A Battlefield TransformedThe United Nations and the Struggle over Postcolonial Statehood

Abstract

As much as the United Nations (UN) provided an institutional context for decolonization, decolonization itself effected a profound transformation in the legal structures and powers of the UN. This chapter argues that that transformation was understood as necessary for the construction of modern states in the decolonized world—but that the meaning and expression of modern statehood was intensely contested throughout the period of decolonization. The chapter traces a series of interconnected struggles in the early UN over the form and functions of the nation-state, each of which resulted in innovations in the institutional framework and powers of the UN. In particular, it focuses on three axes of struggle, over the meaning of self-government, the values and practices of modern government, and the import of sovereign equality.