Within the GLBT community, misunderstanding as to what the UN can reasonably be expected to accomplish is at least as pervasive as it is in other communities. The UN is not a world government. It is an inter-governmental organization comprised of Member States. The UN does not tell its Member States what to do; on the contrary, Member States determine what sort of projects the UN should embark upon, and how its money (collected from the Member States through assessed contributions) is to be spent. Only in very limited circumstances does the UN take action which may be perceived as circumscribing the sovereignty of individual Member States and the results, when it does so, are far from consistently successful.
In the sphere of GLBT rights, perceptions range from a view of the UN as an international vanguard to a view that it’s irrelevant in the global struggle for equal rights. While the latter may once have been closer to the truth, the potential exists for the UN to play a leadership role in this struggle. After more than a half century of mostly silence on the issue, the UN was compelled in ’03 to publicly place the matter of GLBT rights front-and-center in response to an initiative by Brazil and other countries at the UN Commission on Human Rights. Despite these initiatives, the UN human rights bodies have thus far not succeeded in this initiative. One matter of internal importance to the UN has the potential to signal a shift in the international body’s attitude toward alternative families. In the past, benefits and entitlements of UN employment have always been directly linked to family status. If a UN employee is married with dependent spouse and children, he or she receives a significantly higher overall remuneration package than an unmarried or non-parental counterpart (encompassing things like dependency allowances, education grants, and the like). And same-sex domestic or marital partners have been denied medical insurance and pension payments that married opposite-gender couples receive. At long last, these rigid practices are evolving to accommodate nontraditional families. Largely in response to the ongoing advocacy of two staff representative organizations (Federation of International Civil Servants Associations [fisca]and UN Gay, Lesbian or Bisexual Employees [un-globe]), the UN has begun to recognize the same-sex relationships of staff members for purposes of benefits and entitlements. While this internal development does not change the UN’s official external position on GLBT rights, it does constitute a potentially useful precedent. Fisca, un-globe and individual staff member advocacy have employed a variety of tactics, including one-on-one meetings with key, senior UN officials; drafting and defending appeals of aggrieved staff through established channels of internal administration of justice; and concrete, officially advanced proposals to heads of personnel and heads of administration. After roughly eight years of laying groundwork through the above tactics, un-globe hosted a pivotal conference in August 2003. A number of important GLBT activists and NGO representatives served as panelists; Secretary General Kofi Annan accepted an invitation to attend. The ostensible goal of this conference, held on UN premises, was to raise awareness about global GLBT issues. As Kofi Annan was leaving the hall, panelist Barney Frank asked him a rather pointed question: “The current discussion and debate is all well and good, but until such time as you put your own house in order, does it not ring a bit hollow?’ The fact that a number of UN Member States had begun to recognize same-gender relationships domestically has put significant additional pressure on the UN administration. By January 2004, Kofi Annan issued an internal instruction establishing that the UN Secretariat would recognize a staff member’s same-sex relationship for the purpose of benefits and entitlements of employment, provided that endorsement was first received from the government of the country of origin of the staff member. History was thus made. The UN recognized for the first time, a half-century after its founding, that there are lesbians and gays on its staff, and they deserve the same treatment as their straight colleagues. Recent success in this internal UN battle, albeit significant and heartening, falls short of the ultimate goal of staff representative organizations: recognition of the same-gender relationships of staff on the basis of a neutral set of criteria, without reference to practice in a staff member’s country of origin. Furthermore, certain UN offices have been slow to follow Kofi Annan’s lead at the UN Secretariat. The International Labor Organization (ILO) is a notable example. Un-globe (visit www.unglobe.org for more information) and individual staff advocacy therefore continue on a number of fronts. Note: Veteran UN staff member Todd Larson has served as FICSA and un-globe legal adviser / focal point throughout the above-described processes; he teaches an evening course entitled “International Organizations” at Hunter College. Stefan Schweinfest is a founding father of un-globe. Kieran Burns is its current vice president.
