Topic: Promoting Peaceful Post-Election Transitions
Country: Greece
Delegate Name: Mike Weykamp
School: Forest Hills Northern High School
Topic page: background guide and all position papers All Greece position papers GLIMUN 2008 committees
Elections are as old as democracy itself, and the conflicts that sometimes follow them are just as old. There have been elections in recent history that have been overseen by representatives of the United Nations including: Kenya, Congo, and Bosnia. The purpose of the UN representatives being present at the elections is to instill confidence among the population of the country that there is no foul play involved in the election process. Elections in the past that have not had elections observed by an unbiased, stable outside agency have frequently resulted in violence following the election, for example Zimbabwe1. The UN has advocated peaceful transitions of power following elections in the past and must continue to do so in the future even to a greater extent than they have in the past.
Europe as a region has several democratic, election holding nations. Most of these nations have very stable political atmospheres and power is transferred from one political party to another with no hostilities aside from the bitter feelings that a loser feels watching his/her opponents claim the prize they competed for. This, however, is not a rule without exception. The Bosnian elections of 1998 had extreme potential for post-election violence due to the ethnic conflicts 2 that had occurred there in the time preceding the elections, and if the UN had not been involved in promoting the peaceful transition of power it is likely there would have been violent ramifications to the election. Another slightly less recent example of democracies stepping in and monitoring the transfer of power after WWII when Germany was in shambles and West Germany was governed by the democratic allied powers that helped restore order in the previously very divided country.
The United Nations are obviously in favor of promoting the peaceful transition of power following elections because they have recently been in nations such as the Congo observing the elections in order to ensure their fairness and accuracy of the elections as to decrease the chance of post-election violence. The United Nations had been involved in over fifty elections world wide in some capacity as of June 2002, and have participated in several others since that time. The United Nations participates in a substantial amount of elections they receive requests to participate in elections that they are unable to assist in because of a variety of reasons. The United Nations are almost unanimously in favor of granting electoral assistance to countries that ask for it.
Greece believes that the United Nations is obligated to grant assistance to unstable countries that face an election and the potential transition of power. Greece stresses that when a stable government is formed in the place of a previously unstable government it allows the country to grow and develop as opposed to focusing its attention and resources on internal conflicts. The more developed a nation becomes the more they are able to participate in world trade on a global scale. The ability of a country to import and export goods is beneficial not only to the country that is stabilized but also to the countries that are then able to trade with the newly developed country.
1 In the Zimbabwe elections no single candidate received a majority. Robert Mugabe and Morgan Tsvangirai received 43.2% and 47.9% of the vote respectively. Tsvangirai withdrew from the election shortly before the second round of the election could take place which led to widespread violence.
2 The killing of an estimated 200,000 Muslims were killed by Serbs in attempt to ethnically cleanse Bosnia & Herzegovina
