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Council Unbound: the Growth of UN Decision Making on Conflict and Postconflict Issues After the Cold War.

Article Excerpt
COUNCIL UNBOUND: THE GROWTH OF UN DECISION MAKING ON CONFLICT AND POSTCONFLICT ISSUES AFTER THE COLD WAR

Michael J. Matheson

U.S. Institute of Peace Press Books, 2006

422 pp., $50.00 (Hardback) $19.95 (Paperback)

Michael J. Matheson's Council Unbound brings to the fore how the United Nations Security Council has developed an "entirely new system of legal authority for managing threats to peace and security" since the end of the Cold War. A former principal deputy legal adviser to the U.S. Department of State, a member of the international law faculty of the George Washington University School of Law and of the UN International Law Commission, Matheson reviews how this has come to pass and elucidates the ways in which this new authority is being played out today. In so doing, he brings attention to actions of the Security Council that go to the heart of today's pressing questions regarding UN renewal in light of the changing role of state sovereignty and emergence of significant non-state actors of many kinds. His style is matter of fact, clear and informative, and in some way belies the importance of the issues at hand.

While Council Unbound does not directly take up the issue of UN renewal, Matheson's work of cataloging and analyzing the post-Cold War expansion of the Security Council's application of its Chapter VII authority does provide a clear basis for assessing the legal and...

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