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UN Performance Problems UN Management Accountability Struggles Where is the Rule of Law? Inadequate UN Oversight Recent Developments
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The UN Charter states as its central provision relating to staffing matters: "Article
101. 1. The staff shall be appointed by
the Secretary-General under regulations established by the General
Assembly. … 3. The paramount consideration
in the employment of the staff and in the determination of the conditions
of service shall be the necessity of securing the highest standards of
efficiency, competence, and integrity. Due regard shall be paid to the
importance of recruiting the staff on as wide a geographical basis as
possible." Charter of the United Nations, 1945, initial phrases, and Articles 97, 100, and 101. [emphasis added] The essence of the
age-old UN staffing problem is highlighted by the two sentences of
paragraph 3 above. The UN is
clearly to employ people who embody the "highest standards" of efficiency,
competence and integrity. But
at the same time it wants representation from all of its 191 countries.
Over the years, the second requirement has been constantly used by
governments for their own purposes, with tacit acceptance by the
Secretariat, and thus seriously undermines the first. This archive has
discussed this problem at length, in the archive subsections on Personnel , The Winner, "Free the Managers",
OHR (Mis-)management, and Management culture
deterioration. Secretary-General
Annan has attempted to modernize the Secretariat during his eight years at
the helm by "opening up" staffing processes and getting rid of red tape to
achieve a more dynamic UN.
Most recently, he has launched further significant initiatives for
greater management freedom to hire and promote, major new mobility
processes to move staff around the globe, and newer and more flexible
contractual arrangements for the international civil
service. "Human resources management reform: Report of the Secretary-General," UN document A/57/293 of 8 August 2002.
As Mr. Annan asserted
further, in his "agenda for further change" of 2002: "Improving management was
the priority of my first term. I have put great emphasis on
establishing clear lines of responsibility and ensuring that managers are
held accountable for their actions. … I am confident that the new
system of recruitment, by giving managers primary
responsibility for staff selection, will lead to a new level of
accountability and empowerment. I intend to adopt additional
measures to cut unnecessary layers of bureaucracy. At present, the Organization
recruits highly qualified individuals for management functions -- yet its
procedures do not allow them to manage
… As decision-making is devolved to
programme managers, the roles and responsibilities of the central
service provider, the Department of Management [note: including
OHRM], and those of the executive offices in each of the departments,
will need to be reviewed." "Strengthening of the United Nations: An agenda for further change: Report of the Secretary-General, UN document A/57/387 of 9 September 2002, paras. 188-190. [emphasis added.] The problem with these
statements is that they do not ensure accountability, but
only assure or intend that "things will be
taken care of." As stated
everywhere with regard to law and accountability, things must be done, and
be seen to be done. Yet in
the UN Secretariat, there has never really been, and is not now, any clear
mechanism to independently and transparently ensure management
accountability. This point is
underscored by the statement above that the roles of the service
providers, DM and OHRM, "will need to be reviewed", i.e. were in a state
of flux. Thus, there is still
no clear and specific mechanism for "securing the highest standards" of
staff and performance as required by the UN Charter, at a time when UN
managers are being given more and more freedom. The personnel reforms
have forged ahead, but there is no evidence that the underlying situation
of careless staff selection and promotion has changed from that noted by
Theodor Meron in 1975: "Some members of the [UN] staff
have great ability and commitment but they support a great many parasitic
'deadwood' employees and
employees serving primarily the political interests of their
government. … The principle of merit
can in the long run be protected only by fair and objective procedures and
safeguards, which are subject to law and to effective grievance
procedures. But
… should the present trends
continue … the staff would probably be suspected of lacking neutrality and
might lose the confidence of
some Member States. The
result might be paralysis of the Secretariat , which would be unable to
play an effective role in situations of
crisis." Theodor Meron, The United
Nations Secretariat: The Rules and the Practice, Chapter 4, "Selected legal
questions", D.C. Heath,
Lexington, Mass., 1977, pp. 83-84. [emphasis
added.] [Note: Mr. Meron is a former
delegate to the UN, international law professor at New York University,
and currently serves as president of the UN tribunal for the former
Yugoslavia.]
The point was repeated
by two senior UN veterans in 1985: "For its friends, of which we are
two, …. the problem [at the UN's 40th anniversary is] …. that it is not
particularly effective in averting conflict or fighting poverty, [nor
ready to reverse] …. these trends, let alone its own genteel
deterioration.
[Among other things], the
Secretary-General must have the basic authority to manage his own
organization; to hire and fire according to the highest professional
standards and thereby provide overall tone and leadership to the
system. There must also be a
higher caliber of appointments at the top. There is nothing wrong with
political appointments if appointees have a distinguished and relevant
career record. But
governments have too often considered comfortable United Nations
sinecures a dumping ground for mediocre diplomats. A board of independent, eminent
people should be constituted to establish the desirable qualifications for
each senior vacancy as it comes up.
If individual governments still insist on sending poorly qualified
time-servers, at least their actions would be recognized for what they
are." Sadruddin Aga Khan and Maurice F. Strong, "Proposals to reform the U.N., 'limping' in its 40th year, New York Times, October 8, 1985. [emphasis added.]
The importance of
distinguishing between the competent and the incompetent staff for UN
productivity was also emphasized in the 1993 Thornburgh report to
Secretary-General Butros-Ghali. "Nearly everyone of my senior
management colleagues in the Secretariat and many staff members as well
have complained about the 'deadwood' problem. While present practices dictate
that nearly all terminated employees should receive a substantial cash
payment, the aggregate cost of keeping unqualified, incompetent or
non-productive staff members in place far exceeds, in my view, whatever
termination expenditures might be necessary to 'clean up' the
Organization.
Managers simply must be permitted to terminate those not measuring
up to 'the highest standards of [efficiency, competence and] integrity'
contemplated by the [UN] Charter. … Therefore, I suggest that you make
it clear that your commitment not to terminate staff whose posts are
affected by the restructuring will not protect those staff members who,
for reasons unrelated to the restructuring, are simply not performing
adequately. … These
steps, together with
others herein recommended, would have a positive effect on the
morale of that vast majority of dedicated staff members remaining on the
job as well as on the productivity of the Organization as a
whole." Dick
Thornburgh, Under-Secretary-General for Administration and Management,
"Report to the Secretary-General of the United Nations" ["The Thornburgh
report"], 1 March 1993, pp. 9-10.
Recognizing the
continuing problems of poorly chosen (and retained) staff, Childers and
Urquhart proposed a drastic
remedy in 1994: "The issue of 'deadwood and
mediocrity': Constant talk about 'deadwood',
'mediocrity', 'bloated bureaucracy,' etc., does not promote optimism about
any significant improvement.
What is desperately needed is serious work on the problems. The General Assembly
should request the Secretary-General to organize an independent commission
of internationally respected civil-service and recruitment
specialists. It
must be so composed as to enjoy the trust and cooperation of staff
associations as well as of
the member-governments. It should carry out a
thorough screening of the actual competence for their designated posts of
officials at mid-professional and above grades. Such a process alone would
reliably establish how many existing staff actually have a useful function
in UN service. Responsibility
for the costs of the termination of those who do not must be shared by
member-governments. …. Sweeping talk of 'mediocrity' is
unprofessional and misleading.
…. The potential of a significant number of staff is simply not
known because of poor job assignment, indifferent supervisors (themselves
inadequately supervised by poorly chosen department heads), and the
lamentable paucity of in-service training and retraining. The real extent of
irredeemable 'mediocrity' can only be identified by proper,
independent
screening." Erskine Childers, with Brian
Urquhart, in Chapter X, "The international civil service", in "Renewing
the United Nations System", Development Dialogue, 1994:1, Dag
Hammarskjold Foundation, Uppsala, Sweden, 1994, p.
165. [emphasis added.]
This dramatic effort
to firmly purge the system of its weak managers has never yet been taken,
but the problem very much continues on in the new millennium, as shown in
a key quote from the "Brahimi report" on peacekeeping problems in
2000: "Challenges to
implementation
… No amount of money or resources
can substitute for the significant changes that are urgently needed in the
culture of the Organization. … People everywhere are fully
entitled to consider that [the United Nations] is their
organization, and as such to pass judgement on its activities and
the people who serve in it. Furthermore, wide disparities in
staff quality exist and those in the system are the first to acknowledge
it; better performers are given unreasonable workloads to compensate
for those who are less capable.
Unless the United Nations takes steps to become a true meritocracy,
it will not be able to reverse the alarming trend of qualified personnel,
the young among them in particular, leaving the Organization. Moreover, qualified people will
have no incentive to join it.
Unless managers at all levels, beginning with
the Secretary-General and his senior staff, seriously address
this problem on a priority basis, reward excellence and remove
incompetence, additional resources will be wasted and lasting reform will
become impossible." Report of the Panel on United Nations Peace Operations [the "Brahimi report"], UN document A/55/305 -- S/2000/809 of August 21 2000, p. xiv.
[emphasis added.]
The "free the
managers" efforts of the past decade have not provided any such independent
and credible mechanism for convincingly demonstrating that Mr. Annan's
assertions about ensuring accountability, moving to "new levels" of that
accountability, and "recruiting highly-qualified" managers are valid, most
especially for removing incompetence. There are, however, tools
available for providing an independent check on staffing processes in the
Secretariat -- modest
"quality control" as it were -- which could confirm or deny the
true extent of "irredeemable
mediocrity" (and unfairness, and improper selection), or of "high-quality"
in the UN Secretariat management ranks. IO Watch will be
seeking out further examples of this independent scrutiny process, which
seems to be routine in at least some national civil services. For the moment, only two will be
noted, the first being the application of such a review in UNESCO in 1999
and 2000: "Last November the 188 [UNESCO]
member states named Mr. [Koichiro] Matsuura to the
director-generalship.
… Widely expected to be a cautious
and bureaucratic manager, the new director-general entered office
confronting what amounted to a challenge from his predecessor, Frederico
Mayor of Spain, who had made 71 promotions and high appointments during
the final days of his term. Mr. Matsuura suspended them
all. He also refused to renew
23 temporary individual consulting contracts about to expire. According to an independent
Canadian audit of the organization, up to 40 percent of UNESCO staff
appointments and promotions during recent years have failed to meet the
organization's own criteria." William Pfaff, "A reformer from Japan straightens out UNESCO",
International Herald Tribune, October 6, 2000.. [emphasis
added.] A specific statement
of the duties of experts who serve as independent "auditors" for personnel
processes was provided in an advertisement, in The Economist, for
new Commissioners in the United Kingdom in 2000: "Appointment of
Commissioners Circa £12k
pa
2-8 days a month
As part of the Modernising
Government reforms, the Civil Service is seeking to be more outward facing
… The Civil Service Commissioners
have a key role to play in these reforms. The Commissioners -- who are appointed directly by HM
The Queen, are not civil servants and are independent of Ministers -- [they] have the legal
responsibility of ensuring that appointments to the Civil
Service -- at all levels -- are made solely on merit on the
basis of fair and open competition, which is a cornerstone of a
professional, permanent and apolitical Service. … They also uphold the
arrangements for whistle blowing by civil servants set out in the Civil
Service Code. Commissioners chair competitions
for recruitment to the Senior Civil Service and contribute in monthly
Commissioners' meetings to the development of policy and practice: they
may also audit a Department's junior or middle-level recruitment
procedures or hear appeals under the Civil Service
Code. Commissioners are people with
track records of distinguished achievement in diverse fields … Candidates
must have significant experience in making senior appointments and a
commitment to good practice, selection on merit and equal opportunities."
"Executive focus", The Economist, November 4th,
2000. [emphasis
added.] For almost six decades
the United Nations has failed to firmly implement the UN Charter's call
for the "highest standards" in staffing matters. IO Watch concludes that
establishing such a small group of independent experts could, at modest
cost, help achieve: -- the fundamental principles stated
by Meron, Childers and the Brahimi report regarding merit, fairness,
objectivity, law, and safeguards ; -- the UN duty (for
its own credibility's sake) to meet the labor and human rights standards
it advocates in the UN Global Compact for multinational corporations;
-- transparently and clear processes
for the public to judge (as eloquently stated by the Brahimi report) that
the UN does indeed hire and reward top-flight
people; -- much needed assurance that any
increase in UN salaries is justified by the quality of staff performance
demanded; -- the "missing link"
of a firm accountability mechanism for management staffing matters and
decisions which has always been missing; and -- real legitimacy to
allow the UN to properly claim adherence to "best practices" in human
resources management, rather than the past few practices at all (but oh,
so much rhetoric.).
This small group could be located in, or at least have as its supportive
unit, the office of a new, modestly-sized but robust UN Human rights ombudsman, as
discussed under the major archive section on Where is the Rule of Law?. |
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