History

League of Nations

• predecessor of UN, founded 1920

• Council of the LoN as the predecessor for UNSC

  • four permanent members (UK, France, Italy, and Japan) and four non-permanent members elected for three-year terms

• US never became member > opposition in US Senate

• collective self-defense (Art. 10 CLoN)

  • focus on collective self-defense instead of collective security -> today’s SC goes beyond collective self-defense (more efficient)

  • only some elements of collective security in Art. 11 CLoN

• main issues: unanimity, lack of concrete mechanisms and implementation measures

  -> failed with WWII

UN History

-> avoiding a new world war as the main purpose of the UN with SC at the core

• Declaration of St. James Palace (June 1941)

• Atlantic Charter (1941)

• Dumbarton Oaks Conference (1944)

• Yalta Conference (1945)

• San Francisco Conference (1945)

Declaration of St. James Palace (June 1941)

declaration of exiled governments in London (incl. UK, Australia, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, and Greece)

• pledged their solidarity in fighting against the Axis powers

Atlantic Charter (1941)

political declaration by US President Roosevelt and UK Prime Minister Churchill to fight Nazi Germany

• set out goals for after the end of WWII

• territorial integrity, global cooperation, self-determination, abandonment of the use of force

Dumbarton Oaks Conference (1944)

main diplomatic conference to design the main features of the UN

• US, UK, Soviet Union, China > victory nations decided on a new world order

• France’s government (in exile) only invited after Dumbarton Oaks (Churchil wanted more than one European power on the SC)

• only the council responsible for peace and security and determines what constitutes a thereat to the peace, breach of the peace, or of act of aggression

Yalta Conference (1945)

“the three old men” (Roosevelt, Churchill, Stalin) deciding on design of the UNSC

• restricted membership (P5 and non-permanent elected members)

• decision making process incl. no unanimity, single majority for procedural matters, qualified majority for substantive issues, veto power for P5

  -> Art. 27 ("Yalta formula")

San Francisco Conference (1945)

conference with 50 delegegations to write, vote on, adopt, and sign the UN Charter

• only small adjustments to previous agreements

• general agreement over UNSC being a political organ with broad powers

• from the beginning tensions between need for efficiency and flexibility vs. legal certainty

  -> very little codification on working methods