Personnel Shortages of UN Peacekeeping Operations (pko s) in Post-Cold War World: a New Dataset of UN pko Authorized Strength

Despite their remarkable growth in the post-cold war era, UN Peacekeeping Operations ( pko s) have been constantly challenged by personnel shortages, namely, the huge gap between the actual contributions from troop contributing countries ( tcc s) and the size authorized by the Security Council. Insufficient peacekeepers have become one of the major concerns to fulfill UN pko s’ mandates. Although UN pko personnel contributions have been a heated topic in the literature, little heed has been paid to personnel shortages. While we know many pko s are understaffed, we have only limited knowledge on how and why personnel shortfalls vary across pko s and, for a specific pko , across various types of peacekeepers (troops, military observers, and civilian police) and over time. This paper fills the blank of our empirical analysis of UN pko personnel contributions by presenting a new dataset on UN pko Authorized Strength. Using UN Security Council Resolutions and Secretary-General Reports, this dataset provides monthly and annual data for most UN pko s’ authorized strength in the post-cold war era. Using the authorized strength as the benchmark, we analyze the features, patterns, possible reasons as well as consequences of UN pko personnel shortages.