3
compromise have been far from optimal: no matters of consequence are decided in the UNGA,
while numerous important measures have fallen victim to great power veto in the UNSC.
During its 60 year existence, the UNSC’s decision rules have been substantially changed only
once. In 1963 the size of the Council was increased from 11 to 15 members in response to the
accession of numerous newly independent states into the UN system.
2
As UN membership has
increased about 50 percent since that time, it is not surprising that the current composition of the
Security Council is often criticized for not being representative of all UN members. The veto power
afforded to the United States, Russia, the UK, France, and China is regularly characterized as
reflecting the world of 1945 rather than the 21
st
century. In 1993 the General Assembly created the
Open-ended Working Group (OEWG) to examine possible changes to the Security Council’s
structure and decision-making procedures.
3
The OEWG focused on two “clusters” of possible
changes. Cluster I issues include the size of the UNSC, increases in the number of permanent and
non-permanent members, and the veto power. Cluster II issues involve consideration of changes
that would improve the interaction between the Assembly and the Council, examination of ways to
increase the participation of non-permanent members in Council deliberations, and ways to increase
the UNSC’s transparency and accountability.
4
The ongoing work of this committee and proposals from outside the UN have focused
attention on UN reform in general and Security Council reform in particular. Calls for
comprehensive reforms to improve the effectiveness and legitimacy of the UNSC have gained
momentum in the wake of the impasse between the Council and the U.S. over the latter’s proposals
and subsequent actions in Iraq during late 2002 and early 2003; more general perceptions of the
growing U.S. resort to unilateralism have added to these concerns. The OEWG’s narrow mandate
has not included consideration of weighted voting as an alternative decision method. A recent, wide-
ranging reform proposal by Joseph Schwartzberg (2003) calls for substantial changes to the Charter
Convention