In today's seamless world, political frontiers have become less salient both for international organisations, whose rights and duties can extend beyond borders, and for member states, whose responsibilities within borders can be held to international scrutiny. This is a world characterized more by its major cities and agglomerations, with nodes of financial and economic power and their globally wired transport and communications networks. Cumulatively, they span an increasingly interconnected and interactive world characterized more by technology-driven exchange and communication than by territorial borders and political separation.

In this period of transition, the United Nations is the focus of the hopes and aspirations for a future where men and women live at peace with themselves and in harmony with nature. Over a billion people living in abject poverty will have had neither the spirit nor the means to cheer the arrival of the new millennium. The reality of human insecurity cannot simply be wished away. Yet the idea of a universal organization dedicated to protecting peace and promoting welfare - of achieving a better life in a safer world, for all - survived the death, destruction and disillusionment of armed conflicts, genocide, persistent poverty, environmental degradation and the many assaults on human dignity of the 20th century.

The comparative advantages of the UN are its universal membership, political legitimacy, administrative impartiality, technical expertise, convening and mobilizing power, and the dedication of its staff. Its comparative disadvantages are excessive politicization, ponderous pace of decision-making, impossible mandate, high cost structure, insufficient resources, bureaucratic rigidity, and institutional timidity. Many of the disadvantages are the product of demands and intrusions by 188 member states who own and control the organization, but some key members disown responsibility for giving it the requisite support and resources.

Universities are the marketplace of ideas. The United Nations University lies at the interface of the interaction between ideas, international organizations and international public policy. In an information society and world, the comparative advantage of UNU lies in its identity as the custodian and manager of knowledge-based networks and coalitions that give it a global mandate and reach.

The United Nations has the responsibility to protect international peace and promote human development. The UN Charter codifies best-practice state behavior. Scientists have a duty to make their knowledge available for the betterment of humanity. UNU has the mandate to link the two normally isolated worlds of scholarship and policy-making. The January 2000 conference held at the UNU in Tokyo was one item in the ongoing effort to fulfill that mandate. The Millennium Conference was organized to showcase new ideas and fresh thinking of relevance to the United Nations and, in a wider sense, to the challenges faced by humanity. The goal was to put all important issues on the table in order to set the scene for discussions and decisions in the millennium year, and to offer solutions that were creative, integrative and good examples of lateral thinking.

One recurring refrain in the conference was the tension between the twin processes of globalization and localization; a second common theme was the need for partnerships between different actors, including individuals, at all levels of social organization; and a third was the comprehensive and interconnected nature of many of today's major problems that require urgent policy measures. Solutions must be individual-centered, within the framework of human security which puts people first; they must be integrated and coordinated; and they must be holistic, tackling the roots of the problems even while ameliorating the symptoms of stress and distress.

Globalization refers both to process and outcome. National frontiers are becoming less relevant in determining the flow of ideas, information, goods, services, capital, labor and technology. The speed of modern communications makes borders increasingly permeable, while the volume of cross-border flows threatens to overwhelm the capacity of states to manage them. Globalization releases many productive forces that, if properly harnessed, can help to uplift millions from poverty, deprivation and degradation. But it can also unleash destructive forces - 'uncivil society' - such as flows of arms, terrorism, disease, prostitution, drug and people smuggling, etc. that are neither controllable nor solvable by individual governments. At the same time, and indeed partly in reaction to globalization, communities are beginning to re-identify with local levels of group identity.

Recommended solutions to the dilemma include decentralization and subsidiarity, on the principle that the locus of action and solution should be where the loci of the problems lie. There must be active participation of the local government, NGOs, and the private actors in all phases of planning and implementation. Thus international democracy promotion should be directed at building local capacity - supporting, financially and technically, the various pillars of democratization processes, the rule of law and the judicial system, the legislatures, in addition to assisting the conducting of elections.

The combined effect of globalization - both the process and the outcome - and localization is to erode the legitimacy and effectiveness of national governments and intergovernmental organizations. There has been a corresponding decline in levels of resources and support for international organizations, including the United Nations.

In the meantime, a host of new actors from civil society - NGOs, labor unions, churches - have become progressively more assertive in demanding a voice at all top decision-making tables. Sometimes developing countries attach their concerns to NGOs, while at other times NGOs attack the state of affairs in developing countries (slave labor, child labor, environmental laxness).

The solution to these challenges - in the fields of security, development and environment - lies in global governance. The goal of global governance is not the creation of world government, but of an additional layer of international decision-making between governments and international organizations which is comprehensive and not merely piecemeal social engineering, multisectoral, democratically accountable, and inclusive of civil society actors in the shared management of the troubled and fragile world order. There is the need to widen and strengthen international legal jurisdiction - in terms of compliance and actors - by building structured systems of incentives and disincentives.

At the same time, we must confront, address and redress the problem of unelected, unaccountable, unrepresentative and self-aggrandizing NGOs. They can be just as undemocratic as the governments and organizations they criticize, and represent single-issue vested interests such as the gun lobby. By contrast, most industrialized-country governments are multipurpose organizations trying to represent the public interest by the choice of the voters. In many developing countries, societies are busy building sound national governments as the prerequisite to effective governance: good governance is not possible without effective government.

Partnerships are called for between governments, international organizations, NGOs, other civil society organizations and individuals. Some countries are beginning to involve citizens more substantially in the political decisions-making process through well-designed public choice mechanisms like referenda. We are likely to witness increasing issue-specific networks and coalitions. The United Nations has the moral legitimacy, political credibility and administrative impartiality to mediate, moderate and reconcile the competing pulls and tensions associated with both the process and outcomes of globalization. Human security can provide the conceptual umbrella that brings together the four themes of the UNU Millennium Conference - security, development, environment and governance - within one coherent framework. This would help to give practical content to the opening words of the Charter, "We the peoples."

Under-Secretary-General van Ginkel is the Rector of UNU. Prof. Thakur is Vice Rector (Peace and Governance).

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