While I understand that the UN can’t really punish the non member states (or. . . can they? )— or hell, some would argue the UN can’t even punish member states, but I digress. . .
I guess what I’m getting to is the question that in theory or practice, does the UN assume its standards for things like human rights or war or whatever, apply to everybody, members and non members alike? Even if just philosophically, the UN feels this way, I’d be curious to read some dialog on it.
Article 39 of the UN Charter says the UN can respond to “any threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression”.
The United Nations was originally formed on the basis that it was responding to the threat of Nazi Germany, which was obviously not invited to be a member. So the idea that the UN can enforce its standards against outsiders was there from the beginning.
Well, there are very few countries that aren’t members of the UN. Kosovo, Taiwan, and the Holy See pop up on one search. But to change your question a bit, there is a whole area of international law called “customary” international law, in which certain standards become so accepted that all nations are expected to uphold that law, even though there is no treaty for any country to sign on the matter. Many aspects of customary international law are being codified over time, but matters such as when a country may act in self defense, the rejection of slavery and torture, and other similar basic matters of how states must conduct themselves in the international sphere are basically considered compulsory today. Whether a country is in the UN or not, signed a particular treaty or not, that country is obligated to uphold certain codes of international law or face the consequences.
So in that respect, there is no question that states that try to do things outside of the norms of international behavior can face consequences regardless of whether or not they formally signed up to such standards of behavior. The UN, regional organizations, or ad hoc groups of countries could decide to act against a state that gets way out of line, yes.
I should probably correct myself. The United Nations that fought against Germany in WWII was not legally the same UN that exists now.
The original United Nations were the member states of the Atlantic Charter in 1941. The current United Nations is essentially the successor of this group and was founded by the United Nations Charter in 1945.
There’s a concept in international law of certain norms being jus cogens (also called peremptory), which means they are universally binding and completely non-derogable. Non-UN member states are considered just as obliged as member states to respect these norms. There isn’t a universally-agreed list of which norms are jus cogens but the ones that have pretty widespread agreement would include slavery, genocide, aggression, torture, discrimination, extra-judicial killing, political self-determination and piracy.
)— or hell, some would argue the UN can’t even punish member states, but I digress. . . 