A Choice Outstanding Academic Book of 2003. Translated into Arabic, French, and German.

The first study to trace the development and impact of the UN's most significant ideas on the world's economy.

"Carefully researched and well documented, this dissection of the UN's contributions and failures in the areas of international economic and social development is an important addition to the literature." —Choice

"With the publication of this first volume in the United Nations Intellectual History Project, a significant lacuna in 20th-century scholarship and international relations begins to be filled." —Kofi A. Annan, UN Secretary-General

"A provocative reminder of the major role of the United Nations in global social and economic affairs in the postwar period; and a tantalizing taste of what is still to come in a major intellectual effort better to understand the UN's past and potential future role." —Prof. Gerald K. Helleiner, University of Toronto

"This book as well as the whole project have the great value of raising questions about the easy, conservative realist approach that dominates diplomacy. I wish that I had had it when I was teaching courses on international organization." —Prof. Leon Gordenker, Princeton University

Good data, Michael Ward argues, serve to enhance a perception about life as well as to deepen an understanding of reality. This history of the UN's role in fostering international statistics in the postwar period demonstrates how statistics have shaped our understanding of the world. Drawing on well over 40 years of experience working as a statistician and economist in more than two dozen countries around the world, Ward traces the evolution of statistical ideas and how they have responded to the needs of policy while unraveling the question of why certain data were considered important and why other data and concerns were not. The book explores the economic, social, and environmental dimensions of the UN's statistical work and how each dimension has provided opportunities for describing the well-being of the world community. Quantifying the World also reveals some of the missed opportunities for pursuing alternative models.

“The political economy of international statistics hardly exists as a subject, but could scarcely be more important to our understanding of the world. We read the world through statistics, but we know little about the non-technical aspects of how they are formulated. This book makes a strong contribution to filling the gap.”—Prof. Robert Hunter Wade, London School of Economics

“Ward’s volume is a well-informed and engaged account of the intellectual and political controversies underlying an essential, expensive, and in many ways successful, UN activity that takes place without notice by the media or the public—the development and assembling of international statistical data.”—Robert E. Lipsey, National Bureau of Economic Research

“This seminal work tracks the UN statistical system from the bold and idealistic days of its foundation when its objective was to “quantify the world” through to today’s obsessions with performance targets. It covers a fascinating debate on the value of internationally harmonized data, highlighting the danger of vesting power in information entirely in the hands of governments. It is essential reading for anyone interested in ‘political arithmetic.’”—Denise Lievesley, UNESCO Institute for Statistics

Unity and Diversity in Development Ideas retraces the contribution of each of the UN’s five regional commissions—Europe, Asia, and the Far East, Latin America, Africa, and Western Asia—to UN development thinking and also considers the adaptation of UN global principles to the specific condition of each region. Confronted with the same broad issues—growth, employment, inequality, regional tensions, and globalization—the regional commissions generated different, and sometimes innovative, responses that reflected their economic and cultural diversity. With contributions from former executive secretaries of the commissions themselves and from experts in the individual regions, Unity and Diversity in Development Ideas is an invitation to the UN system to undertake a serious reflection on the formulation of global initiatives. It is also a plea for the UN to draw from its invaluable wealth of national, regional, and global experiences a vision of development adapted to the 21st century.

“In showing the diversity of issues faced by the various regions and the diversity of answers developed by the UN Regional Commissions, this book clearly demonstrates that one-size-fits-all policies are inadequate to our world.”—Stéphane Hessel, Ambassadeur de France

“The UN’s economic commissions have been the source of much of the real innovation in our understanding of economic development. Such ideas, documented by this second volume in the series, are one of the lasting legacies of the United Nations system. Indeed. The UN Intellectual History Project is long overdue.”—Craig N. Murphy, M. Margaret Ball Professor of International Relations, Wellesley College

A Choice Outstanding Academic Book of 2005.

UN Contributions to Development Thinking and Practice is at once a history of the ideas and realities of international development, from the classical economists to the recent emphasis on human rights, and a history of the UN's role in shaping and implementing development paradigms over the last half century. The authors, all prominent in the field of development studies, argue that the UN's founding document, the UN Charter, is infused with the human values and human concerns that are at the center of the UN's thinking on economic and human development today. In the intervening period, the authors show how the UN's approach to development evolved from mainstream areas of economic development to include issues of employment, poverty reduction, fairer distribution of the benefits of growth, equality of men and women, child development, social justice, and environmental sustainability.

“The far-reaching contributions that the United Nations has made to the theory and practice of development policy are often underappreciated. This well documented study takes a powerful step towards correcting that neglect. It also helps us to understand the continuing relevance of many of the major developmental ideas that have emanated from this remarkable institution.” —Prof. Amartya Sen, Harvard University

“A timely and important study that casts new light on the pioneering—and too little recognized—role played by the United Nations system in shaping some of the most important development thinking and results over the last 60 years. In doing so it not only provides valuable lessons from the past but helps point the way to a 21st century agenda that remains true to the bedrock UN principles of putting people at the heart of development.”—Mark Malloch Brown, United Nations Development Programme

“Often when the Bretton Woods Institutions continued along a path of narrow orthodoxy, the UN stood up with new ideas and alternative policies. This volume documents these and other too often ignored but important contributions over the UN’s 60 years.”—Prof. Joseph E. Stiglitz, Columbia University

“Our understanding of debates over the nature of economic development, the role of international organisations and the place of economists in shaping policy are transformed by this readable and deeply researched book. It makes a major contribution to the history of economic thought and of post-war economic change.”—Prof. Martin Daunton, University of Cambridge

“This thoroughly researched history gives a lively and readable account of what seven famous economists contributed to UN thinking. The UN work of Kalecki, Kaldor, Prebisch, Singer, Furtado, Dell, and Noyola Vazquez is critically re-examined and its later consequences are explored. In the final chapter, the authors offer their own important proposals for reform of the current international economic architecture.”—José Antonio Ocampo, Under-Secretary General for Economic and Social Affairs, United Nations

“This thoughtful and scholarly book, surveying the origins and evolution of United Nations economic policy-making, cogently illuminates how the asymmetrical power among nations has shaped the institutions we see today. It is essential reading for anyone who wishes to understand contemporary international economic institutions.”—Frances Stewart, Director, Centre for Research on Inequality, Human Security, and Ethnicity (CRISE), University of Oxford

Also available for download from www.unhistory.org.

The UN has had a more positive and pioneering record on the economic and social arena than is generally recognized. Its contributions to development, thinking, and ideas are among its most important achievements. Yet often these are little known. This short book provides an overview of those contributions, drawing on the results and findings of the UN Intellectual History Project already published or in preparation.

“The United Nations is the grand experiment of our age, and, like all experiments, it proceeds through trial and error. Far from being a distant bureaucracy, the UN is composed of individuals who are reshaped by vital experiences. UN Voices gives international civil servants human faces and shows how ideas drive the grand experiment. It is a fascinating book.”—Prof. Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., historian and special assistant to President John F. Kennedy

“The authors have cajoled, intrigued or reassured their seventy-three “voices” into telling a fascinating story of the UN and its institutions, which is also a story of seventy-three individual lives; of women and men who are no longer simply voices, but individuals with their own complicated histories of emigration and education, family relationships and professional choices, hopes and successes.”—Prof. Emma Rothschild, King’s College, Cambridge University

“This extremely impressive oral history volume puts a human face on the ideas and individuals that have shaped the 60 year history of the United Nations. “Voices” is an astonishingly moving personal as well as institutional oral history, drawing upon the testimonies of 73 leaders whose idealism, strategic thinking and collective cooperation led to a system of global governance. This book could not have been more timely, as it is an intellectual contribution that will guide our future even as it illuminates our past.”—Mary Marshall Clark, Director, Oral History Research Office, Columbia University

In Women, Development, and the UN, internationally noted development economist and activist Devaki Jain traces the ways in which women have enriched the work of the United Nations from the time of its founding in 1945. Synthesizing insights from the extensive literature on women and development and from her own broad experience, Jain reviews the evolution of the UN's programs aimed at benefiting the women of developing nations and the impact of women's ideas about rights, equality, and social justice on UN thinking and practice regarding development. Jain presents this history from the perspective of the southern hemisphere, which recognizes that development issues often look different when viewed from the standpoint of countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. The book highlights the contributions of the four global women's conferences in Mexico City, Copenhagen, Nairobi, and Beijing in raising awareness, building confidence, spreading ideas, and creating alliances. The history that Jain chronicles reveals both the achievements of committed networks of women in partnership with the UN and the urgent work remaining to bring equality and justice to the world and its women.

“Devaki Jain opens the doors of the United Nations and shows how it has changed the female half of the world—and vice versa. Women, Development, and the UN is a book that every global citizen, government leader, journalist, academic, and self-respecting woman should read.”—Gloria Steinem

“Devaki Jain’s book nurtures your optimism in this terrible war-torn decade by describing how women succeeded in empowering both themselves and the United Nations to work toward a global leadership inspired by human dignity.”—Fatema Mernissi

“MacFarlane and Khong … offer us a thought-provoking and realistic critique of what they term the overreach of human security as a concept as well as its practical limitations. This is an important and stimulating book.”—Prof. J. Ann Tickner, University of Southern California

“[A] major contribution to our understanding of the ideational role of international organizations. The research is extensive, the writing lucid, and their assessment is clear-eyed and relevant.”—Prof. Stephen M. Walt, Harvard University

“Human beings as individuals have increasingly been placed at the center of international scholarly and policy discourse. Perhaps surprisingly for an organization made up of governments, the United Nations has been at the forefront of capturing this historic shift in the new conceptual language of human security. The “how,” “why” and “so what” of the shift is brilliantly analyzed by MacFarlane and Khong in this important new book that is rigorous, detached, and critical rather than mushy and full of passionate conviction.”—Prof. Ramesh Thakur, Senior Vice-Rector, United Nations University

This innovative, high profile volume presents an authoritative and accessible state-of-the-art analysis of the United Nations. The volume is intended to shape the discipline of UN studies, and to establish itself as the essential point of reference for all those working on, in, or around the world organization. The volume is substantial in scope, containing 40 chapters from 49 leading scholars and practitioners - writing sometimes controversially, but always authoritatively - on the key topics and debates that define the institution.

“This Handbook is extraordinarily ambitious and very timely, providing the most comprehensive assessment available anywhere of the UN's performance in an increasingly challenging global environment, and featuring an outstanding cast of authors. It will be an indispensable reference guide for scholars and practitioners alike.”—Prof. John G. Ruggie, Harvard University, Former UN Assistant Secretary-General

“The Oxford Handbook on the United Nations provides the essential overview of the UN under its Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon. Timely and authoritative, the book provides a well-judged balance of analysis, critique, and prescription at a crucial time for the World Organization.”—Mary Robinson, President, Realizing Rights: The Ethical Globalization Initiative, Former President of Ireland and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights

“Given the constant pressure of events within the United Nations, and rapid developments in all the fields that it touches, it is very useful to have a study that stands back and reflects on the challenges for the United Nations as the new Secretary-General takes office. The Oxford Handbook on the United Nations is clearly a scholarly and important work. The editors of this volume have sought contributors of the highest quality to comment on the track record of the Organisation and to make recommendations for the future. The Handbook will surely be of interest to all those who know - or think that they know – the United Nations.”—Judge Rosalyn Higgins, President of the International Court of Justice

This book will be an assessment of the revolutionary idea of human rights, beginning with the UN Charter and the Universal Declaration and ending with the contemporary emphasis on the holistic package of civil, political, economic, social, and group rights. The analysis will raise questions about the unfinished revolution, not the least whether the world, as too often before, may be entering a phase of reversal in what was a major area of human advance. The authors will examine important advances and continued strong support for human rights that will not easily be reversed by the war on terror. The outcome, as so often before, will depend on the pressures brought to bear by civil society.