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Copyright 2000 The Economist Newspaper Ltd.

The Economist

September 09, 2000 , U.S. Edition

HEADLINE: Millennium summiteers

AT THE largest assembly ever of world leaders, they rattled through five-minute forgettable speeches and promised fine things they will soon forget. Then they prepared to put their names to a declaration that commits them to make the 21st century fairer, more humane and more peaceful than its unmourned predecessor. But will this week's conclave of around 160 heads of state or government at the United Nations' "millennium summit" in New York, make a ha'p'orth of difference to the billions of victims of poverty, cruelty or war? The UN is determined that it should, even though the past decade has been littered with worthy UN conferences resulting in even worthier pledges that, by and large, have changed people's lives very little.

This time may be different, says Kofi Annan, the UN's secretary-general, who wrote the report that became the basis for the declaration that the summiteers will be signing on September 8th. One of the reasons for thinking so is that this bid to better the world, to ensure that "globalisation" becomes a beneficial force for all -- and not, as at present, regarded by the poorest as a term of abuse -- is an unusually collective effort; as well as the private get-togethers in the shadow of the official bunfight, business leaders, non-governmental organisations and others are in New York holding meetings on roughly similar agendas (see ). In all this, the UN sees itself as catalyst and target-setter -- and monitor of the steps that may, or may not, be taken to turn the pledges into reality.

A main target, set by Mr Annan and agreed to by the summiteers, is to halve by 2015 the 22% of people who live on less than a dollar a day and to ensure primary education for all by the same date. Towards this end, the declaration calls on the industrialised world to adopt a policy of duty- and quota-free access for exports from the least-developed countries, and to be much more generous about debt cancellation. The special needs of Africa, the poorest continent, receive special attention. If such commitments do succeed in making the rich world a little less selfish in its dealings with the poor world, the puff and flummery will have been worth while.

Global humanism

The summit, said Mr Annan firmly, is a working session, not a celebration. Just as well: the celebration of the UN's 50th birthday in 1995 turned into something of a wake. But that party took place at the organisation's darkest hour, just after its peacekeeping catastrophes in Rwanda and Bosnia, when it looked as if the UN should steer clear of anything but the most conventional post-conflict peacekeeping measures. That prognosis is now slowly being revised as it becomes clear, yet again, that often it is only the UN that has the universality and moral legitimacy to intervene when the world decides that something should be done about some dreadful situation. The other options -- regional intervention or coalitions of like-minded states -- work only on rare occasions.

It has become a cliche to say that intervention should be "robust". But it would be folly to expect 160 statesmen to agree on how and when this robustness should manifest itself: many sovereign states think intervention as dirty a word as globalisation. The declaration calls for the UN to be given the resources and tools it needs, but for peacekeeping in calm waters, not in stormy ones. The UN's own report on peacekeeping, which describes what happens when an under-equipped and under-trained UN unit meets well-armed militia forces uninterested in peace, is mentioned as a matter for the General Assembly, not for governments.

The bitterness for UN commanders is when governments with the capacity to help, choose not to do so: countries with large armies often send in their troops but only to evacuate their own nationals. Robin Cook, Britain's foreign secretary, suggested this week that a UN military staff college should be set up, and that Britain could be its host. This would be an improvement on what happens now, with every mission starting from scratch, but it is still a long way from the earmarked, quickly available units that the UN has asked for, let alone the standing army that it dreams of.

The trouble, says Lieut-General Romeo Dallaire, the Canadian UN commander who called in vain for reinforcements when the Rwandans were butchering an unprotected minority, is that countries interpret their national interests so narrowly. At a seminar in London this week, the brave general called passionately for "global humanism". Could there be a better, or alas more remote, form of globalisation?The heads of state at the UN's millennium summit are saying admirable things; the next step is to do them

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