A seat at an irrelevant table
The Security Council is supposed to be the cockpit of global peace. In reality, it is a room with five kings and 10 spectators.
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The Security Council is supposed to be the cockpit of global peace. In reality, it is a room with five kings and 10 spectators.
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President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has returned from New York where he had asked the world to vote the Philippines into a non-permanent United Nations Security Council seat. The Philippines, he said, has always been “part of the solution.”
He said the country fought in the Korean War under the UN flag, it sent peacekeepers to far-flung conflicts, and paid its dues on time, even landing on the UN’s honor roll of contributors. All of which is true.
But the question is not whether the Philippines has been a loyal member of the United Nations. The question is simpler, and harder. What exactly would a seat on the Security Council do for Filipinos? Let us first dispel the illusion of power.
The Security Council is supposed to be the cockpit of global peace. In reality, it is a room with five kings and 10 spectators. The kings are the permanent members — the United States, Russia, China, Britain and France. Each has veto power, which means any one of them can kill any resolution.
The rest of the world, including whatever country temporarily wins a seat — the Philippines perhaps, if this campaign succeeds — can debate, negotiate, and cast votes all they want. But when one of the five decides otherwise, the discussion ends there.
It is a curious arrangement. The world’s supreme peace body is governed by the privilege of a handful of states. The result is what we see today.
The war in Ukraine drags on. Gaza burns. Sudan collapses into civil war. Myanmar remains trapped under military rule. The Security Council meets, drafts resolutions, condemns the violence, then someone vetoes it and the whole exercise goes up in diplomatic smoke.
It is not that the UN is utterly useless. It does humanitarian work, it runs agencies, and it organizes conferences where nations can at least talk before they start shooting. But the idea that the Security Council commands the world’s peace is a relic of another century.
These days, the council cannot even command agreement among its permanent members.
Which brings us back to the Philippine campaign. Suppose the country wins a seat from 2027 to 2028. What then?
Our diplomats will sit at the famous horseshoe table. They will deliver speeches about peace and stability. They will participate in negotiations whose outcomes are already constrained by the interests of the big powers.
That is diplomacy. There is honor in it. But will it change anything at home? Will it stop Chinese ships from bullying Filipino fishermen in the West Philippine Sea? Will it lower the price of rice in the markets? Will it reduce the electricity bill of a household in Quezon City or Cebu?
The honest answer is no.
The Philippines has bigger battles to fight — economic, territorial, social — and most of them will not be decided in New York conference rooms.
Thus, there is something faintly tragic about the spectacle of small nations campaigning for a temporary seat in a body that itself seems increasingly irrelevant to the realities of power.
The great powers settle their disputes elsewhere — through alliances, sanctions, trade wars, sometimes real wars. The Security Council merely reacts.
To be fair, Marcos is not wrong when he says the Philippines has a record of service — or servitude, if you may — to the United Nations. That record exists. Filipino peacekeepers have done admirable work. Our diplomats have often spoken with clarity in international forums.
Still, prestige is not policy. Winning a Security Council seat would make for a fine headline in the diplomatic pages. It would show that the Philippines can still rally votes among the community of nations.
But whether it would matter in the life of an ordinary Filipino is another question entirely. One suspects the answer would not be found in New York.
