How to build a bridge

In these complicated and stressful times, many people have stopped reading the news.

Speaking to a packed house at a UM event taking place at the Canadian Museum for Human Rights this past January, the Hon. Lloyd Axworthy bemusedly confessed to getting “a little irritated” by such declarations at dinner parties whenever conversation turned to the Trump Administration or the mind-boggling torrent of bad news.  

“When people say, ‘I just can’t watch the news anymore,’ I think, ‘Well that’s your prerogative, but if you can’t watch the news then maybe go and help create some news that’s better news,’” said Axworthy.

Disengagement and despondency in the face of the constant barrage is, for Axworthy, a misunderstanding of the political process and what it means to be a global citizen.

He was in Winnipeg as part of the J.W. Dafoe Political Studies Students’ Conference, organized annually by UM political studies students. This year’s conference focussed on the topic, “The UN at 80: Successes, Hopes, Failures and Challenges.” Marking its fortieth year, the student-run conference featured not one but two well-known Canadian political figures: Axworthy, former Minister of Foreign Affairs under the Chrétien government, and Bob Rae, a Canadian diplomat and former provincial and federal politician who currently serves as the Permanent Representative of Canada to the UN in New York.

UM students and experts on what it means to be a global citizen today.

Both gave insights about the history and possible future of the organization, and how, from the signing of its charter on June 26, 1945, the UN has helped build relationships between nation-states — but also to amplify and strengthen human security globally.

Andrea Charron in conversation with Lloyd Axworthy on stage at the J.W. Dafoe Political Studies Students’ Conference, Canadian Museum for Human Rights, January 2025. Photo: Bill Featherstone

It’s complicated

UM political studies professor Andrea Charron says that the UN is understood as having two souls: the first entails peace and security — the motivating factors following the Second World War that are the domain of the powerful UN Security Council (UNSC) and especially the 5 veto-wielding Permanent Members (P5): China, France, Russia, the UK and the US.

The second soul, and often overlooked,” she says, “are the ‘soft security’ goals that include reaffirming faith with fundamental human rights, social justice and progress, cooperation and development.”

In relation to this second purpose, it’s important to remember that though “the UN is deeply flawed, no other organization has the reach and mandate to feed, vaccinate, protect and defend the poorest in the world,” she says.

Charron is director of UM’s Centre for Defence and Security Studies and served as an advisor to the student-organizers of the conference.

Canadian Armed Forces members during the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Mali in 2019. Photo: Department of National Defence TM02-2019-0076-0010

She also notes that new ‘peacekeeping’ missions today are complicated, “often involving the use of force to establish the conditions for a cease fire between states and non-state actors, and with civilians are the main targets of violence, especially women and girls.” With the possibility of required force, it’s the UNSC (particularly the P5) that decides if a new mission is authorized.

Charron’s recommended reading: Adam Chapnick’s authoritative book on Canada’s role on the UN.  

Bob Rae gave a keynote at the Canadian Museum for Human Rights as part of the J.W. Dafoe Political Studies Students’ Conference, January 2025. Photo: Bill Featherstone

The UN: ‘Sounds like a good idea’

In his keynote address, Bob Rae observed that the UN experiment is one with an inherent tension, between “united” and “nations” — a tension that encompasses hopes, challenges and frustrations. Diplomacy and politics, he pointed out, have always historically included that same tension between the realists and idealists, between the obstacles and shortcomings and the hopes and possibilities.

“I’m always reminded of the joke Mahatma Gandhi told when he was asked, what did he think of Western civilization, and he said, ‘It sounds like a good idea,’” said Rae.

“And the same thing could be said of United Nations. It would be a good idea but we’re not united. But the problems that surround us are problems that require our unity and require our collective will to deal with.”

While the UN was not designed to resolve all conflict or address every injustice, its creation has resulted in gains in human rights around the world, he said.

He added, “It’s important to stress that when the UN was born [and the Charter was created], it came as a result of a process of debate and discussion.”

Now there are 193 member states from all over the globe in the UN, which started with just over 50 countries. Rae noted that it’s remarkable “just to sit and listen and learn from what it is that is said as people describe who they are and the journey that they have been on and that process of decolonization that’s taken place … and the remarkable acts of generosity and remarkable acts of reconciliation that go well beyond what we thought was possible in in 1945.”

In summation, he said, “We live with this contradiction at the heart of the UN: it’s full of these aspirations and achievements at the same times as it’s full of its inabilities to fully achieve.”

UN and Canada flags at International Issues Speaker Series in Ottawa, organized by the United Nations Association in Canada (UNA-Canada), 2020. Photo: UNA-Canada

A global parliament in need of repair?

Fundamentally, the United Nations Charter “can be understood as a ‘global constitution’ that regulates the relationships between states,” says assistant professor of law Nathan Derejko, “and the UN General Assembly as the ‘global parliament’ where all states are equal and have both a voice and a vote.” Derejko is the Mauro Chair in Human Rights and Social Justice at UM and was a panelist at the conference.

The UN’s effectiveness — or perceived lack thereof — is dependent upon the political will of member states, he says. “All too often shortcomings and failure are placed exclusively on the UN,” he says, “when in reality it is the direct result of the actions, inaction, or inadequate actions of states.”

Second-year master’s student in political studies Lindsay Speirs was one of the conference organizers. She points out that despite its flaws, the UN remains the most capable organization to address issues between states in a fair and legal manner — even though many states find ways to evade or disregard these rules — and to aid the most vulnerable in ways that would not be otherwise possible.

She adds that while “the UNSC and the powers that the P5 member states possess may be a point of criticism, it offers a valuable forum for great power dialogue to enable structured change.” She sees hope in the unique capacity of the UN, with its flexible Charter, to evolve.

Adam Muller, a UM professor and human rights scholar who was another panelist at the conference, sees the UN as in need of repair and restoration. Muller is the director of UM’s Peace and Conflict Studies programs.

He says Canada is well-suited to take a lead role in any such work of repair, as a so-called middle power with a long record of successful transnational collaboration, a commitment to human and Indigenous rights, and respect for the rule of law.

Charron agrees and sees Ambassador Bob Rae’s position as President of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) as one key to Canada’s future role at the UN.

As the US withdraws funding and interest, she says, “Canada needs to be prepared to contribute more resources and to fill important roles in UN agencies like the World Health Organization, ECOSOC, and the International Court of Justice.”

The opening of the 24th Session of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues in New York, April 2025. UN Photo/Loey Felipe

Where is the UN on the rights of Indigenous Peoples?

Brenda Gunn is a UM professor of law and newly appointed Expert Member of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, 2026-28. She developed a handbook on understanding and implementing the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) that is one of the main resources in Canada.

As a conference panelist, she addressed “the evolving role of Indigenous peoples in the UN and how Indigenous peoples can participate as Indigenous peoples, not as Non-Governmental Organizations, but as full governments, sitting in the rooms with a voice when our issues and rights arise,” she explains.

She notes that throughout the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries, Europeans signed many treaties with Indigenous peoples grounded in both European and Indigenous legal principles; recognizing Indigenous peoples as sufficiently autonomous to enter into treaties.

“The preamble of the UN Declaration clearly explains that recognizing the rights of Indigenous peoples in Canada is critical to reset the relationship,” she says, “moving us away from a colonial relationship where Canada makes all decisions for Indigenous peoples, to a new relationship based on principles of justice, democracy, respect for human rights, non-discrimination and good faith.”

Axworthy strongly endorses the restoration of Indigenous peoples as a founding nation of Canada: to be actively involved with the justice system and education. He advocates for starting a “serious dialogue amongst Canadians” on this issue, to “correct an error of the past and build something as a positive direction for the future.”

Correcting the lie at the heart of Canada’s story, said Axworthy, will “open the doors for full participation for our Indigenous community — not only domestically but in what we do internationally.”

Bob Rae (right) next to Lloyd Axworthy and Andrea Charron at a packed house at Canadian Museum for Human Rights as part of the J.W. Dafoe Political Studies Students’ Conference, January 2025. Photo: Bill Featherstone

Bridge-building for global citizenship now

Rather than defaulting to transactional relationships and “deal-making,” suggested Axworthy, it’s important to come into politics and diplomacy “with a framework, with a set of ideals: here’s what’s right and what’s wrong — and try to make things a little more right.”

His approach is about active bridge-building over differences, and he maintained that growing up in North End Winnipeg had a lasting effect on his approach to politics and diplomacy.

“There was diversity and accommodation and people in need, living all together,” he noted, adding that the principles of public service and accommodation were reinforced by his time as a Chretien Liberal during the Quebec Referendum. Never taking unity for granted; instead working to “be able to live with difference, not perfectly, but to ‘get along,’” as he put it. He stressed the importance of seeing democracy as an opportunity to work together for the greater good.

Muller: ‘The practice of global citizenship isn’t always easy, perhaps especially in times like ours when so many of our social and political interactions seem purpose-built to divide, unsettle or silence us.’

For Derejko, the “heart and soul of global citizenship is empathy and action for all people and the planet. It means understanding that our life choices in our communities can and do affect individuals in communities across the globe.”

Empathy and openness to others’ differences are also key for Muller, and he emphasizes that global citizenship goes beyond “being” to “doing.” His approach draws on a school of thought going back to Ancient Greece that holds that “we are what we do.”

Muller admits, “The practice of global citizenship isn’t always easy, especially in times like ours when so many of our social and political interactions seem purpose-built to divide, unsettle or silence us.”

UM experts on what it means to be a global citizen today.

Becoming a global citizen requires that we challenge these obstacles and are “actively seeking connection with and understanding of others,” he contends.

“Global citizenship obliges us to think and act in a spirit of radical openness vis-à-vis other ways of being and doing in the world,” says Muller, “even, and maybe especially, when those ways seem offensive or strange.

“This kind of openness towards cultural and other differences lies at the heart of our efforts to cultivate empathy and undermine prejudice.”

Mariianne Mays Wiebe