Security Council Resolution 678 and Persian Gulf Decision Making: Precarious Legitimacy

In his recent book The Power of Legitimacy Among Nations, Thomas Franck defines “legitimacy” as it applies to the rules applicable among states . “Legitimacy,” he writes , “is a property of a rule or rule-making institution which itself exerts a pull toward compliance on those addressed normatively because those addressed believe that the rule or institution has come into being and operates in accordance with generally accepted principles of right process. In adopting Resolution 678 of November 29, 1990, implicitly authorizing the use of force against Iraq in response to Iraq’s August 2, 1990 invasion and subsequent occupation of Kuwait, the United Nations Security Council made light of fundamental UN Charter precepts and thereby flirted precariously with “generally accepted principles of right process.” It eschewed direct UN responsibility and accountability for the military force that ultimately was deployed, favoring, instead, a delegated, essentially unilateralist determination and orchestration of world policy, coordinated and controlled almost exclusively by the United States. And, in so doing, it encouraged a too-hasty retreat from the preeminently peaceful and humanitarian purposes and principles of the United Nations. As a consequence, it set a dubious precedent, both for the United Nations as it stands today and for the “new world order” that is claimed for tomorrow.