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The complexities of winning a UN Security Council seat

The complexities of winning a UN Security Council seat

by Dr Damien Rogers
October 17, 2014

New Zealand’s appointment to the United Nations Security Council will afford a number of benefits, and also open up a raft of complexities to navigate.

New Zealand will have, for the duration it holds its seat on the UN Security Council, a stronger voice in contemporary world affairs.

All members of the UN General Assembly and other non-state members of the international community will now want to know and understand New Zealand's views on the most pressing matters featuring on the Council's agenda.

New Zealand's diplomats will gain valuable experience and heightened profile, which they will benefit from (as will New Zealand more generally) if they progress their careers in capitals around the world.

New Zealand's diplomats will need to manage the growing gap between New Zealand's hitherto strong commitment to multilateralism, international organisations, and the rule of law, and its increasingly close defence ties to the United States and its willingness to abandon multilateral, international organisations, and the rule of law when it better suits its interests.

In particular, New Zealand's increasing interconnectedness with the US global surveillance network will come under increased scrutiny by UN member states.

However, New Zealand might find itself frustrated by an inability to shape the UN Security Council's agenda to include the most pressing security concerns for humanity -- namely (i) the negative impact of climate change and the degradation of our habitat; (ii) the need for the US, among others, to reduce and disarm their nuclear weapons stockpiles in accordance with their obligations under the Non-Proliferation Treaty; and (iii) the elimination of poverty which denies decent life chances to more than one sixth of humanity. The latter, of course, may well require a re-thinking of New Zealand's current pursuit of free trade agreements.

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This decade-long effort to rejoin the UN Security Council has been the result of significant bipartisan efforts and support. It will be interesting to see if this effort is recognised.

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Dr Damien Rogers is a lecturer in politics and international relations at the Albany campus, and has a PhD in political science and international relations from the Australian National University.

Dr Rogers is author of Postinternationalism and Small Arms Control: Theory, Politics, Security (Franham, Surrey: Ashgate, 2009) and is currently researching for a book on international prosecutors of atrocity crime.

Before entering academia, Dr Rogers spent nearly a decade working within New Zealand’s wider intelligence community, including at the Government Communications Security Bureau, Ministry of Defence, New Zealand Defence Force, and the Border Security Group of Immigration New Zealand.

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