Reconstituting the United Nations for collective security – we need a popular campaign!

A political settlement for Palestine

Gaza cannot be separated permanently from the West Bank, East Jerusalem, settlements, refugees, borders, resources and Palestinian self determination. An international force must support Palestinian sovereignty and Israel's security within a comprehensive political settlement. Otherwise it could become Gaza's jailer, disarming and containing Palestinians while leaving occupation and dispossession unresolved. A standing UN force would also deploy more quickly than the ISF because its command, transport, equipment and trained personnel would already exist. It would protect civilians, prevent armed parties from overturning an agreed settlement and create space in which legitimate institutions and a just peace could survive.

Some voices in the right direction

Finland's President Alexander Stubb has proposed a Council with broader permanent representation and no power for any single state to veto a decision; he would also suspend the voting rights of a Council member that violates the Charter. Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, confronting a war in which the aggressor is itself a permanent member, has argued that the General Assembly should be empowered to override a veto. Turkey's President Recep Tayyip ErdoÄŸan has for years expressed the wider democratic objection in the phrase 'the world is bigger than five'. These proposals differ, but all reject the proposition that the interests of one great power should automatically outweigh the judgement of the rest of the international community.

Other governments have concentrated on restraints that do not require immediate Charter amendment. France and Mexico have promoted a political declaration under which the permanent members would voluntarily refrain from using the veto when genocide, crimes against humanity or large-scale war crimes are occurring. By July 2022 it had been endorsed by 104 states and two UN observers. The Accountability, Coherence and Transparency group has similarly sponsored a code of conduct asking every Council member, permanent or elected, not to vote against credible action intended to prevent or halt mass atrocities. These initiatives cannot legally compel a permanent member, but they establish a clear standard against which every veto can be judged.

The African Union's position exposes the central question of equality. Its members hold that the veto should ultimately disappear; yet, for as long as it exists, Africa demands two permanent seats carrying the same rights and privileges as the present five. In 2026 the Chairperson of the African Union Commission, Mahmoud Ali Youssouf, reaffirmed that demand as the correction of a historical injustice. The claim is compelling, because Africa cannot remain excluded from permanent representation. But equality should be achieved by democratising authority, not by multiplying national vetoes and creating new sources of paralysis.

These campaigns nevertheless reveal the scale of the obstacle. None of the five permanent members has accepted the legal abolition of its veto. The legitimacy of collective security cannot depend indefinitely upon the consent of those benefiting from its failure.

The UN has advanced international law, decolonisation, human rights, humanitarian relief and peacekeeping. These achievements justify preservation, but not acceptance of paralysis.

No state should be judge in its own cause or possess authority to prevent the world from responding to aggression or atrocity.

The veto should be abolished or deprived of its capacity to defeat collective security. Representation must broaden without multiplying privilege. Law must be matched by an accountable, permanently prepared, rapid deployment, armed force.

Reconstitution must begin now.

Peace must become a practical guarantee, not a promise that disappears whenever a powerful state objects.