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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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IO Watch's central concern, as its title indicates, is the rule of law and
management accountability in the UN.
This archive has emphasized this problem throughout, in the many
programme performance difficulties cited; the ongoing weaknesses of
accountability, transparency, and oversight processes; and especially the
void of a UN outside the law (and the bias in "UN law" toward protecting
managers instead of honoring basic staff rights). The problems of bad,
or careless, or non- UN management
proved to be a very persistent and consistent theme over the first
half-century of UN operations, as the following eight quotes
indicate: "Based on its studies
the
committee reiterates the vital importance above all others of selecting
well qualified personnel and not letting standards deteriorate because of
the difficulties and complexities of recruitment. The ability of the United Nations
to carry out its essential and urgent work depends in the final analysis
on the quality of its personnel." Committee on the Reorganization of the Secretariat, document A/7359 of November 27, 1968, p. 37, 1968, as quoted in Housang Ameri, Politics of staffing the United Nations Secretariat, Major Concepts in Politics and Political Theory, Vol. 8, Peter Lang, New York, 1996, p. 549.
"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.]
"A complaining staff member is
immediately classified as a 'personnel case', presumably because he or she
has had the temerity to intervene.
If the complaint
has to do with management direction, all hands in OPS
[Personnel] and its
affiliates close ranks to gather material to fashion as strong a
personnel case as possible, and no recognition whatsoever is made of the
key management issue.
.
The guilty persons can get away
with this kind of irresponsible performance more readily in the
bureaucratic system of the UN than in any foreign office, however
small. There is no really
effective vertical responsibility upwards within the UN table of
organization, nor effective direction downward
" Donald
Dunham, "Management by personnel action", Secretariat News (New
York), November 30, 1984, p. 11.
[emphasis added]
"A distinguished
professor of international law once deplored the fact that 'the League of
Nations has been abandoned to the diplomats', but the UN Secretariat
is much more dependent on the national diplomatic
bureaucracies. They
derive invaluable flexibility and power from having additional posts at
their disposal
to confer
favors but also to displace unwanted staff.
the incentives are
all the greater because many UN posts, especially the senior
ones, are much sought after because of the [high] scales of pay
and the prestige
they carry. A diplomatic ideology
has even developed at the UN, [that] there is no higher dignity than that
of Ambassador, holders of this title being by definition capable of taking
up any high-ranking post, even in a technical field. This naturally generates a bias in
favor of 'generalists' at the expense of other
professionals." Maurice Bertrand, "The recruitment policy of United Nations staff", in de Cooker, Chris, ed., International Administration: Law and Management Practice in International Organisations, UNITAR, Martinus Nijhoff, Dordrecht, the Netherlands, 1989, II.2/1-9, pp. II/2 and /3. [Note:
Mr. Bertrand served as an Inspector in the UN Joint Inspection Unit from
1968-1985.]
"Survival of the
unfittest
. Few [UN system] agencies have
staff able or willing to develop anything new. Many are packed with time-servers
more concerned with the forms of international bureaucracy, above all
their own little empires, than practical
results.
. the UN is right to [seek
balance] and discriminate in favour of people from the third
world. Alas, third world countries are
less discriminating in choosing who to send there. For them the UN agencies serve
often as a convenient dumping-ground for people they would rather not have
at home, because they are incompetent or a political threat. And under the guise of equity,
they have insisted that cushy jobs be created for their nationals at all
levels of the UN. The richer countries, who complain
the loudest about this, must share the blame for [politicized recruitment]
to an international civil service [theoretically] beyond the reach of
national governments. Member governments' intrusive
backing of their own nationals has created a system in which merit plays
little role. Too many UN
staff have got in (and on) not because of what they achieved, but because
of where they came from, who they knew or who owed whom a
favour." "The United Nations agencies: A case for emergency treatment", The Economist, December 2, 1989, pp. 27-28, 30 [28]. [emphasis added.]
"UN officials who advocate a
cleanup
say that management by
top officials has been inept and,
occasionally, corrupt. 'There is no [regular] supervision of any agency'
said [a senior
official.] Governing councils
are 'basically rubber-stamp bodies.' The U. N. Board of Auditors
cites numerous [problems] and 'weak internal controls'
during 1990 and
1991
[Many anomalies [that they report]
'appear to be recurring' and point to a 'lack of determination to enforce
regulations and rules and make the heads of units of the organization
accountable,' the report says. A recent confidential internal
paper circulating in the U. N. Development Program
put the problem more
bluntly. Citing 'a deplorable
vacuum of basic ethics' in the system, it noted widespread criticism of
'prolific structures, pompous-Byzantine attitudes of ranking officials,
operational inefficiency and
gross mismanagement of financial and
personnel resources.'" William Branigin, "The U.N. empire: polished image, tarnished reality", "As U.N. expands, so do its problems: Critics cite mismanagement, waste", Washington Post, September 20, 1992, p 4.
"Current problems in what you
[Secretary-General Butros Butros-Ghali] have correctly identified as 'the
present outmoded system of personnel management' constitute a major
stumbling block to true reform within the Organization.
Defects exist in nearly every
aspect of present personnel practice.
The result is too much 'deadwood'
doing too little work and too few good staff members doing too much,
over-extending themselves sometimes to the point where they have become
counter-productive." 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. 8-9. "
all United Nations
agencies specializ[e] in the production of pious verbiage, which
skillfully combines highmindedness with the self-interest of its staff
for the fact is that
agencies
are inherently
corrupt and corrupting, regardless of who directs
them.
This is not to say
that [they do] no good work at all,
or that [they do]
not have sincere and competent staff in
lower echelons. But at
higher levels
politicking and jockeying for position overwhelm any lingering concern for
[the agency's mission]. [The agency] hires not by competence but by allocation of jobs
among member nations. This
not only amounts to positive discrimination in favour of the incompetent
but ensures that political skills matter more than technical
capacity." Anthony Daniels, the Sunday
Telegraph (UK), 25 April 1993.
[ emphasis added.]
Determined General
Assembly resolutions seeking accountable management in the late 1980s and
early 1990s produced little Secretariat response to this sorry
situation. Finally, in 1993,
as discussed in the archive subsection on 1993 Management Accountability
Attempt, the Assembly passed its
very specific management accountability resolution (48/218 A). The
Secretariat, however, fought back with its own proposals, not only to
forestall implementation of the new management accountability
requirements, but to promote instead a vigorous strategy of "freeing the
managers to manage".
This process of
liberation began under Secretary-General Butros Ghali from 1993 to
1996. But it was has been
even more vigorously pursued by Secretary-General Annan from 1997 up to
the present time. It should
be noted that Mr. Annan is the ultimate UN "insider", having spent almost
his entire career of 40 years as a UN staff member, with the last 15 as a
senior official. The following six capsule quotes show the steady pressure
for UN management freedom from the original aggressive 1993 declaration of
independence" on up to the present day: "The more complicated
and increased demands by Member States
may require adjustments in
[Secretariat regulations and rules]
The balance between
centralized controls and the legitimate concerns for a more decentralized
style of management will have to be rethought.
But ad hoc
adjustments will not address the central problem of [balancing]
the need for a greater degree of managerial discretion by
senior staff and the ultimate
responsibilities of the Secretary-General to Member States. A thorough
review of the [relevant] regulations, rules and procedures [for staff]
will be undertaken
to
provide sufficient
discretion in the conduct of their work, and in particular in the use of
resources, to permit [UN ] programme managers
to implement
mandates
in an effective
and efficient
manner, while preserving
adequate central control and oversight
[and] make the necessary adjustments to the [existing UN] systems of
accountability and responsibility." "Accountability and responsibility of programme
managers in the United Nations: Report of the Secretary-General", UN
document A/48/452 of October 5, 1993, paras. 57,
59.
[emphasis added.]
"The Secretary-General's strategy
for modernizing the management of the Organization's human resources
encourages improved managerial skills, increased managerial responsibility
and effectiveness through increased delegated authority, responsibility
and accountability as well as optimal individual staff performance and,
thereby, improved organizational performance." "Implementation of the strategy for the
management of the Organization's human resources: Report of the
Secretary-General", UN document A/C.5/51/1 of 16 August 1996,
Summary.
"I am pleased to submit
what I
believe to be the most extensive and far-reaching reforms in the fifty-two
year history of the Organization.
the Organization needs to be
significantly reconfigured to do better
also so realize significant
administrative efficiencies.
The report seeks
on my own initiative, nothing
less than to transform the leadership and management structure of the
Organization.
" "Renewing the
United Nations: A programme for reform: Report of the Secretary-General,"
UN document A/51/950 of 14 July 1997, Letter
of transmittal.
. The prime responsibility for
taking action to remedy accidental and intentional performance failures
will lie with supervisors and managers at all levels.
In addition
the Department of Management is considering the setting up of transparent
accountability mechanisms
"
"Human resources management reform: Report of
the Secretary-General",
UN document A/53/414 of 13 October
1998, paras. 6-9. [emphasis
added]
"The next few years will
see the consolidation and institutionalization of the [management reform]
changes introduced to date, and further improvements aimed at ensuring
[accordance] with worldwide standards of good practice.
so as to enable
the Orgainzation to attract, develop, and retain staff of the highest
quality
[with] due attention to the request by the General Assembly that
[the Secetary-General] continue to improve accountability and
responsibility in the reform of human resource management, as well as
monitoring mechanisms." "Human resources
management reform: Report of the Secretary-General," UN document A/57/293
of 8 August 2002, para. 12. [Note: this
language would have been much precise and accurate if it had said
"attention to the many and repeated request[s] of the General Assembly" and to "continue to
improve management accountability and
responsibility in the UN secretariat",
although that lesser task that it did specify has also not been honored.]
"Improving the
quality of management was a priority of my first term. I have put
great emphasis on establishing clear lines of responsibility and ensuring
that managers are held accountable
I am confident that [our] 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 a budget, procure what they
need for everyday activities or authorize travel for their staff. As decision-making
authority is devolved to programme managers, the roles and
responsibilities of the central service provider
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.] This determined parade of new Secretariat initiatives
to progressively free UN managers, with ever-greater assertions of the
benefits to (someday) be obtained, has gone on now for eleven years and
shows no signs of ending. Unfortunately,
however, IO Watch concludes that this grand process of liberating the managers to "manage, buy
and travel" has never been joined with implementation of the
management accountability processes and sanctions for managers who perform
unsatisfactorily or abusively. The effect, not surprisingly, has been deteriorating
overall management performance in the UN Secretariat. Mr. Annan may
have hoped that good new managers hired would somehow overpower the bad
ones, but the fact is that those bad ones continue to exist, and to
arrive, in the UN Secretariat, and it seems that their very negative
impact on UN performance, morale, and credibility continues to grow and
grow.
Flashing caution signs about this Secretariat
management deterioration have been posted all along the way over the past
decade, as shown by the following capsule quotes. The first head of the transitional unit preceding the
OIOS, Mohamed Aly Niazi, spoke from years of hard internal oversight
experience when he informed the General Assembly in 1994 that:
"The effectiveness of an oversight office depends to a large extent on
how senior officers perceive their roles. The concept
of management accountability in the United Nations has not been
consistently applied.
no system of accountability will be effective without
the assurance that sanctions will be promptly applied when violations
occur. I
strongly recommend that any new system of accountability and
responsibility include specific penalties or sanctions for United Nations
managers and other staff who disregard United Nations regulations and
rules or who are negligent in the conduct of their duties and
responsibilities.
During this first
year, [the OII] has addressed symptoms but has not yet been able to
address the root causes of many [UN] problems. A vast amount of work remains to be done before the
United Nations has management structures and a management culture
adequate
to the great tasks entrusted to it
. " "Report of the Office of
Inspections and Investigations", UN document A/49/449, 28 September 1994, pages 5-6.
[emphasis added] More than 4,200 UN staff were queried in a worldwide
survey in 1995 about their work. While generally satisfied, the staff
identified bureaucratic managers and systems as the "Achilles heel" of UN
operations.
The results indicated that: "When it comes to organization and supervision, [43
percent]
consider that their supervisor's performance is inadequate
or downright bad. Professional staff are the most
concerned.
On the whole, staff members want better -- i.e., qualified -- managers,
more accountability within the Organization and more personal initiative
and responsibility." "Picture of UN
staff: A worldwide survey: Organized by UN staff for UN staff",
Geneva,
25 September 1995, pp. 3, 5, 10,
13-14.
A 1995 article on a staff-management dispute over the
right of staff to challenge the performance ratings given them by managers
focused the debate very concisely: "In considering
[this dispute]
a critical
question has been avoided: what is the rationale for increasing
the vulnerability of staff to unfair and/or arbitrary judgements by
administrators? The pat answer to that -- it will
allow "managers to manage" -- is unconvincing because the most serious problem
affecting the efficiency and effectiveness of the UN Secretariat has been
bad management.
The Secretariat reforms
proposed by the Secretary-General would
remove a range of checks and balances
built into the international civil service for the very obvious reason
that in in a multicultural, multinational context, justice must not only
be done but be seen to be done. While the integrity of the [staff
performance] rebuttal process might seem an arcane matter to outsiders, it
is the only recourse for a staff member victimized by a bad manager. To weaken it
would be to reduce the integrity of the entire structure
The United Nations will clearly [face] wrenching changes in the period ahead, and it would be both unfair and counterproductive to do away now with the only means staff have to hold managers accountable." "Staff-management
spat with possible serious impact reflects a joyless 50th anniversary," International Documents Review, 16 October 1995, p. 2. A
1993 UN consultant study which surveyed the UN management culture had
already noted the serious underlying problems in the Secretariat
(confirmed by other analyses), arising from: "(a) a United Nations 'board of directors with 185
members and sensitive, competing and even conflicting views
(b) an organizational culture that increasingly values control over
facilitation, "process" over outcomes, hierarchy over collaboration, and
personal power over collective purpose, all in a highly sensitive
multicultural context;
(c) complex and cumbersome managerial systems [that]
nevertheless
permit abuses of authority;
(d)
the perception that management and administration are of lesser
worth than "substantive" work;
(e) the very broad span of control
[at top levels] and the often
poor communication
throughout the Organization;
(f) a general confusion about the [UN's] goals and objectives;
(g) a lack of the clearly understood standards and measurements
required to establish accountability for
performance;
(h)
valuing staff rights over the needs of the Organization, leading to
[cumbersome] rules and processes that subvert managers' ability to
lead;
(i) bending hiring and promotion rules to allow personal and
political objectives to supercede those of the [UN];
(j) [complex and cumbersome] financial and budgetary procedures
that
[often lead to] untimely and almost-useless work; and
(k) controlling offices [concentrating on preventing failure rather
than] encouraging success or improving systems
" As cited in Joint Inspection
Unit, "Management in the United Nations: Work in progress", UN document
A/50/507, 1995, para. 113.
A
1995 JIU report also explored Secretariat progress in management reform
and stated in general that: "'United Nations
management'
has been termed an oxymoron, a juxtaposition of incompatibles. Over the past
fifty years, there have been various attempts to strengthen United Nations
programmes and improve their management, but they have not been well
implemented.
However, the
future status and credibility of the United Nations require it to
demonstrate that it is a learning organization which will skillfully and
flexibly manage its limited resources to produce results
The current effort
is undoubtedly the best, and possibly the last, opportunity to
establish
a strong management culture and performance emphasis in the United
Nations." Joint Inspection Unit, "Management in the United Nations: Work in progress", UN document A/50/507, 1995, "Executive Summary, Conclusions, and Recommendations." The same JIU report concluded that perhaps the
situation was now beginning to change, but also cited two telling examples
that suggested not: "
the Inspector
does know of a comparatively relatively recent situation in which a
professional staff member complained to a senior administrative assistant
about their new Director's almost total lack of involvement in 'his'
unit's work, and she responded, with earnest disbelief, 'But Directors are not
supposed to do any work. ' The current [top UN
manager] recently observed that he could not forget the 'tremendous burst of
applause' at a 1995 meeting he had with staff in Geneva when a
staff member denounced the low quality of management. He cited this
incident as a 'defining moment' in his relationship with the [UN], and
recognized the right of staff to good leadership and his obligation to
give it to them." Joint Inspection
Unit, "Management in the United Nations: Work in progress", UN document
A/50/507, 1995, paras. 114-117. The first head of the OIOS, Mr. Karl Th. Paschke,
stated in his first annual report to the General
Assembly in 1995 that, with regard to accountability, he sought an active
partnership with managers. But even he was troubled by their
attitudes:
"
efforts must be made to do away with the widespread tendency of staff, even in key
positions, to shun responsibility and accountability. OIOS backs
measures taken by the [DAM] to achieve this goal and will focus its own
recommendations to management accordingly.
Many UN managers are not used to and seem to be quite
reluctant to accept criticism, particularly when it comes to applying
accountability criteria rather than settling for the promise that some
specific problems won't recur. This feature of the United Nations culture must be
changed if we are ever to develop staff awareness and acceptance
of responsibility and accountability. United Nations managers must
stop being defensive and enter into a critical dialogue with
OIOS. In
order to make oversight effective, we offer ourselves as partners, not
adversaries." "Report of the
Secretary-General on the activities of the [OIOS]", UN document A/50/459, 2 October 1995, "Preface."
[emphasis added]
Another report, by a blue ribbon group of UN "insiders" in 1997, cited the
accountability complications and acrimony in UN
decision-making. The group feared that various practices, habits,
attitudes, and misperceptions on the part of both the Secretariat and
Member States had fueled an "us versus them" mentality that could well
[and in fact did and seems to continue to] undermine UN management reform
attempts.
The report summarized the respective "sins" involved: "Sins of member
states: Secretariat staff
resent
member state interference in
their daily work
[their
micromanagement of] the hiring and promotion of Secretariat
personnel
[and of] Secretariat budgeting,
. too often
seeking to control the minor details of spending allocations.
. Secretariat staff
members are also frustrated by lack of clear direction from
intergovernmental bodies. Too often member states fail to agree on how
best to confront global problems
. Moreover, mandates are frequently
assigned to the Secretariat with little thought as to the resources needed
for their implementation. Sins of the
Secretariat:
. Member states
contend that ineffective -- some would say nonexistent -- managerial
practices throughout the Secretariat have led to inefficient use of the
[UN resources]
; a staff unaccountable for its actions and prone
to delegate upwards; insufficient program coordination
; and wasteful
duplication of efforts. There has been a lack of transparency
in Secretariat decision making [on] policy issues, personnel, and budget
expenditures.
much of the information that is provided is not timely or
readable.
Overall,
inefficiency and lack of accountability within the Secretariat, whether
perceived or real, have invited member state micromanagement.
" "Making UN reform work: Improving member state-Secretariat relations", Report of the twenty-eighth United Nations issues conference, The Stanley Foundation, February 21-23, 1997, pp. 2, 14-16. [emphasis added.] Management conflicts were also revealed in an International Documents Review article in early
1998 about a project which the new head of OHRM was undertaking for a
"thorough review" of UN staff matters. The article observed that she
sought delegation of 'maximum responsibility' to line managers, because
central control is 'excessive.' She stated that: "OHRM will convene
a task force of experts [to make a] 'clear delineation of
responsibilities' [which] is expected to lead to a reduction in
micro-management. [The IDR then notes that] Micromanagement by intergovernmental bodies is an
index of the lack of trust between the majority of delegations and the
UN Secretariat.
[If this trend is to be
reversed] there must be a much clearer conceptualization of change, a
balanced explanation of implications, and an absolute sincerity of
purpose.
The current perception of the Secretariat among many delegations is
that in terms of personnel policy it is confused, does not understand the
full implications of what is proposed, and has a hidden agenda.
In pushing for
reorientation, Ms. Salim speaks some home truths
'We can no longer assume
that a [20-year] staff member has developed the necessary managerial and
supervisory skills'
there is 'widespread staff distrust of management'
and the UN's 'organizational culture is one in which advancement is
generally expected on the basis of longevity rather than
performance.'" "UN personnel chief
reviewing all aspects of management in bid to simplify controls, delegate
authority,", International Documents Review,
16 February 1998, p. 2. [emphasis
added.]
Meanwhile Mr. Paschke, despite his earlier faith that
UN managers could develop and apply their own performance and monitoring
systems, was having second thoughts. The OIOS found in 1998 that: "The quality of departmental submissions received by
OIOS for the 1996-1997 programme performance period clearly indicates
that, in many departments and offices, there is still inadequate commitment to
oversight, and, consequently no coordination or managerial
mechanism that collects and analyses on a routine basis information on the
progress made and results achieved under the various activities and
programmes.
Many departments still do not have either a senior planning and
coordination function
or a unit to provide coordinated feedback on the success and shortfalls in
programme implementation. [Progress requires that programme managers recognize]
such systems as basic management tools for improving efficiency and
effectiveness of implementation." "Report of the
Secretary-General on the activities of the OIOS", UN document A/53/428, 23 September 1998, Preface, para. 184 .
[emphasis added.]
An assessment of recent UN peacekeeping problems
illustrated the ongoing management problems in the critical major area of
UN field operations: "After
the
. chaos in Sierra Leone, [many people have urged changes in
UN The
UN is always short of the personnel it needs for peacekeeping
operations.
First
The same is true of the UN's police monitors, who are supposed to improve
respect for When
peacekeepers perform badly, it is too politically embarrassing to remove
them.
This is Dennis C. Jett, "The UN's peacekeeping failures are built in and intractable", International Herald Tribune, May 23, 2000. [Note: Mr. Jett, an advisor at the Carter Center, is the author of Why peacekeeping fails, St. Martins, New York, 2000, and was U.S. ambassador to Mozambique from 1993-1996]
A
much-awaited report in 2001 on serious performance problems and crises in
the major, and critical, operational area of UN peacekeeping was similarly
blunt in its criticisms. "The Brahimi report
implicitly criticizes the appointment of key peacekeeping personnel on
geopolitical grounds, rather than on merit, and details how UN senior
peacekeeping staff in the field -- civilian and military -- should prepare
for duties.
In the case of Sierra Leone, there is little evidence of any
preparation at all. As the report states, 'Put simply, the UN is far
from being a meritocracy today, and unless it takes steps to become one,
it will not be able to reverse the alarming trend of qualified staff
leaving the organization.' These are fighting words at the UN,
where turf, national advantage, and every job are fought over and
preserved with a vigor that belies the public image of UN torpor in most
other respects.
The UN is urged by the panel to create a standing pool of civilian
personnel specializing in field service
, in the absence of which
inexperienced and untrained staff must start afresh in every peacekeeping
operation, thus inevitably making many avoidable mistakes early on." David M. Malone and
Ramesh Thakur, "UN peacekeeping: Lessons learned?", Global Governance, 7 (2001), 11-17 [14].
[emphasis added.] [Note: the report
referred to is the Report of the Panel on United
Nations Peace Operations [the "Brahimi report"], UN document A/55/305
--
S/2000/809 of August 21 2000, which is
available at www.un.org/documents under
the A document number] In 2001 when Secretary-General Annan was re-elected
for a second term, even his supporters emphasized that
there was still very much work to be done to improve UN management. -- One editorial emphasized that he "must continu[e]
to curb patronage and wasteful spending elsewhere in the UN bureaucracy."
-- A former senior official praising Mr. Annan
nevertheless warned that "Decisive action should not continue to be
postponed in regaining the motivation and professional quality of the
United Nations in its earlier years." -- And another admirer stated bluntly that "The
personnel system is still a disaster, which he must now tackle
resolutely."
"Kofi Annan's
record", The New York Times, 27 March 2001, Enrique ter
Horst,
"A Re-elected Secretary-General can give the world the facts", International Herald Tribune, 6 July 2001, and William Shawcross, "Another five
years at the UN helm for Annan, of course", International Herald Tribune, 27 June 2001. But IO Watch finds that UN bad-management problems
have continued to expand, as discussed in some detail under the preceding
sections of this archive. -- Managers have now been empowered not only to
select their own staff, but to investigate them at any time for perceived
misconduct.
-- UN whistle-blowers seem to be an
extinct species, although the General Assembly emphasized that they were
to be a functioning and closely-protected one. -- Mr. Annan admitted (but has done
precious little to change) the widespread belief that the UN internal
justice system shields managers from accountability for their
decisions. -- A new "code of conduct" developed by the UN
Administration turned staff rights into obligations and was quite soft on
"due process" requirements. -- A long-standing process keeps too many
UN staff in limbo as "floaters", "discards", and "walking wounded", even
as the Secretariat speaks stoutly of "zero tolerance" for harassment, and
control of
managerial misconduct. -- new quasi-judicial processes threaten
summary dismissal and other grim fates for staff in the shadows of the
inadequate internal justice system, including potential criminal
prosecutions (but not for managers). -- and an OHRM long known for its own
liberal exceptions to UN rules, is now tasked by the General Assembly with
oversight of management accountability, although its role is only slowly
developing and remains very vague. The deficiencies of this "brave new world" of UN
management freedom without accountability were confirmed by the US General
Accounting Office in 2004, when it reported that: "In 2002, the [OIOS] found that program managers and department and office heads were not complying with U.N. regulations. | |||
