(2004-03-23) Community Of Democracies

Jonathan Rauch on the idea of a CommunityOfDemocracies caucus within and outside the UN. In 1996, a private group called the United Nations Association of the United States of America floated the idea of a caucus solely for democracies. With 120 or so nations (out of 191 U.N. members), such a caucus could serve as a powerful counterweight to the traditional caucuses... "United Nations" is an oxymoron. Democracies and dictatorships are mongoose and cobra, with no real hope of uniting except opportunistically. But a community of democracies - that might just work. It already works in NATO and the EU. (Open Society)