanon | Liberia | Libya | North Korea | Pakistan | Republic of Chad | Rwanda
Sierra Leone | Somalia | Sudan/Darfur | Syria | Uganda | Western SaharaSanctions
The UN Security Council imposes sanctions to enforce international law. Sanctions are supposed to persuade rulers to change their military, economic, or human rights policies, so as to end wars, civil conflicts or other crises that threaten international peace and security. Sanctions are potentially a very important tool, but all too often, sanctions harm innocent victims and fail to achieve policy ends. This section looks at the debate on sanctions and includes many documents proposing ways to make sanctions more effective, better "targeted," and more humane.Peacekeeping
In the early 1990s, the Security Council launched an unprecedented number of peacekeeping operations, sometimes highly ambitious and very costly. By the mid-nineties, political and financial support for Peacekeeping Operations (PKOs) had waned, especially in the US, which started to promote "regional" approaches to peacekeeping. But after the war in Kosovo, broad opposition to unilateral peacekeeping led to a revival of the UN variety, even though the UN remained and ill-equipped for this task, as the Brahimi Report of 2000 made very clear. This section looks at the lessons from past experiences, offers many articles and reform poposals, and discusses the role and future of PKO.Thematic Issues
In the late 1990s, the Security Council began to consider general themes affecting conflicts. This section looks at major cases, including Diamonds in Conflict, the Dark Side of Natural Resources and Small Arms and Light Weapons.
General Articles
This page lists general issues and debates of the Council.
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