Shining a light: UN peace operations in hostile world

ABSTRACT: This paper attempts to establish that modern UN peacekeeping operations, however flawed, are instrumental to ending conflicts and physical suffering amidst humanitarian crises and can serve as a basis for lasting settlements between warring factions, as well as stepping stones for national development. It begins by exposing the criticisms levelled at these operations in the past decade,particularly by US scholars and commentators, who presented them as obstacles to narrow, more violent and theoretically more effective solutions to disputes, but also demonstrates that a positive shift in American stance towards the UN could occur in the incoming Obama administration. It continues by asserting that UN peacekeepers enter operating theatres where Western armies refuse to tread or are called upon to mitigate the disaster left behind when an exit is made in haste, often after such powers conclude that the situation is intolerable and that a solution is not fundamental to their national interests. The conclusion states that UN peacekeeping operations are not a panacea, but constitute a viable solution to crises until governments can establish better ways to co-ordinate their actions.KEYWORDS: conflicts, Human Rights, peacekeeping, United Nations, United States