Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

U Thant and the Office of U.N Secretary-General

1967; SAGE Publishing; Volume: 22; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1177/002070206702200101

2052-465X

Leon Gordenker,

Global Peace and Security Dynamics

U Thant, writing what he no doubt expected would be his last annual report as United Nations Secretary-General, stressed some of the basic beliefs which conditioned his work during his five years in office.1 A few days earlier he had relied on those beliefs as the foundation of his announcement that he would not be available for a second appointment to the office he took over, initially as Acting Secretary-General, after the death of Dag Hammarskjold.2 His statements encourage an examination of his views and the related policies which give individual character to his incumbency in the highest office of the international civil service. As a prerequisite to his activities the Secretary-General must form an appreciation of the world political situation of which his organization is a part. The policies he favours, the programmes he urges on the membership, his remarks in the deliberative organs and the infrequent but extremely serious invocation of his special right under Article 99 of the United Nations Charter3 to summon the Security Council to consider what he deems a threat to or breach of the peace all must be fitted into his perceptions of world politics. His succes or failure to retain the confidence of the membership, on which much of his effectiveness as a formulator and innovator of policies must rest, depends on the skill with which he assesses the political situation.