The Executive Board of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) held its 48th session in Paris from June 3 to 20, 1957, under the chairmanship of Dr. Vittorino Veronese. After approving work plans for carrying out in 1957–1958 two major projects which had been endorsed by the ninth session of the General Conference, the Board allocated 1957–1958 budgets of $839, 209 for the first project, a ten-year plan for the promotion of better cultural understanding between east and west, and $500,000 for the second, a six-year project for scientific research on arid lands. A third major project, concerned with extension of primary education in Latin America, had been approved by the Board at its previous session.

Organizational and procedural problems occupied the greater part of the business of the first session of the South Pacific Commission which was held in Sydney, Australia, from May 11 to May 21, 1948. Although formal ratification of the agreement creating the commission had not been received from France and the Netherlands, both countries had stated that ratification was to be formalized as soon as possible, and their commissioners were empowered to act as though ratification had taken place.

This essay is addressed to the issue of the extent to which and the ways in which the United Nations may serve the interest of the United States in the maintenance of world peace during the decade that lies ahead. It rests upon two assumptions, both of which require careful qualification: first, the assumption that the United States has, and recognizes that it has, a fundamental interest in international peace; second, the assumption that the United Nations is in principle an organization dedicated to the promotion of international peace.

From its 874th through its 876th meetings the Security Council considered the complaint of the government of Cuba that that country had been subjected by the government of the United States to “repeated threats, harassments, intrigues, reprisals and aggressive acts.” The discussion was opened by Mr. Raúl Roa, Cuban Minister for Foreign Affairs, who began by asserting that Cuba had been under no juridical obligation to bring its complaint to the Organization of American States (OAS) before submitting it to the Council. He then traced the history of United States hostility to the revolutionary government of Cuba, hostility based, in his opinion, on opposition to the Agrarian Reform instituted by that government and culminating in the recent drastic curtailment of the Cuban sugar quota. In his reply to Mr. Roa, Mr. Lodge (United States) assured the Cuban government that the United States had no aggressive purposes against Cuba, and deplored the removal of the controversy between the two nations from its rightful forum in OAS to the Security Council. He also indicated, after a summary of Cuban-United States relations during the preceding year and a half from the United States point of view, that the reduction of the Cuban sugar quota had been no act of economic aggression, but rather a justifiable measure of self-protection on the part of the United States to ensure its needed supply of sugar in the face of acts by the Cuban government which made this supply extremely insecure. In conclusion, Mr. Lodge stated his belief that someday, somehow, Cuba and the United States would again be friends.

The World Health Organization sponsored an inter-regional conference on rabies, held on Coonoor, India, during July 1952, which gave intensive and individual training in complicated laboratory procedures to an international group. A consultant staff of eight members gave lectures, led discussions, and supervised the laboratory work of 47 participants. One of die objects of die conference was to teach standardized procedures in rabies tests so that results obtained in laboratories diroughout the world might be compared.

Mr. Paul van Zeeland (Belgium) presided over the eleventh session of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe which was held in Strasbourg, May 22 and 23. Several meetings of the ministers' deputies had been held prior to the convening of the eleventh session to consider primarily the Eden proposals, in particular a memorandum circulated by the United Kingdom deputy expanding his government's ideas. On the basis of this memorandum and on replies to a questionnaire circulated to governments by the deputies, the deputies reported to the Committee of Ministers that “it had not been possible to reach agreement on the action to be taken on the British proposals … the majority of the delegations considered that the Committee of Ministers and the Consultative Assembly of the Council of Europe … could be used as the ministerial and parliamentary institutions of (the restricted) Çommunities.” At its eleventh session, the Committee of Ministers, noting the report of the deputies, decided to give formal approval to the principles underlying the Eden proposals and to request the opinion of the Consultative Assembly on the best means of giving them effect.

PAFMECA was formed at a conference held in Mwanza, Tanganyika, from September 16 to 18, 1958, for the purpose of coordinating regional activities toward the achievement of independence for territories in East and Central Africa. The conference, which was attended by representatives of political parties from Kenya, Nyasaland, Tanganyika, Uganda, and Zanzibar, considered the following issues: 1) the position of those present toward (a) the non-African minorities in Kenya, Tanganyika, and Uganda, and (b) the Central African Federation (Nyasaland, Northern Rhodesia, and Southern Rhodesia); 2) methods for achieving coordinated action among the nationalist movements in East and Central Africa and for pooling resources in a concerted drive against imperialism; and 3) the development of a fundamental philosophic creed for the emergent African nations.

We analyze the design of an international climate agreement. In particular, we consider two goals of such an agreement: overcoming free-rider problems and adjusting for differences in mitigation costs between countries. Previous work suggests that it is difficult to achieve both of these goals at once under asymmetric information because countries free ride by exaggerating their abatement costs. We argue that independent information collection (investigations) by an international organization can alleviate this problem. In fact, though the best implementable climate agreement without investigations fails to adjust for individual differences even with significant enforcement power, a mechanism with investigations allows adjustment and can enable implementation of the socially optimal agreement. Furthermore, when the organization has significant enforcement power, the optimal agreement is achievable even with minimal investigative resources (and vice versa). The results suggest that discussions about institutions for climate cooperation should focus on information collection as well as enforcement.

The universal and regional international organizations that are part of the twentieth century political scene confront one basic question: how to move successfully from international recommendation to national action. Mechanisms that offer at least a partial answer to this problem are of interest; and one such approach is the official pressure group of the Consultative Assembly of the Council of Europe, its Permanent Working Party on Parliamentary and Public Relations.

The first extraordinary session of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) Assembly was convened at headquarters in Montreal from June 19 to 21, 1961, at the request of twelve of the contracting states, to consider increasing the size of the ICAO Council. The delegate of the United Kingdom proposed a change in article 50(a) of the ICAO convention to provide for 27 members of the ICAO Council instead of 21, and delegates of Venezuela, Cameroun, and South Africa immediately supported the increase. Among arguments advanced for expanding the Council were the following: 1) a Council of 21 no longer adequately represented the membership of the organization, which had reached 86; 2) adequate geographic representation was of paramount importance since international routes covered most of the world; 3) the increase would facilitate the participation in the Council's work of the more than twenty states that had achieved independence in the past few years; 4) the practice of holding an Assembly session only every three years placed greater responsibilities on the Council; and 5) all the specialized agencies except ICAO and the Intergovernmental Maritime Consultative Organization had increased the size of their executive bodies. Although there was some debate as to whether the increase ought to be to 25 or 27 members, the United Kingdom motion for the latter number prevailed, along with a proposal sponsored by the Italian and Venezuelan delegations stating that it was highly desirable for the amendment to the convention to come into force before the next Assembly session. Consequently, all contracting states to the convention were urged to ratify the amendment as soon as possible.

In the introduction to the annual report for 1954–1955 on the work of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) the Director-General of FAO (Cardon) stated that although FAO had many separate projects in the fields of agriculture, economics, fisheries, forestry, and nutrition, the organization had an over-all program, that of improving human well-being by increasing and improving the production, distribution, and utilization of food and other products of agriculture, forestry, and fisheries. He stated that progress had been made in unifying and integrating FAO's work since 1) each division of FAO contributed to the five major aspects of the general program, and 2) the work of direct technical advisory assistance for economic development had been more closely integrated with the regular FAO program. In elaborating on his themes of integration, the Director-General stated that “…the need grows more pressing for the closest integration within each receiving government, within each agency, among agencies, and with the like activities of bilateral and other programs”. During the year under review, considerable progress had been made in the more effective association of FAO's work with that of other international organizations.

The 40th session of the Council of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) consisted of twelve meetings held on April 27 and May 24 and between June 6 and 22, 1960. The Council examined the secretariat's draft of the preliminary study on supersonic aircraft and decided that the study should be issued on the responsibility of the ICAO Secretary-General, with suggestions made by representatives to the Council to be taken into account. The Council considered the reports of a working group on an investigation of major deficiencies in air navigation facilities and services on the main international air routes through Southeast Asia and the Pacific, Southeast Europe and the Middle East, and the Caribbean and south America. As recommended by the group, it approved for further investigation the following problems: 1) the lack of adequate flight testing of radio-navigation aids in all these areas; 2) the shortage of trained personnel in Iran, Iraq, and Turkey, and 3) the lack of proper transmitting and receiving facilities in Burma. The Council further decided that the machinery for promoting the implementation of regional plans should take the form of a standing group with a permanent membership of five—the President of the Council (chairman), the President of the Air Navigation Commission, and the chairmen of the Air Transport, Joint Support, and Finance Committees—and a floating membership to be selected on an ad hoc basis by the President of the Council to act when needed after secretariat efforts had failed in the implementation of regional plans.

The Council convened for its sixth session on January 18, 1949 at ICAO headquarters in Montreal. It adopted a resolution establishing an Air Navigation Commission, which was to assume the functions of the former Air Navigation Committee. The commission was to consist of twelve members, with Argentina, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Netherlands, Sweden, United Kingdom, and the United States having already appointed representatives. Annex 7 (Standards and Recommended Practices for Aircraft Nationality and Registration Marks) to the Convention of International Civil Aviation was adopted by the Council, and approval was granted to the provisional agenda of the third ICAO Assembly, scheduled to open in Montreal on June 7, 1949. Also approved by the Council was the convening in London on April 20 of a combined conference to deal with the problems of North Atlantic weather stations, joint support to Greece in respect to the development of the Ellinikon airport, and provision of essential air navigation services requested by Denmark for its Loran station in the Faeroe Islands. Approval was given to the convening on April 11 in London of a meeting of experts to consider revision of the communications network for carrying meteorological information in the North Atlantic region.

At the seventh regular meeting of the Danube Commission in December 1952 it was decided to extend the mandate of the special commission established in July 1952 to examine the Yugoslav proposal for amendment of the rules of procedure and the Statute until the eighth regular meeting. However, despite Yugoslav objections, the report of the special commission was not put on the agenda for the eighth meeting. Also discussed at the seventh meeting were the Yugoslav failure to pay dues for the preceding year, and the action of Yugoslavia in taking over control of the locomotive traction of the Sip Canal. Yugoslavia took the position that it had a right to defend its national interests in the light of previous breach of contract by other Commission members. With Yugoslavia objecting to both nominations, the meeting elected the Rumanian representative as chairman and the Soviet delegate as secretary of the Com-mission, the latter for a term of three years.

The second session of the twelfth plenary meeting of the International Cotton Advisory Committee was held in Washington from November 2 to 12, 1953. The first session, held in Washington from May 4 to 5, 1953, had been concerned with budgetary matters and the exchange of information. Representatives of 28 members of the committee as well as observers from 24 non-member governments and six international organizations were present at the second session which considered a technical study proposing three possible types of international cotton agreements: 1) a multilateral contract, under which quantitative quotas and minimum and maximum prices for each importing and exporting country would be established; 2) a buffer stock agreement, which would also set floor and ceiling prices for cotton and under which there would exist buffer stocks, held by member governments or by an international agency which would be built up in times of surplus and drawn on in times of shortage; 3) a combination of 1) and 2). The meeting failed to agree on any of these, and referred the question to the standing committee for further study. Other resolutions of the committee at this meeting included recommendations to the standing committee to study means of increasing cotton consumption to close the ten percent gap between production and consumption, and to circulate information about the terms of external trade of cotton importing and exporting countries, and a recommendation to the secretariat to begin publishing textile statistics. E. D. White (United States) was reelected chairman of the standing committee. In closing, the session accepted the invitation of the government of Brazil to hold its next plenary meeting in Sao Paulo.

The 24th meeting of the Caribbean Commission was held in Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas, the Virgin Islands, from May 22 to May 28, 1957, under the chairmanshipof Mr. N. L. Mayle (United Kingdom). The report of the Central Secretariat, submitted by the Secretary-General, was considered and approved. The United States section reported that negotiations were under way for the continuation and expansion of the Caribbean Training Program. The Puerto Rican government proposed that it assume all of the administrative expenses of the program, which had been financed by the International Cooperation Administration, in order to coordinate more effectively the facilities of the University of Puerto Rico with governmental institutions.

On July 2, 1964, the Chairman of the Executive Board, Pierre-Paul Schweitzer, transmitted to the Board of Governors the nineteenth annual report of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) Executive Directors for the fiscal year ended April 30, 1964.