Taking an historical approach, Dr. Ryan explores both how the UN has affected world politics and how the international political system has formed and limited the work of the Organization.
The book looks at why the UN was created, how it was affected by the Cold War and how successive Secretaries-General struggled to find a role for themselves. We see how negative and even hostile views of the UN were changed by the end of the Cold War and by the UN-sponsored action in the Gulf, why the UN over-reached itself in Bosnia and Somalia and how it failed to stop the genocide in Rwanda. While the main focus of this book is the role of the UN in promoting international peace and security, it also examines the work of the UN in other areas, including human rights and environmental protection.