The score at half-time

Jun 11th 2009

From The Economist print edition

Ban Ki-moon has turned in a mixed performance so far. He needs to improve

THE first secretary-general of the United Nations told his successor it was the toughest job in the world. It has since got harder. Halfway through his first five-year term, Ban Ki-moon, only the eighth man to fill the post (there have been no women), still struggles to make his voice count in a cacophonous world. South Korea’s foreign minister before moving to the East River, Mr Ban has made his country proud. He shows signs of wanting a second term; some wonder whether he deserves it.

The UN was created to set and uphold norms on everything from human rights to (lately) terrorism and climate change, to resolve crises, keep the peace, alleviate poverty and encourage development. In fact, as Mr Ban has found, managing relations with the UN Security Council and the General Assembly is like trying to run a company with a divided 15-member board, while keeping 192 querulous shareholders from each others’ throats—and his own. Getting a grip on the UN’s vast array of agencies, commissions, programmes and envoys is a management job from hell.

Mr Ban is also expected to man the bully pulpit. On behalf of “We the peoples”—as the UN charter has it—he is supposed to prod governments, especially the big powers, to keep their lofty promises.

For a time, admirers hailed Mr Ban’s predecessor, Kofi Annan, as a “secular pope”, ready to speak up for those in need of UN succour. But his authority sagged after people close to him were found to have mismanaged and even profited from a UN oil-for-food effort in Iraq.

Mr Ban set out to project a different image: industrious, diligent—and to the chagrin of many, cautious. Indeed Mr Ban got the job in 2007, in a deal brokered by America and China, because he was not the head-over-parapet sort. That disappoints many: more “secretary” than “general”, as wags have it. So how is he doing?

• Truth to power: 3/10 There is nothing wrong with quiet diplomacy if it gets the job done. Mr Ban’s low-profile efforts got humanitarian aid into Myanmar after the cyclone where others failed. All the same there is a sense that he ducks too easily, too often.

After a tough word with Robert Mugabe produced a tongue-lashing in return, say insiders, Mr Ban did his darnedest never to upset Zimbabwe’s despot again. Similarly he tries not to cross the Russians, who are also prone to throwing tantrums.

Mr Ban is hoping for re-election; indeed, he keeps score of the miles he travels and the hands he shakes. Partly for that reason, say UN-watchers, he tries not to offend China over the conflict in Darfur, and over efforts by the International Criminal Court to arrest Sudan’s president, an ally of China’s, on war-crimes charges. Not wanting to annoy America, Israel’s chief ally, Mr Ban also largely kept his head down over the fighting in Gaza.

After Sri Lanka’s war ended, Mr Ban denied that the UN had leaked grim civilian casualty figures (indeed, some UN officials reportedly sought to suppress the toll). That obscured his other responses—such as an appeal to aid the Tamil refugees. With Sri Lanka’s government shielded by China, India and others at the Security Council and at the UN Human Rights Commission, human-rights groups had hoped Mr Ban would speak up more for the victims.

• The bigger picture: 8/10 To his credit, climate change was Mr Ban’s early priority. He brought together government heads and nudged their officials along when agreement seemed elusive, putting his best Secretariat brains to work on the issue. When the food crisis erupted, he quickly knocked heads together so that various bodies, including the World Bank and the World Food Programme, could co-operate and help vulnerable countries. Yet the credit crunch has again pushed the UN to the sidelines.

• Keeping the peace: 6/10 Mostly Mr Ban can exhort and facilitate, unable to do much if others resist. But peacekeeping operations, once mandated by the Security Council, are under his control. The UN now has about 113,000 blue helmets and other personnel on the ground (twice the number of 15 years ago) and is managing 18 missions around the globe; the strains are showing. In Congo its largest peacekeeping effort has been dogged by indiscipline. When violence flared again recently in eastern Congo, it was caught flat-footed, lacking intelligence and barely able to defend itself, let alone protect civilians.

That is supposed to be changing. Mr Ban has split the peacekeeping department in two. A new under-secretary for field-support operations, an energetic Argentine, Susana Malcorra, gets boots and kit on the ground; this frees the overall head of peacekeeping, Alain Le Roy, to run missions and do the politicking. Their staffs do not co-operate as well as their bosses do, but if anyone can get cash out of mean governments to put peacekeeping on a firmer footing, it is Ms Malcorra.

• Management skills: 2/10 Mr Ban cuts an isolated figure, cut off by an inner circle of mostly Korean advisers. Communication with senior staff is poor, and since Mr Ban is not a good listener, it is hard to harness their expertise. What is needed is some leadership from Mr Ban and some clear goals to aim at.

There is lots for him to do: making the bits of the UN work together across a wider range of issues; drumming up more peacekeepers; and getting rich countries to help poorer ones meet the Millennium Development Goals. Time is running out.