AMSCO 9.8 Institutions Developing in a Globalized World Notes

Overview

AMSCO Topic 9.8, Institutions Developing in a Globalized World (AMSCO p.696-702), covers how globalization changed international interactions among states, focusing on the United Nations and the global organizations built around it after World War II. The chapter explains the UN's six main bodies, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, peacekeeping missions, and financial institutions like the World Bank and IMF. This topic sits near the end of Unit 9 (1900 to present), connecting the postwar push for cooperation to the globalized world you studied in Topic 9.7 on resistance to globalization.

The big idea: after two world wars, nations built international institutions with the stated goal of maintaining world peace and making cooperation easier. Whether those institutions actually deliver is exactly the kind of evaluation question the AP exam loves.

The United Nations: A Structure for Peace

The United Nations was born on October 24, 1945, a date still honored as United Nations Day. Representatives of the United States, Great Britain, the Soviet Union, and China first discussed the idea in 1943, while World War II was still raging. Despite their ideological differences, the Allies shared one commitment: stop conflicts from escalating into another world war.

• At its founding, the UN had 51 member states. By 2019, membership had grown to 193.
• The UN Charter's preamble promised "to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our life-time has brought untold sorrow to mankind."
• Through agencies like the IMF and World Bank, the UN provides technical advice and loans to developing nations. Other organizations like the WTO and GATT promote free trade worldwide.

Why the UN succeeded where the League of Nations failed

The League of Nations, created in 1920 after World War I, had the same basic purpose: resolve international disputes and prevent another world war. It failed for two big reasons. First, the United States never joined, since some Americans feared membership would undercut U.S. authority. Second, it had no real power, and it disbanded after failing to prevent World War II. The UN's founders learned the lesson. This time, all the major powers agreed they needed to belong for the organization to have any chance of success.

The Six Main Bodies of the UN

Six main bodies carry out the UN's work. Know what each one does, because the structure explains both the UN's strengths and its limits.

• The General Assembly is the only UN body where all members have representation. Each member nation gets one vote, and decisions on peace and security, admitting new members, and the budget require a two-thirds majority of those present and voting.
• The Security Council acts on issues the General Assembly debates, and it can even authorize military force against a country accused of violating UN principles. It has five permanent members (the leading WWII Allies: the United States, France, Great Britain, Russia, and China) plus 10 rotating elected members. Each permanent member holds veto power. That veto was controversial from the start in 1945, and conflicts among the five often blocked UN action entirely.
• The Secretariat is the administrative arm, led by the secretary-general, who usually comes from a small, neutral nation so no great power dominates the organization. All five permanent Security Council members must approve the selection. Secretariat staffers swear loyalty to the UN and cannot take instructions from their home countries.
• The International Court of Justice settles disputes about international law that countries bring to it. It has no enforcement power, but the Security Council can act on its judgments, and most countries obey its decisions anyway.
• The Economic and Social Council is the largest and most complex part of the UN. It directs economic, social, humanitarian, and cultural activities, including promoting green energy and raising wages in poorer countries in the early 21st century.
• The Trusteeship Council supervised trust territories (including land that is now Israel, Papua New Guinea, and Nauru) on their path to self-government. When Palau, the last trust territory, became independent in 1994, the council suspended operations. Some have suggested it could become trustee of the seafloor or outer space.

Human Rights and the Universal Declaration

In 1948, the UN adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a milestone document setting standards for all governments and all people. Drafters came from different countries, cultures, and legal traditions, and the declaration has been translated into more than 500 languages.

Rights it includes:

• Freedom from slavery, torture, and degrading punishment
• Equality before the law and the right to a nationality
• The right to own property, individually or with others
• Freedom of thought, conscience, religion, opinion, and expression
• Equal pay for equal work, plus the right to rest and paid holidays
• Equal rights for children born within and outside of marriage
• The right to adequate food, clothing, shelter, health care, and education

Since 1948, the UN has investigated abuses such as genocide, war crimes, government oppression, and crimes against women.

UN Peacekeeping: Successes and Failures

Peacekeeping is what the UN is best known for since World War II. Prevention through diplomacy comes first, with special envoys sent to resolve problems peacefully. When that's not enough, the UN sends peacekeeping forces made up of civilians, police, and troops from member countries. The soldiers are usually lightly armed and instructed to return fire only if attacked.

• The first peacekeeping mission responded to the 1948 Arab-Israeli conflict in Palestine. Later missions went to the Congo, Lebanon, East Timor, and the Balkans.
• Peacekeeping exploded in the 1990s. In 1988 the UN had only 5 active operations; by 1993 it had 28, with soldiers from dozens of countries including Canada, Venezuela, Ukraine, Egypt, and Bangladesh.

1990s missions to know

• Successes: UN troops kept peace while Namibia transitioned from South African colony to independent state. Peacekeepers helped end civil wars in Mozambique, El Salvador, and Cambodia, and in Haiti they maintained order while a democratic government replaced a military dictatorship.
• Failures: In 1994, peacekeepers could not prevent the massacres in Rwanda. In 1995, UN forces withdrew from Somalia while civil war raged. Bosnia took years and produced mixed results. As one UN officer in Bosnia put it, "It's much easier to come in and keep peace when there's some peace around."

Why peacekeeping struggles

Two recurring problems. First, slow response: by the time member countries agree on a mission and send forces, the war may have grown too big to control. Second, mismatched expectations: people expect peacekeepers to stop the fighting, but their actual job is monitoring truces, running free elections, and supplying civilians. By 2019, the UN ran fewer but larger missions: down to 15 operations, but with more total troops.

Other UN Priorities: Refugees, Food, Culture, Health

The UN's mission goes well beyond peacekeeping.

• Refugees. Working with NGOs and the UNHCR (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees), the UN provides food, medicine, and temporary shelter to people fleeing war, famine, and disasters. Among the earliest refugees it helped were Palestinians displaced after the 1948 UN partition of Palestine created Israel. In 2019, the UN aided refugees from Venezuela and Myanmar.
• World Food Program (WFP). Established in 1961, with first missions in Iran, Thailand, and Algeria in 1962. It has fed more than 1.4 billion people affected by natural disasters or political unrest.
• UNESCO. Created in 1945 to repair WWII damage to schools, libraries, and museums, then shifted to developing literacy, extending free education, and protecting cultural and environmental sites as World Heritage Sites. The UK, Singapore, Israel, and the U.S. all left UNESCO over politics and priorities; the UK and Singapore rejoined, but as of 2019 the U.S. had not.
• World Health Organization (WHO) controls epidemics and provides vaccines. UNICEF was created to help children after WWII, then expanded to aid children in the developing world and at disaster sites. Human Rights Watch (HRW) monitors abuses in 100 countries, using the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as its guide.
• The Global Goals. In 2015, the General Assembly set 17 goals to accomplish by 2030, including ending hunger and poverty, achieving gender equality, ensuring clean water and sanitation, and fighting climate change. The UN partnered with NGOs like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Financial Institutions and Independent NGOs

Several financial NGOs work closely with the UN on economic issues. Each is independent, and each draws criticism. This is great evidence for any essay weighing globalization's costs and benefits, a theme that continues in Topic 9.9 on continuity and change in a globalized world.

• World Bank (created 1944) fights poverty with loans to countries. It first funded dams and roads, then expanded to social projects like education and disease prevention. Critics say it ignores how projects damage the environment and local culture: a dam might permanently flood farms, or a highway's profits might flow to overseas investors instead of locals.
• International Monetary Fund (IMF) (created 1945) promotes stable currency exchange rates through short-term loans and economic advice. Critics argue its loan conditions ignore each country's individual needs and that wealthy nations steer it for their own benefit while it claims to help developing nations.
• Together, the IMF and World Bank produced the 2018 report Pathways for Peace on preventing violent conflicts.
• International Peace Bureau, founded in 1891, operates entirely separate from the UN. It won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1910, began working for nuclear disarmament in the 1980s, and lobbies governments to cut military spending. By 2019, it had 300 member organizations in 70 countries.

Key Terms to Know

Practice and Next Steps

Once you have these notes down, check the Topic 9.8 course study guide for the College Board's framing of how globalization changed international interactions among states, and browse the full set of Unit 9 AMSCO notes to see how this topic connects to the rest of the unit.

To test yourself:

• Run through guided MCQ practice on Unit 9 to see how the UN and international institutions show up in multiple choice.
• Try FRQ practice with instant scoring using globalization-era prompts, since the costs and benefits of international institutions make strong evaluative essay material.
• Look up any term that's still fuzzy in the AP World key terms glossary.