Britain and the United Nations

This volume is one of a series of national studies on international organization initiated by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and carried out by private institutions and individuals in more than twenty countries. This particular study has been written by Mr Geoffrey L. Goodwin, with the assistance of a Study Group of the Royal Institute of International Affairs under the chairmanship of the Rt Hon. Kenneth Younger, M.P., P.C.

The decision, taken in 1952, to initiate this programme reflected both the Endowment's long-standing conviction that international organizations, such as the United Nations, are central to the quest for peace and the assumption that their significance and functioning depend first and foremost upon the attitudes and policies of their members. The fact that the question of Charter review would be on the agenda of the General Assembly in 1955 also seemed to afford a unique opportunity for assessing the strengths and weak nesses of the United Nations in terms of national expectations and their fulfilment during the brief but rich testing period of the first ten years. Thus, in sponsoring this series of studies the Endowment has sought to encourage an exchange of unofficial national views on international organization, with the object of stimulating a closer examination of the past record and future potentialities of the United Nations and of increasing understanding of differences and similarities in national attitudes towards the organization.