As is common to many organizations, the United Nations operates based on rules and regulations outlined in its charter.  And, in order to become a member of the United Nations, each country that joins must sign and agree to these regulations and procedures.  The same is true of its peacekeeping operations.  In order to begin a new peacekeeping operation, there must be the potential for sustainable peace in a currently warring country.

While each peacekeeping operation has the ultimate goal to “alleviate human suffering and to create conditions and build institutions for self-sustaining peace,” they do not however take any kind of ends-based action.  Instead, each peacekeeping action taken by UN is based on a set of conditions and rules which must be met.  These include “a genuine desire on the part of the warring parties to solve their differences peacefully, a clear mandate, strong political support by the international community, and the provision of the resources necessary to achieve the operation’s objectives.”  At no point are questions raised regarding the probable outcome of the mission, but instead, these are replaced by the hope that through the operation sustainable peace can be achieved.

 While the UN’s goal is definitely a moral one, its approach may not be however.  Despite all the good that the UN tries to create, they often fail in recognizing and measuring the consequences of their actions.  As they are attempting to work with several different parties at one time to bring peace between them, each party also has its own agenda and aspirations.  It is when these turn from achieving and keeping peace that trouble ensues and military force becomes a primary tool for the UN.  These uncontrollable and unforeseen consequences are where the peacekeeping forces of the UN lack in ends-based morality.  When this does occur, they must often utilize their military resources while retaining their rule of minimizing the suffering of non-combatants.  This then also leads the peacekeepers to undertake great personal risks.  Additionally, under certain circumstances and despite immense efforts by peacekeepers, peace simply cannot be achieved.  Such was the case in Rwanda in 1994 and in Somalia and Bosnia between 1992 and 1995.

While the peacekeeping efforts of the UN seek to achieve a very positive and moral objective, they however, only rely upon the rules-based method.  And, while this method has been utilized for decades, only by incorporating different aspects of the ends-based method can optimal results and minimal loss be achieved.