1. Cold War and Decolonization

2. United Nations  Established on 24 October 1945  At its founding, the UN had 51 member states (now 193)  During the Second World War, US President Franklin D. Roosevelt initiated talks on a successor agency to the League of Nations  April–June 1945: United Nations Charter  January 1946: The first meetings of the General Assembly (London)  The General Assembly selected New York City as the site for the headquarters of the United Nations, and the facility was completed in 1952  UN’s primary mandate was peacekeeping; The organization participated in actions in Korea and the Congo, as well as approving the creation of the state of Israel (1947)  The division between the US and USSR often paralyzed the organization  1956: The first UN peacekeeping force was established to end the Suez Crisis

3. The UN’s Organization  The UN’s principal organs:  The General Assembly (the main deliberative assembly); the Security Council (for deciding certain resolutions for peace and security); the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) (for promoting international economic and social co-operation and development); the Secretariat (for providing studies, information, and facilities needed by the UN); the International Court of Justice (the primary judicial organ); and the United Nations Trusteeship Council (inactive since 1994)  UN System agencies include the World Bank Group, the World Health Organization, the World Food Programme, UNESCO, and UNICEF  The most prominent officer is the Secretary-General  The organization’s membership grew significantly following widespread decolonization in the 1960s, and by the 1970s

4. General Assembly  The General Assembly is the main deliberative assembly of the United Nations; composed of all member states  The assembly meets in regular yearly sessions, but emergency sessions can also be called  The assembly is led by a president, elected from among the member states on a rotating regional basis, and 21 vice-presidents  A two-thirds majority of those present is required on important questions  Examples of important questions include recommendations on peace and security; election of members to organs; admission, suspension, and expulsion of members; and budgetary matters  Apart from approval of budgetary matters, resolutions are not binding on the members  The Assembly may make recommendations on any matters within the scope of the UN, except matters of peace and security that are under consideration by the Security Council

5. Security Council  The Security Council is charged with maintaining peace and security among countries  The Security Council has the power to make binding decisions that member states have agreed to carry out, under the terms of Charter Article 25  These are known as United Nations Security Council resolutions  The Security Council is made up of fifteen member states, consisting of five permanent members and ten non-permanent members  The five permanent members hold veto power over UN resolutions, allowing a permanent member to block adoption of a resolution, though not debate  The ten temporary seats are held for two-year terms, with member states voted in by the General Assembly on a regional basis  The presidency of the Security Council rotates alphabetically each month

6. Secretariat  The UN Secretariat is headed by the Secretary-General, assisted by a staff of international civil servants worldwide  It provides studies, information, and facilities needed by United Nations bodies for their meetings  The UN Secretariat also carries out tasks as directed by the Security Council, the General Assembly, the Economic and Social Council, and other UN bodies  The Secretary-General acts as the de facto spokesperson and leader of the UN

7. International Court of Justice  The International Court of Justice (ICJ), located in The Hague, is the primary judicial organ of the UN  Established in 1945 by the UN Charter, the Court began work in 1946 as the successor to the Permanent Court of International Justice  The ICJ is composed of 15 judges who serve 9-year terms and are appointed by the General Assembly; every sitting judge must be from a different nation  The ICJ's primary purpose is to adjudicate disputes among states, but it has heard cases related to war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and other issues  The ICJ can also be called upon by other UN organs to provide advisory opinions

8. People’s Republic of China  The end of the Chinese Civil War:  Major combat ended in 1949 with the Communist Party in control of most of mainland China, and the Guomindang retreating offshore, (Taiwan, Hainan, and their surrounding islands)  1 October 1949: Mao Zedong proclaimed the establishment of the People’s Republic of China  1950: The People’s Liberation Army succeeded in capturing Hainan from the ROC and incorporating Tibet  Mao’s Great Leap Forward, a large-scale economic and social reform project, resulted in an estimated 45 million deaths between 1958 and 1961, mostly from starvation  1966: The Cultural Revolution, sparking a period of political recrimination and social upheaval which officially lasted until Mao’s death (1976)  October 1971: The PRC replaced the Republic of China in the United Nations, and took its seat as a permanent member of the Security Council

9. Cold War  Political and military tension between the Western Bloc (US, its NATO allies and others) and the Eastern Bloc (Soviet Union and its allies in the Warsaw Pact)  There was no large-scale fighting between the two sides, although there were major regional wars, in Korea, Vietnam, and Afghanistan supported by the two sides  The beginning of the Cold War:  Marshall Plan (April 1947)  Cominform and the Tito–Stalin split (1948)  Containment and the Truman Doctrine  Berlin Blockade and airlift (1948-1949)  North Atlantic Treaty Organization (1949)  Korean War (1950-1953)

11. Korean War  A Security Council resolution authorizing a US-led coalition to repel the North Korean invasion of South Korea, passed in the absence of the USSR  Taiwan  Japanese rearmament

12. Cold War  Warsaw Pact and Hungarian Revolution  Competition in the Third World  Space race  Berlin Crisis of 1961  Cuban Missile Crisis  Confrontation through détente (1962–79):  French NATO withdrawal  Czechoslovakia (Prague Spring)  Brezhnev Doctrine  Third World escalations  Sino-American rapprochement  Second Cold War (1979–85):  Soviet war in Afghanistan  Polish Solidarity movement and martial law  Soviet and US military and economic issues

14. Decolonization  Definition: the withdrawal from its colonies of a colonial power; the acquisition of political or economic independence by such colonies  The process may involve either nonviolent revolution or national liberation wars by pro-independence groups  The United Nations Special Committee on Decolonization was created in 1961 by the General Assembly with the purpose of monitoring implementation of the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples and to make recommendations on its application  It has stated that in the process of decolonization there is no alternative to the colonizer allowing a process of self- determination

15. Methods and Stages  Decolonization is a political process, frequently involving violence (war of independence, revolution, civil war)  More often, there was a dynamic cycle: negotiations, minor disturbances escalating into more violent revolts, further negotiations until independence was granted  In rare cases, the actions of the pro-independence movements were characterized by nonviolence (Indian independence – followed by an “Indian civil war”), and the violence came as active suppression from the occupying forces or from forces representing minority local communities who felt threatened by the prospect of independence (settlers, minority groups)  Decolonization generally progressed through one or more stages: including the introduction of elected representatives, degrees of autonomy or self-rule

17. The Third World  The emergence of this new political entity, in the frame of the Cold War, was complex and painful  Several attempts were made to organize newly independent states in order to oppose a common front towards both the American and the Soviet influence  The Non-Aligned Movement constituted itself, around the main figures of Jawaharlal Nehru (India), Sukarno (Indonesia), Tito (Yugoslavia), and Gamal Abdel Nasser (Egypt)  1955: After the Geneva Conference (1954) which put an end to the First Indochina War, the Bandung Conference gathered Nasser, Nehru, Tito, Sukarno, and Zhou Enlai (Premier of the People’s Republic of China)  1960: The UN General Assembly voted the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples

18. The Non-Aligned Movement  1961: The Non-Aligned Movement was officially created in Belgrade, and was followed in 1964 by the creation of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) which tried to promote a New International Economic Order (NIEO)  The UNCTAD wasn’t very effective in implementing this New International Economic Order, and social and economic inequalities between industrialized countries and the Third World kept on growing throughout the 1960s until the 21st century