For those who would disparage the U.N., part II…

Beyond helping Carmen Electra, the United Nations does have one commodity that is valuable to the United States right now — legitimacy. Like it or not, the rest of the world confers a status to the United Nations such that their imprimatur on a course of action resonates with publics and governments. Fareed Zakaria argues today that exercising power without legitimacy is costly and difficult:

On one side is history’s most awesome superpower, victorious in war, ruling Iraq with nearly 150,000 troops and funding its reconstruction to the tune of $20 billion this year. On the other side is an aging cleric with no formal authority, no troops and little money, who is unwilling to even speak in public. Yet last June, when Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani made it known that he didn’t like the U.S. proposal to transfer power to Iraqis, the plan collapsed. And last week, when Sistani announced that he is still unhappy with the new U.S. proposal, L. Paul Bremer rushed to Washington for consultations. What does this man have that the United States doesn’t? Legitimacy. Sistani is regarded by Iraqi Shiites as the most learned cleric in the country. He is also seen as having been uncorrupted by Saddam Hussein’s reign. “During the Iran-Iraq war, Sistani managed to demonstrate that he could be controlled neither by Saddam nor by his fellow ayatollahs in Iran, which has given him enormous credibility,” says Yitzhak Nakash, the leading authority on Iraqi Shiites…. The tragedy is that while Sistani’s fears are understandable, Washington’s phased transition makes great sense. It allows for time to build institutions, form political parties and reform the agencies of government. An immediate transfer would ensure that the political contest will overwhelm all this institutional reform. But Washington lacks the basic tool it needs to negotiate with the locals: legitimacy. (This is something well understood by anyone who has studied the lessons of Bosnia, Kosovo and East Timor.) Belatedly it recognizes that the United Nations can arbitrate political problems without being accused of being a colonizer.

Zakaria’s thesis finds support from the Financial Times:

Kofi Annan, UN Secretary General is to consider sending a team to examine whether direct elections were a feasible way of choosing a provisional Iraqi government by the end of June, or to look for possible alternatives…. Abdel Aziz Hakim, an official in the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) who is believed to reflect Ayatollah Sistani’s views, said: “There should be a real participation of the people through elections in choosing this council.” But “if this is not possible we should search for alternatives; after we establish the principle of referring the matter to the people”. He suggested any conclusions by a UN team “would be respected” by Ayatollah Sistani. (emphasis added)

Developing….