James5

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Over the winter I visited Geneva for two weeks studying Institutions in International Law, this post is part of a series on what I learnt and thought about the institutions we visited. See them all here.

The job of the Secretariat of an international institution is to provide administrative support to the institution. This means it provides information, studies and research to allow the institution to carry on its functions, organises the conferences and meetings of the Members, consults with Members, helps to resolve disputes, and sometimes provides assistance for Members who need it.

Some Secretariats are well-known and relatively interventionist, the WTO and UN Secretariats come to mind as high-profile bodies who drive a great deal of policy making and action within their institutions. For example, the UN Secretary-General, under Kofi Annan, produced the Peoples’ Report in 2000 which ultimately led to the Millennium Declaration.

There’s debate over the autonomy given to some Secretariats, whether they should be allowed to actively pursue their own agenda or should be restrained by the Members’ wishes. This obviously raises issues of accountability and good governance if an unelected Secretariat is shaping and pushing the agenda of an institution.

Perhaps one of the crucial most roles for the Secretariat, however, is to act as the ‘institutional memory’ of an international institution. Whereas, Member representatives may come and go, the Secretariat’s staff is relatively stable. It is the Secretariat who know the procedure and how things work. They know intimately the history of an organisation, what is realistic and what is unachievable. This role is critical to the proper functioning of any institution.

What the Secretariat does ultimately demonstrate, is that these institutions are more then just the some of their Members. That they aren’t just forums for discussion and negotiation of certain issues. Rather they are actors in their own right, and who is in charge can make a real difference to the direction and results of the work of the institution.

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Over the winter I visited Geneva for two weeks studying Institutions in International Law, this post is part of a series on what I learnt and thought about the institutions we visited. See them all here.

UNESCO is the United Nations Education, Science and Cultural Organisation. It was instituted to:

contribute to peace and security by promoting international collaboration through education, science, and culture in order to further universal respect for justice, the rule of law, and the human rights and fundamental freedoms proclaimed in the UN Charter.

So they do a range of difference things from promoting literacy, to registering cultural heritage sites, to improving the freedom of the press.

UNESCO is one of the older international institutions, established in 1946 and carrying on from the work of League of Nations’ International Commission on Intellectual Cooperation.

What I found most interesting about the presentation we heard on UNESCO was the increasing work they do in fields such as development. Encouraging increased literacy is a good example of this. While UNESCO was designed with a wide, almost vague, mission - it seems that their modern work covers an extremely wide range of fields. Human rights, development, cultural heritage. Not only does this mean UNESCO has a lot to do, within a constrained budget, but it also means there’s overlap with the work of agenices such as the UNDP, UNICEFs, and NGOs and government.

Sure a ‘holistic’ view of their work is important when you consider what UNESCO does, but I worry that this expanding ‘mission creep’ is not in the best interest of UNESCO, the people being helped or other groups doing development. What’s wrong with a bit of specialisation?

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Opinio Juris has a good discussion going over the limits of the powers of the UN Security Council - particularly in referring matters to non-UN judicial bodies such as the ICC.

Chapter VII of the UN Charter grants the Security Council wide discretionary power in regards to maintaining “peace and security”, and even though there was some controversy over the creation of judicial bodies like the ICTR and ICTY (as the Security Council has no judicial power it was questioned whether it had the power to create bodies that did), it now seems clear that the Security Council is able to create subsidiary judicial organs such as the ad hoc tribunals.

I can’t imagine this power wouldn’t also extend to referrals to bodies such as the ICC, given this precedent and the wide discretion available to the Security Council when dealing with matters. The problem is extending the powers of the ICC beyond its signatory nations - even though Sudan hasn’t signed up to the Rome Statute the Security Council is effectively placing their head of state under the ICC’s jurisdiction.

This is especially interesting for the United States who, not having signed the Rome Statute and actively signing immunity agreements, is potentially opening itself up to ‘back door’ ICC prosecution. Of course, given their veto power on the Council they have nothing to fear in reality, but the precedent is now there.

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I’ve been very impressed with the new ABC series The Hollowmen. It’s a mockumentary style series set in the Prime Minister’s “Central Policy Unit”, a unit set up by the Prime Minister to help him get re-elected. Though ostensibly they are public policy makers, their work mostly revolves around spinning issues and finding political palatable solutions to problems. Watching them as they ‘consult with stake holders’, develop ‘initiatives’, and ’seize momentum’ reminded me of Tom Davis excellent Public Policy Making subject at university, and is also making me reconsider a career in the public service.

The most recent episode, currently available on the website, is especially interesting as it deals with Australia’s relationship with Indonesia. The set-up is a massacre in West Papua and the Government trying to work out how to respond without offending the Indonesians.

There are two moments in the episode that really resonate with some of the concerns I’ve had about working in international law, and I think concerns that people generally have about the relevance and meaningfulness of international relations.

When the massacre is first brought to light and the CPU is working how they the Prime Minister can respond, the strongest response the public servants can think of is to “ask for restraint”. Anything more would be dangerous for bilateral relations - there’s a whole exploration of different trade sanctions and how difficult they would be for Australian industry too. One character mentions this is why he left DFAT, because they are so incapable of action. I guess that’s one frustration of the political/diplomatic side of international law - softly, softly, to get the result.

Another stand out moment was the discussion with the Australian Indonesian Human Rights Dialogue (AIHRD), a bilateral group that engages in dialogue on human rights. It was presented as a totally ineffectual ‘talkfest’ between the governments, barely able to agree on an agenda, it’s claim to fame being an eventual resolution to “agree to disagree” on human rights in West Papua. This is one of the questions I have received when I’ve talked about wanting to work for the Humanitarian Dialogue Centre, and is certainly a strong criticism of international institutions generally. Our UN tour guide said “Blah, blah, blah is better than war, war, war”; but when faced with UN conferences that have existed for 11 years without agreeing on an agenda and on-going fighting despite all the blah, blah, blah it’s understandable that people are sceptical!

I’d highly recommend you tune in to Hollowmen, Wednesday nights or each week on the ABC’s website. It’s public policy making in action!

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Well I’m now back from Geneva, arriving home at 6am last Thursday after more than 24 hours of travel.

I was doing an awesome subject called Institutions in International Law with Dr Andrew Mitchell and Bruce Oswald from Melbourne University, and had an amazing two weeks visiting institutions and people and also having some great times with friends in Geneva (such as busking on lake Geneva).

The first week we focused on trade, with a bit of development, IP and health mixed in. We visited the WTO, UN, WHO, ACWL, WIPO, UNCTAD and, one of my favourites, the Australian Mission in Geneva. It was fascinating hearing from people who actually work for these institutions about the work they do and how they got to where they are now. Visiting the United Nations building was particularly inspiring, as we walked through rooms and halls where history was made - for example the room where the League of Nations ended and bumping into a diplomat who had worked at the UN for the past 30 years.

The WTO was also a real blast. We heard from an intern working in the Appellate Body and saw the room where the AB Members actually made actual decisions, had a tour of some of the highlights of the building and heard from the Barbados ambassador on what it’s like negotiating for your country at the WTO. Really fascinating insight into a world that is often behind closed doors.

In week two Oz took over and we headed out to the ‘peace & security’ (with some development and environment mixed in) institutions. We visited and heard from the ICRC, UNEP, UNHCR, OHCR, IOM, ILC (we got to see an actual session!) and my absolute favourite for the trip the Humanitarian Dialogue Centre. The presenters gave us a candid insight into their jobs and lives and what it was really like to work in some extremely intense situations. We heard about the challenges facing the institutions and their staff as they dealt with issues of ‘legitimacy, accountability and governance’ and of course the ‘fragmentation of international law’ (the course buzzwords).

The Humanitarian Dialogue Centre was an especially eye-opening experience for me. They are a small organisation on the banks of lake Geneva that do mediation and negotiation work during conflicts. They are often the first in to help set up discussions between warring parties. The also do work on humanitarian mediation to try and get assistance to those that need it. It’s an amazing institution that I’d love to work one day.

So now I’ve got an essay to write - currently percolating through ideas about the UN Security Council as a peace and security dispute settlement mechanism (trying to think about the differences between trade and peace & security and what could be transferred between the two areas), but we’ll see what happens. I’m also preparing applications for the ICTR and SCSL - so if anyone has any contacts that can help me get a placement for next year let me know!

James5 will be back in action from now - some older links will probably pop up as I go through what I’ve missed, and I’ll also hopefully be writing about some things learnt in Geneva, not to mention the usual topics. If there’s any topic in particular that you’d like me to write about let me know!

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