Kingdom of the Netherlands, 2000

“We, the

peoples” is a powerful rendition of world affairs and a

daunting portrait of life for future generations. It took

intellect and diplomatic savoir-faire to state a complex

case in such a concise and forceful way. We are

grateful to the Secretary-General and his staff for

producing it.

“We, the peoples” are of course the opening

words of the Charter, and I want to take them as a point

of departure. Other speakers have done so before me

and have argued in favour of a more robust structure

for keeping the peace in the world community. They

are right. The United Nations role in the area of

preventing or limiting armed conflict was conceived as

its principal purpose. The Brahimi report has shown

how, in spite of that, the United Nations peacekeeping

function has in fact become its Achilles heel. The

Brahimi recommendations deserve to be

implemented — the sooner the better. At present, the

Netherlands Government and parliament are debating

how to improve our national contribution to

peacekeeping.

15

“We, the Peoples” can lead to reflections on a

totally different side of the United Nations reality as

well. I, for one, would take this opportunity to argue in

favour of closer ties between the United Nations and

the private sector.

In 1945 the world was run by States. The Charter

hinges on that very assumption. It covers all aspects of

life as they were prevalent at the time, from peace and

security to social justice, from economic cooperation to

human rights. Despite its ambition, the Charter hardly

mentions any other actors besides States. Non-

governmental organizations appear in the Charter only

once. The private sector is not referred to at all. In

other words, the Charter conforms to a model of

governance as old as the Peace of Westphalia, a state

system going back to the mid-1600s.

In order to strategize for the future, we need to

ask ourselves: who, in actual fact, runs the world

today; where and how are world affairs conducted; and

how can we position the United Nations accordingly?

The United Nations is made up of Member States.

That is fitting and proper. States will be the custodians

of foreign relations for a long time to come. But their

roles have changed significantly with time. States can

no longer be thought of as the hard billiard balls of

international relations. Internationalization has altered

the concept of sovereignty. Nor are Sates autonomous

entities as before, pursuing self-defined national

interests. Their actions are now much more shaped by

economic pressures, information flows, and population

movements. For States, too, globalization is here to

stay. Other actors have entered both the domestic and

international scenes. Civil society is one. The private

sector is another. Since 1945, civil society, made up of

non-profit organizations, has blossomed along a wide

spectrum, beyond any expectation of the United

Nations founding fathers. Many non-governmental

organizations operate across national boundaries. At

the present time, the United Nations system could

never hope to operate properly without the assistance

of non-governmental organizations, not to mention

normative thinking and advocacy. Non-governmental

organizations have acquired access to the United

Nations at different levels, and participate in many of

its discussions.

Although a potent actor on the domestic and

international levels, the private sector has been

virtually ignored by traditional United Nations

diplomacy. The business community, and notably

transnational corporations, were viewed by many as the

competitor, if not as the enemy of international public

interest. Documents critical of multinationals were

being issued by the United Nations and the specialized

agencies until recently. Confrontation rather than

dialogue. I am not contending that there were no

grounds for that position: quite the contrary. However,

nowadays we see a growing awareness in the business

community of the necessity of responsible corporate

policies and of a role for private enterprise in the

pursuit of interests that go beyond maximizing

immediate profits. As an example, I refer to the Global

Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization, in which the

pharmaceutical industry closely cooperates with

international organizations, Governments and other

actors.

We need to build on that. Indeed, the time has

come to expand the concept of a partnership with the

private sector. Why? Two reasons. First of all, the

world is up against incredible odds and, secondly, the

private sector does exist and wields a lot of power in

the international arena.

About the odds: take a sustainable future, where

elementary laws of ecology must be respected. Not

even the most powerful Government can put a stop to

global warming — nor all the Member States of the

United Nations combined. A sustainable future needs

to be pursued in conjunction with industry, civil society

and the scientific community. For equitable working

conditions, and other forms of social justice, States

need to involve the private sector. The same is true for

fighting corruption, the spread of small arms, wasting

water or AIDS.

We have truly entered an era that is very different

from the one in which the United Nations was born —

an era in which the course of humanity and the quality

of life on earth have more and more become a shared

responsibility; an era where Governments, the private

sector and civil society are drawn ever more closely

together. They all have a stake in global governance.

The so-called global public goods are a matter for all of

them together.

The private sector has a stake in the future of the

planet, too. Of course, it is here to do business. But no

planet, no profit. Companies should find it in their own

interest to assume a responsibility equal to their weight

in international relations and the influence they have at

16

the domestic level. Chief executive officers, too, want

a livable world for their grandchildren. The private

sector must be called upon to enter into a responsible

corporate partnership in sync with other actors at the

international plane. True, the role of each actor needs

to be different. Their motivation can remain different,

too — as does the legal basis on which they act. But

their determination needs to be the same: the

determination to secure the longevity of life as we

know it and to secure for everyone on the planet an

equitable share of its bounty.

Different roles, shared responsibility. That

concept needs to take root in this Organization as well.

The United Nations cannot credibly hope to play a

galvanizing role in meeting the challenges of the

coming century if it cannot show that its debates and

its action platforms reflect the real world outside the

conference rooms. If we want to see the United Nations

as “unique in world affairs” — as the Millennium

report puts it — it must be able to show that all players

are on the stage.

The Secretary-General's Global Compact could

not have come at a more opportune moment. It is the

mere beginning of a process, but it is off to a promising

start. The Global Compact deserves the active support

of the international community, and it deserves to be

joined by other multinationals. I do understand the

trepidations of some non-governmental organizations

who fear that multinational corporations will drape

themselves in the United Nations flag and become

untouchable in the pursuit of profit. I understand, too,

the apprehension felt by diplomats in this hall, who

have a lifetime invested in the exclusivity of the State

and its monopoly on multilateral discourse. But the

Global Compact is not a Trojan horse.

And I will go even further. We have given civil

society structural access to the United Nations system.

By contrast, the access we are giving to the private

sector, with the notable exception of the International

Labour Organization, has been ad hoc, not structural.

In the future, we must create appropriate channels of

communication with the private sector, inside this

Organization, where they, as well as Governments and

civil society, can try and get a hold on the convulsions

of our time — a forum where, at the very least, they

can deliberate and begin to break down the barriers of

mistrust that have divided them for so long.

That is the first reason why the United Nations

needs to broaden its scope and become more inclusive.

The second is the power of the private sector. Many

companies have turnovers larger than the national

budgets of some Member States, and the same is true

for the personal fortunes of some chief executive

officers. The relationship between States and the

private sector has altered dramatically over time. States

were once thought of as bulwarks against harmful

economic impact from abroad. Economic weight was

viewed as a trump card in the power play among

nations. Today, States are increasingly serving as

instruments for adjusting domestic policy to the

realities of the present-day world economy. They have

become intermediaries between the world economy,

with its own structure of power, and domestic societies.

This brings up the question of where world affairs

are being conducted and how they have caused a shift

in the style of diplomacy. Economic globalization has

shifted the focus of attention to forums other than the

United Nations here in New York, notably to the

International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, the

World Trade Organization and, on a regional level, the

European Union. Policies are tested in the margins of

the World Economic Forum in Davos or decided

elsewhere. Brussels has become a hub of world affairs.

That focus has brought on a different cast of players

than in the days of Talleyrand and Metternich. Foreign

Ministers now work shoulder to shoulder not only with

development ministers, but also with finance and trade

ministers, as well as with central bankers. International

affairs, whether we like it or not, are increasingly about

economics.

Forging a relationship with the private sector is

therefore indispensable if the United Nations wants to

preserve its relevance over the long haul. The

multilateral system, for its part, must seek closer ties

with other centres of power and with the business

community. Mr. Kofi Annan has been vigorously

pursuing closer relations with all these various forums,

and we encourage him to do more of the same.

Responsible corporate partnership is also about

protecting the weak. The United Nations was set up not

only to guarantee peace and security, but also to secure

freedom from want. Despite its obvious advantages,

globalization is leaving too many victims by the

wayside. The gap between the rich and the poor

continues to widen, and the poor suffer the most, in

war and in peace. Meanwhile, the private sector wields

17

a great deal of power in its decisions as to where it will

buy, sell and invest. Those decisions may bear directly

on the quality of life in many developing countries.

Even though the odds are staggering, the United

Nations system can make a difference in reducing

poverty, gender inequality and child and maternal

mortality. But it can make a difference only from a

position of strength and from a platform shared by

other actors at the international level: from a position

of shared responsibility. The Millennium Summit has

declared poverty eradication the United Nations

number one priority. We applaud that. But fighting

poverty is not only a moral imperative, as it always has

been; it has also become an economic one. That is

another reason for the United Nations to become more

inclusive of the private sector.

The Secretary-General's report (A/54/2000), “We

the peoples”, duly poses the question of how to take

the United Nations forward. Whatever the way

forward, it needs to be a bold one. For too long we

have been remoulding old ideas. While doing so, we

have kept the United Nations on a very short leash,

hardly allowing it to stray off the beaten path. More of

the same is not enough. In other words, the United

Nations is bound to miss its cue if we, the peoples,

pursue our business as usual. The future will pass us

by.

The alternative is an avenue that is much more

ambitious. It amounts to using the United Nations

system as a vehicle for the development of a new

vision of world politics, a vision for the “post-

Westphalian” era. In such a vision, present trends

would be given legitimacy and a conceptual

framework. In such a vision, the principle of non-

intervention yields to the defence of human rights;

sovereignty is further reappraised; there is room for

civil society and the private sector; and economics are

also held responsible for social and development goals.

Such is the road less travelled, but the only one that

can make all the difference.