The world is bigger than five : Ramesh

‘The World is bigger than five’ is a motto coined by the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in 2013 when he was the Prime Minister of Turkey. It was his way of expressing dissatisfaction with how the five permanent members (P5) of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) continue to undermine the wishes and decisions of the rest of the UN member states. He repeated this statement in his speech on 24 September 2014 during the annual UN General Assembly (UNGA). He highlighted the tragic consequences of the veto power privilege exercised by the UNSC permanent members even when the required nine votes are obtained by the UNSC members to pass a binding resolution. He repeated this slogan again in 2016 UNGA suggesting that with the current way of working UNSC will never be able to promote peace and security in the world. He repeated this again in 2023 UNGA and said that UNSC no longer works for global security but instead uses the UNSC as a base to engage in ‘strategic confrontation’ with their adversaries. Many UN member states perhaps share this view but are unable to express as bluntly as the President Erdogan for fear of reprisal from the permanent members of the UNSC.

The publicly funded Turkish TV channel, TRT now has a biweekly programme called ‘Bigger than Five’ as part of its Global Affairs programme since March 2019, broadcast from its London and Washington studio (alternate Thursday 20:30 GMT). The focus of the programme is on global issues that matter to the world and the UN system. The programme has interviewed many global statesmen and personalities on issues of economic and geopolitical significance.

Difficult or made it difficult?

The first United Nations Secretary General Trygve Lie described his job as ‘the most difficult job in the world’. When he said this, it was at the beginning of the United Nations (UN) with just 51 member countries and the world population of 2.5 bn; today the world population has surpassed 8bn. Today the UN has 193 countries and two States with observer status with no more colonised countries. The reality of the global economy today is very different from the time when the UN was created. The 75 years old UN Charter is still admirable; it is the working mechanism and the structure of the UN systems that needs to match the needs of current geopolitical, economic and security imperatives. As the current Secretary General said ‘we can’t build a future for our grandchildren with a system built for our grandparents.’

Many countries and statesmen have expressed dissatisfaction with the way the UN functions, such as unwritten rules governing appointment of heads of key positions in different departments and branches of the UN system. The exercising of the veto by the permanent members of the UNSC is perhaps the biggest obstacle in the functioning of the UN system, disappointing its member states but only a very few has expressed as blatantly, as eloquently and as relentlessly as the Turkish President Erdogan.

There are many visible failures of the UN system such as not being able to follow through the climate change accord, internal conflicts as in Sudan, illegal invasion of sovereign countries, state terrorism, its inability to enforce binding resolution and even preventing genocide. The Secretary Generals - past and present - have been regularly undermined by the P5 members. It is an insult to the UN system. The functioning of the UN system is becoming like colonial administration where views of the minority are not counted even on matters of life and death.

Representation may not be an issue

There are grievances from certain sectors suggesting that the memberships of the UNSC does not represent the world community with a glaring lack of representation from Latin America and Africa in particular while there are two European countries. There are suggestions to include South Africa, India, Brazil and Japan in the Security Council. There are also suggestions to replace the United Kingdom and France to be replaced by the European Union. Will it solve the problem? Not likely; it would simply mean enlarging the gangland which will make the bad situation even worse. The problem is not the quantity (memberships); the problem is the quality of work (undemocratic veto authority to protect self-interest and interest of their client states). The general sentiment expressed by the global community is that no country in the world deserves a permanent seat or veto-based decision-making that goes against the majority. Exercising of veto is the most undemocratic act in the global institution which aims to promote democracy; it is an oxymoron. President Erdogan rightly claims that democracy has become a catchphrase in global governance, while decision-making processes in the UN system are totally incompatible with any democratic norms, which the UN pretends to promote.

UN’s biggest failure

The UN is the only multinational institution that can issue binding resolutions for all member states to protect human civilisation and mother nature. But the UN continues to fail on major fronts due to the ego and greed of its member states for which there is no vaccine to prevent and medicine to cure. The biggest failure is its inability to resolve the climate crisis. In 2022 the world consumed 177,000 twh of energy. In 2023 the world was able to produce only 8,989 twh of energy from renewable sources. With the continued warming of atmospheric temperature, there is a high risk of ecological collapse which could result in a massive crop failure leading to severe food shortage globally. Bill Gate’s lab grown meat and protein rich insect diets will not solve this problem. The solutions to address the climate crisis have been known for more than seventy years but the UN was (made) unable to act. Even the recommendations of the past 28 UN global climate conferences remained only on the papers on which they were printed.

Potential threats

The recent spread of artificial intelligence has reached a new height with ideas of mind control with no limits. The role of AI is no longer limited to robotics and automated production lines. It is an accident waiting to happen that will disintegrate all social and ethical norms of human civilisation. It requires a binding UN resolution to decide what is and is not allowed but it will not happen as it is in the hands of private sector’s innovation labs which generates profits for the technocrat-tycoons who in turn influences the governance.

The world has witnessed a cyclical pandemic claiming millions of lives. With the spread of drug resistance bacteria and new strains of viruses, vaccines and medicines may not be of much use in future pandemics. It requires a serious global collaboration which at the moment is weak to say the least. There are also possibilities of different strains of virus escaping from the laboratories where they are being used for experiments. A whole range of viruses have been patented by several countries, which could be used for developing bioweapons. Can natural elements such as viruses be patented?

Whatever reason prompted President Erdogan to remain persistently vocal on the need to reform the UN, the need to change the structure and working mechanism of the UN system is undeniable. The biggest question is can this happen without demolishing the current system and without a major geopolitical upheaval. Meanwhile we can just hope for the best.

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