The Economic and Social Council

• Author: Alexandre Tavadian
• Pages: 301-359

301

Chapter 5

THE ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL COUNCIL

The Covenant of the League of Nations contained only two provisions

that dealt with international cooperation in the economic and social

elds. These were the rst paragraph of the Preamble and Article 23

of the Covenant. The Preamble vaguely established a link between

international cooperation on the one hand and international peace

and security on the other: “In order to promote international cooper-

ation and to achieve international peace and security.” Article 23 was

limited in scope, dealing mostly with the protection of employment

rights of workers, just treatment of the native inhabitants, preven-

tion of human smuggling and drug tracking, supervision of the

trade in arms and ammunition, maintenance and protection of free-

dom of communications, equitable transit and treatment of mem-

bers in relation to commercial relations, and prevention and control

of disease.

The limited scope of international cooperation was due to the fact

that not all nations agreed on the necessity to mention in the Coven-

ant of the League cooperation in the economic and social spheres. In

particular, while the United States and France recognized that inter-

national cooperation in all areas was important to prevent another

war, they believed that the League of Nations was supposed to be a col-

lective security arrangement only. Great Britain and Italy, on the other

hand, favoured a broader role for the League and advocated for the

inclusion of provisions dealing with economic and social cooperation.

302 | UNITED NATIONS LAW, POLITICS, AND PRACTICE

Thus, the diluted and noncommittal text found in Article 23 of the

League’s Covenant was a compromise:

Article 23

Subject to and in accordance with the provisions of international

conventions existing or hereafter to be agreed upon, the Members

of the League:

(a) will endeavour to secure and maintain fair and humane con-

ditions of labour for men, women, and children, both in their

own countries and in all countries to which their commercial

and industrial relations extend, and for that purpose will estab-

lish and maintain the necessary international organisations;

(b) undertake to secure just treatment of the native inhabitants of

territories under their control;

(c) will entrust the League with the general supervision over the

execution of agreements with regard to the trac in women

and children, and the trac in opium and other dangerous

drugs;

(d) will entrust the League with the general supervision of the trade

in arms and ammunition with the countries in which the con-

trol of this trac is necessary in the common interest;

(e) will make provision to secure and maintain freedom of com-

munications and of transit and equitable treatment for the com-

merce of all Members of the League. In this connection, the

special necessities of the regions devastated during the war of

1914−1918 shall be borne in mind;

(f) will endeavour to take steps in matters of international concern

for the prevention and control of disease.

It is interesting to note that the Preamble of the Covenant used the

verb “achieve” in relation to peace and security and the verb “promote”

in relation to international cooperation. This was a clear indication

that achieving peace and security was the organization’s primary goal

whereas international cooperation was a mere ideal. This perception

gradually changed. The nexus between international peace and sec-

urity and the human condition became abundantly obvious during

World War II. The framers of the UN Charter understood that peace

Chapter 5: The Economic and Social Council | 303

and security were inseparable from economic development.1 Hence,

the idea of international cooperation in economic and social spheres

had ripened at the time of setting up the United Nations. During the

Dumbarton Oaks conference, the four allies (China, the United King-

dom, the United States, and the USSR)

reected the idea that the United Nations should be involved in eco-

nomic and social cooperation, albeit within a broader international

order which contemplated the International Bank for Reconstruc-

tion and Development, the International Monetary Fund and the

International Trade Organization (which of course became the

much watered-down General Agreement on Trade and Taris).2

The proposals worked out at Dumbarton Oaks “envisioned the cre-

ation of an Economic and Social Council . . . as a subsidiary body of

the General Assembly.”3 During the San Francisco Conference, the

nations decided to set up ECOSOC as a principal organ of the organ-

ization as opposed to as a subsidiary organ of the General Assembly.4

The rationale for this recommendation was:

The Committee agreed unanimously to recommend to Committee

E/1 that the Economic and Social Council be listed as a Principal

Organ of the Organization. This decision expressed the opinion

of the Committee that economic and social cooperation was of the

utmost importance to the success of the Organization as a whole,

and that the Charter should not give the impression that these

objectives were in any way subordinate to the other principal object-

ives of the Organization.5

1 Report of the High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change, UNGAOR, 59th

Sess, UN Doc A/59/565 (2004) at para 274 [Report of the High-level Panel].

2 Gert Rosenthal, “The Economic and Social Council of the United Nations: Ann

Issues Paper” February 2005, No 15, Dialogue on Globalization at 8.

3 Ibid.

4 Charter of the United Nations, 26 June 1945, Can TS 1945 No 7, art 7.1 [Charter

of the United Nations].

5 United Nations Conference on International Organizations, Commission II, Com-

mittee 3, Economic and Social Cooperation, Report of the Rapporteur Doc 861

II/3/55 (1945) at 229.