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New World Disorder: the UN after the Cold War
David Hannay
I.B. Tauris, due to be published 30 May 2008
As the UK’s ambassador to the UN from 1990 to 1995, David Hannay sat in the Security Council from the time of Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait until the Srebrenica massacre in Bosnia. Drawing on this experience, Lord Hannay illustrates how the early cooperative spirit of the post-Cold War era collapsed when new challenges such as state failure proved beyond the UN to solve and eroded the initial unity of the permanent members of the Security Council.
www.ibtauris.com
Click on here or on the image for more information. |
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The Oxford Handbook on the United Nations
Thomas G. Weiss and Sam Daws (eds.)
Oxford University Press, July 2007
An authoritative, independent one-volume treatment of 60 years of history of the United Nations written by distinguished scholars, analysts, and practitioners. Citations and suggested readings contain a wealth of primary and secondary references to the history, politics, and law of the world organisation. This Handbook provides a clear and penetrating examination of the UN’s development since 1945 and the challenges that it faces in the 21 st century. This key reference work also contains appendices of the Charter of the United Nations, Statute of the International Court of Justice, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
This volume is intended to shape the discipline of UN studies, and to establish itself as the essential point of reference for all those working on, in, or around the world organisation. It is substantial in scope, containing contributions from over 40 leading scholars and practitioners—writing sometimes controversially, but always authoritatively—on the key topics and debates that define the institution.
www.oup.com |
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Fixing Failed States: A framwork for rebuilding a fractured world
Ashraf Ghani, Claire Lockhart
Oxford University Press, May 2008
Ashraf Ghani and Clare Lockhart have served as World Bank officials, advisers to the UN, and high-level participants in the new government of Afghanistan. In Fixing Failed States, they offer an on-the-ground picture of why past efforts have not worked and advance a new solution to this most pressing of global crises. Ghani and Lockhart argue that only an integrated state-building approach can heal these failing countries. They argue that many of these states already have the resources they need and merely need to put them to work in the right way. The authors provide a practical framework for achieving these ends, supporting their case with first-hand examples of struggling territories such as Afghanistan, Sudan, Kosovo and Nepal as well as the world's success stories - Singapore, Ireland, and even the American South.
Source: Oxford University Press
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Chasing the Flame: Sergio Vieira de Mello and the Fight to Save the World
Samantha Power
Allen Lane, March 2008
Chasing the Flame tells the life story of Sergio Vieira de Mello, the Brazilian head of the UN Mission to Iraq who was killed in 2003 in a terrorist attack on the world body’s Baghdad headquarters. De Mello worked for the United Nations for nearly four decades. He served in Lebanon in the aftermath of Israel’s 1982 invasion; in Cambodia in the early 1990s, negotiating with the Khmer Rouge and repatriating refugees; in Bosnia, helping to end the slaughter; and in Kosovo and East Timor, contributing to efforts to build nations out of war-torn societies.
www.penguin.co.uk
To read a review of this by the New York Times, please click here. |
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Raphael Lemkin and the Struggle for the Genocide Convention
John Cooper
Palgrave Macmillan, January 2008
This is the first comprehensive biography of Raphael Lemkin, the man who invented the word genocide and campaigned relentlessly for the 1948 UN convention. The book describes Lemkin’s campaign, showing how his ideas were formed in the midst of ethnic strife in Eastern Europe.
www.palgrave.com
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Law and Practice of the United Nations: Documents and Commentary
Simon Chesterman, Thomas Franck and David Malone
Oxford University Press, December 2007
Combining primary materials and expert commentary, this book demonstrates the interaction between law and practice in the UN, and highlights the possibilities and limitations of multilateral institutions. Each chapter begins with a short introductory essay by the authors that describes how the documents that follow illustrate a set of legal, institutional, and political issues relevant to the practice of diplomacy and the development of public international law through the UN.
www.oup.com |
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A Billion Lives: An Eyewitness Report from the Frontlines of Humanity
Jan Egeland
Simon & Schuster, March 2008
As Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, Jan Egeland oversaw the coordination of the UN’s humanitarian work for three and a half years. The book gives an account of Egeland’s experiences of the war in Iraq and the strife in Darfur, as well as of the Indian Ocean tsunami and the South Asian earthquake. A close adviser of former Secretary-General Kofi Annan, Egeland served at the top levels of the UN at a particularly difficult period in its history, when the organisation suffered the divisive aftermath of the Iraq war, the Oil-for- Food scandal, and terrorist attacks against its personnel.
www.simonsays.com
To read a reivew of this book by the Financial Times, please click here. |
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NGO Involvement in International Organizations: A Legal Analysis
Sergey Ripinsky and Peter Van den Bossche
British Institute of International and Comparative Law, December 2007
This book investigates the arrangements for NGO involvement in the activities of a range of international institutions and examines and compares relevant rules and practices. The analysis focuses in particular on the legal basis for NGO involvement, forms of involvement, NGO participatory rights, applicable accreditation criteria and procedures, and rules on subsequent monitoring of accredited NGOs.
www.biicl.org |
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Surrender Is Not An Option
John Bolton
Simon & Schuster, November 2007
John Bolton, former American Ambassador to the United Nations and vocal critic of the world body, takes readers behind the scenes at the UN and the US State Department. In this memoir, he recounts his appointment in 2005, his headline-making Senate confirmation battle, which resulted in his recess appointment, and his combative 16-month tenure at the UN. Bolton offers his views of various international crises, such as North Korea's nuclear test, Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons, the genocide in Darfur, and the month-long negotiation that led to the end of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah.
www.simonsays.com
To read reviews of this book, pelase click below.
Sir Brian Urquhart's review in NY Books
Financial Times
Chris Dickenson's review in New World, UNA-UK East Gloucestershire |
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Gendered Peace: Women's Struggles for Post-War Justice and Reconciliation
Donna Pankhurst (ed.)
Routledge, October 2007
This volume contributes to the growing literature on women, conflict and peacebuilding, focusing on the moments after the end of a conflict, often characterised by violence and insecurity for women. Gendered Peace traces the development of international legal advances for women, and contrasts this success with the actual experience of women in places like Sierra Leone, Rwanda, South Africa, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, East Timor, Peru, Central America and the Balkans.
www.routledge.com |
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A No-Nonsense Guide to the United Nations
Maggie Black
New Internationalist, June 2007
This slim volume, part of the New Internationalist’s No-Nonsense series, explains in accessible and lively language how the UN system works. On UN reform, the author departs from conventional wisdom, arguing that the current push for ‘system-wide coherence’ at the UN is misguided. Sir Jeremy Greenstock, a former British ambassador to the UN, wrote the foreword. www.nononsenseguides.org
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