The Yale Center for International and Area Studies (YCIAS) has become the new home for the Academic Council on the United Nations System (ACUNS), an organization of scholars, practitioners, teachers and others interested in the work and study of international organizations, especially the U.N. and its agencies. ACUNS has a close working relationship with the United Nations, and works to promote and improve scholarship and research on international cooperation.
The organization was created in 1987 and, in an effort to promote new institutional ties, selects a new headquarters every five years. Prior to coming to Yale, ACUNS had been based at Brown University's Thomas J. Watson Institute for International Studies. YCIAS will be the new base of operations of ACUNS until 2003.
The new executive director of ACUNS is Jean Krasno, associate director of United Nations studies at Yale and lecturer in political science. A specialist on peacekeeping issues, Krasno has been involved with the Pivotal States Project with Paul Kennedy, the J. Richardson Dilworth Professor of History, as well as with several projects focusing on U.N. issues, including collecting and editing interviews for a United Nations Oral History. She has organized seminars at Yale for senior U.N. officials in order to promote discussions of critical issues in a neutral environment, and she is the faculty adviser for the Model U.N., organized annually by Yale students to introduce high school students to the workings of the international organization.
According to Krasno, the United Nations is facing several major policy issues -- including the spread of weapons of mass destruction, global warming and a growing world population -- and ACUNS has a critical role to play in stimulating research and making it available in a useful form to practitioners. She believes ACUNS can help strengthen and prepare the international community for challenges ahead. Moreover, "the academic community can address topics that are politically incorrect," says Krasno, who adds that dialogue is essential to breaking down the bureaucratic barriers that arise in large international organizations.
ACUNS holds workshops, seminars, conferences and meetings bringing together scholars, practitioners and students. These include an annual summer workshop, cosponsored with the American Society of International Law, which serves as a forum for the interdisciplinary examination of international issues and provides assistance to participants with their research and writing. Last summer's workshop, "Globalization and Global Governance: The Changing Roles of State and Non-State Actors," was held at YCIAS.
ACUNS will hold a conference at Yale on "U.N. Responses to Insecurity" Friday-Saturday, Oct. 23 and 24. The event will honor James S. Sutterlin, a career diplomat and distinguished fellow of United Nations studies at Yale.