8 - Should the United Nations Security Council leave it to the experts? The governance and accountability of UN sanctions monitoring

Summary

Introduction

The chapters in this collection use the example of United Nations sanctions as a means to explore the questions of accountability and governance that arise when legal norms are applied with cross-boundary effect. The boundaries in question are both physical, in the sense of clearly delineated national borders, as well as conceptual, as with the traditional distinctions that are drawn between the domains of public and private law, and between international and domestic law. Some contributors explore the broad theoretical questions that arise when seeking to enforce global norms across diverse jurisdictions (Danchin, Sampford). Some discuss accountability and governance at the international level, where the decision to apply cross-border norms is made (Chesterman, Hovell, Nasu). Some concentrate on the domestic interpretation, application and regulation of globally articulated norms (Botterill and McNaughton, Fraser, Nolan, Rice, Stewart, Tully). Others examine the way that actors at the domestic or regional level might influence the accountability and governance of actors at the international level, or vice versa (Boreham, Holmes, Mulgan, de Wet).

This chapter focuses on accountability and governance within the UN sanctions system for sanctions monitoring. The task of sanctions monitoring, which was traditionally undertaken by the Security Council's sanctions committees, is increasingly being delegated to independent bodies of experts. Over the past decade the Council has created a range of sanctions monitoring expert bodies. These bodies provide independent analysis of particular sanctions regimes and make recommendations to strengthen sanctions implementation.