The United Nations
What is the UN
The United Nations is an international
organization founded in 1945
after the Second World War by 51 countries
committed to maintaining international peace
and security
It has since grown to 193 countries
It is the closest thing there is to a World
Government
What’s the UN for?
The UN has 4 purposes:
• To keep peace throughout the world;
• To develop friendly relations among nations;
• To help nations work together to improve the
lives of poor people, to conquer hunger, disease
and illiteracy, and to encourage respect for each
other’s rights and freedoms;
• To be a centre for harmonizing the actions of
nations to achieve these goals.
How is the UN organized?
Like the United States Gov. there are three branches:
• The Legislative Branch is the General Assembly
All members
It passes resolutions
• The Executive Branch is the Security Council and
the Secretary General
It enforces the Resolutions
• The Judicial Branch is the International Court of
Justice (often called the World Court)
It tries people for “Crimes against Humanity”
and settles legal disputes between nations
The Security Council
The General Secretary of the UN runs it from day
to day, the real power is in the Security Council
The UN Security council has 15 members.
Five are permanent members and have VETO
power, they are:
The US, UK, France, Russia & China
The UN can take no action without the security
council voting for it.
This is the weak-point of the UN as often one of
the permanent members vetoes any action