| Summary/Abstract |
When, in An Agenda for Peace of June 1992, Boutros Boutros-Ghali set
out his vision for a revitalised UN after the Cold War, he offered a
definition of UN ‘peacekeeping’ in which the insertion of one innocentsounding
word appeared to herald a new era. ‘Peace-keeping’, the UN
secretary general probingly stated, ‘is the deployment of a UN presence
in the field, hitherto with the consent of all the parties concerned’.
Catching the attention of UN officials, academics and governments at
the time, the reference to ‘hitherto’ was deemed highly significant. It
seemed to imply that the tried and tested principles of UN peacekeeping
– its reliance on the principles of consent, impartiality and minimum use
of force except in self-defence – might now, in the post-Cold War era,
give way to a more expansive role for UN military forces, one that
would likely involve taking the initiative in the use of force.
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