Profile: Jeane Kirkpatrick at the United Nations
Article Summary and Author Biography
As U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Jeane Kirkpatrick has represented a dramatic change in style and approach from her immediate predecessors (and, in her confrontational predilections, from all previous American U.N. ambassadors except for Daniel Patrick Moynihan). Her political philosophy, her attitude toward the United Nations and her relations with African delegates, in particular, are diametrically opposed to those of Andrew Young and Donald McHenry. They were liberals; she is a staunch neo-conservative on foreign policy issues. They saw the United Nations as a helpful forum for arriving at peaceful solutions; she considers it "a dangerous place" where conflicts tend to be exacerbated. They cultivated the African representatives at the United Nations and frequently represented black African viewpoints in Washington; she reflects the Reagan line, which is perceptibly friendlier to South Africa. These differences are not merely personal; they reflect differences in attitudes between the Carter and Reagan Administrations.
Seymour Maxwell Finger is a Professor of Political Science at the Graduate School and the College of Staten Island, City University of New York, and Director of the Ralph Bunche Institute on the United Nations. A former Foreign Service officer, he served at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations from 1956 to 1971, the last five years as Ambassador and Senior Adviser. This article is based on a chapter in his forthcoming book, Your "Man" at the U.N., 2nd edition, to be published by New York University Press in 1984. Copyright (c) S. M. Finger, 1983.
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