Date of Award

2017

Document Type

Open Access Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts in Leadership (MAL)

Department

Leadership

First Advisor

Thomas Morgan

Second Advisor

Alan Tuchtenhagen

Third Advisor

Ron Kurpiers

Abstract

The United Nations (LN) is an organization established to "maintain international peace and security...develop friendly relations among nations [and] to achieve international cooperation ("UnitedNation",20l6). The Security Council is the UN's primary leadership body. It is led by five powerful countries - United States of America (USA), Russia, Great Britain, France and China -- that sit as "permanent members". The leadership of the Security Council is augmented by ten representatives from other countries who are elected by the General Assembly to serve two-year terms. The UN has guidelines for insuring and maintaining world peace. In spite of these positive intentions, international wars, civil wars, humanitarian crises, and genocides have continued to occur in the seventy-one years since the tIN was created. Clearly, there are external events as well as internal issues within the UN which create problems that thwart achieving effectiveness in pursuit of these goals. The UN leadership has not completety fulfilled its mission as a world leader due to these challenges from both within and without the organization. Internal failures are identified and evaluated as leadership failures when members of the Security Council place their national self-interests above the mission of the UN. Effective leadership which eliminates national self-interests for the greater global good can achieve the vision of the LI-l{, which is to maintain peace and security worldwide and reduce the level of human suffering due to needless and counterproductive conflicts. This paper evaluates the United Nation Security Council (UNSC) leadership and its role in promoting and maintaining peace. In particular, the leadership decisions of the Permanent Five (P5) members of the Security Council will be explored and analyzed. Scrutiny is applied to historical instances referenced in chapter four in which it appears that P5 members took actions which seemed to place their own state's national security and economic benefit above global interest. The researcher evaluates the success and/or failure of these decisions. This paper addresses a deep concern that actions taken to avert human tragedy may be held hostage by unrelated concerns such as economic interests or political strategies of the one of the Permanent Five.

Identifier

SC 11.MAL.2017.Moallim.O

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