I found Harsh V Pant's column in Mint today, on why India's diplomatic offensive for a seat in the United Nations Security Council is meaningless and nonsensical, well worth recommending to all my readers. This question that Pant poses needs to be answered by Chacha himself:
Why should global peace and security be a priority for the Indian government, a government that has continued to fail miserably in establishing domestic order and security?
Do read the entire article, which rubbishes everything about the UN.
To my mind, it appears that the ruling elite of our country are on the lookout for clubs like the UN to prop up their misrule, nothing else. Pant quotes Vaclav Havel, former president of the Czech Republic, writing that the UN Human Rights Council is a "Table for Tyrants." As I opined a few days ago, in the context of Aung San Suu Kyi's "belief in human rights," these rights, declared as "universal" by the UN in 1948, are almost entirely meaningless. They are good for bureaucrats, for socialist politicians in socialist democracies, and for trade unionists; they are bad for people, especially poor people.
Pant, who teaches at King's College, London, says:
India’s experience with the UN has historically been underwhelming.
Pant also shows how India's enthusiastic participation in UN peacekeeping missions worldwide has been foolish. He says Indian troops have suffered the highest casualties. Who is being kept "secure" by our Chacha State? Personally, I feel most insecure on our roads.
Pant says that almost every arm of the UN is a "farce." This is particularly true of those well-funded UN bodies which profess to be dedicated to the upliftment of the poor in the Third World - like the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the UN Children's Education Fund (UNICEF). The UN's "Human Development Index" serves only to misguide public opinion as to the means towards such development - for it contains no information whatsoever on vital parameters like the protection of Property and the extent of "economic freedom" available to the citizenry. The alternative Economic Freedom Index, which you can find here, is what opinion makers in poor nations should focus on. Similarly, the UN Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA) is based on "knowledge" that has been completely discredited.
But why the UN alone? The two other "great" international organisations, conceived of by Keynes, the World Bank and the IMF, are equally meaningless. The World Bank was originally called the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development; and the greatest damage it has caused to the goal of "development" has been the role it has played as the arbiter of "knowledge" in the important field of "development economics" - a role it continues to play. Development has not occurred in the Third World only because this knowledge is utterly false. And as for the IMF, it is now hoping to become a global fiat paper money provider - causing global inflation.
Pant makes an entirely valid point in his conclusion: that India should unilaterally pursue its own interests, without a care for all these international bodies. I am in total agreement with this view. Since free trade is in our own interest, we should pursue it unilaterally. Similarly, sound money is in our own interest, and we should adopt the gold standard without consulting any outside power.
I believe these unilateral measures are urgently required. I would like to also add that instead of higher levels of government - higher than our own centralised State - we Indians need to focus on lower levels of government: those that can effectively and efficiently run our miserable cities and towns. This focus on the nitty-gritty, the down-to-earth, is equally important.
