discuss briefly whether international organisations function in a democratic manner give reasons for your answer
Answers
i)In democracy, the general public is involved in elections of the officials, however this is not true with international organizations as the voting rights for leadership position lie with a few countries.(e.g in in the UN, the existence of the five permanent members means that these positions are not subject to elections.)
ii)In democracy decisions are not based on the financial capability of the people- however in the international organizations, this is not the same as only countries that contribute more or are considered powerful make final decisions in international organizations. For example in the IMF and the UN, the countries that contribute more have the privilege of making crucial decisions.
iii)In international organizations the leadership is more of monarch than democracy. This is because the countries that contribute more to the organizations will always hold the decision making positions. The perfect example is in the five permanent UN parliament members- they are there to stay.
iv)In democracies the rule is by majority-the majority rules. However in the international organizations, the few key players have the final say in crucial matters. On paper, it may seem that all the constituting countries have equal voting rights, but this might not be true an example being in the the absolute powers the permanent members of the UN have (if they wanted to, they could overturn any decision made by the UN .
v)In a democracy all members are regarded as equal. However, this might not be true considering how the international organizations operate. Some of the countries like the US,China, Russia,France,UK and others do not receive the same treatment as other nations do. Since this countries have key positions in most of the organizations they are in, it is hard to imagine that they do not make decisions on behalf of the other countries.