United nations organisation : a collective security system?

Abstract EN

Unlike security through the balance of power which marked the international system in the 19th century, collective security is based on the "imbalance of forces", those brought together by all the Member States against any aggressor.

United Nations Organisation has always been portrayed by both politicians and political scientists as the concretisation of the collective security concept, and is often qualified as a collective security system.

To verify the accuracy of this statement, we will first define the main features of collective security, before searching whether these characteristics apply to United Nations Organisation or not.

We will conclude that considering the UN as a collective security mechanism is nothing but a myth, and that this organisation has rather been conceived as a balance of power system and that it has always been intended to function as a concert of powers.