'The Hand that Holds the Pen': Boutros Boutros-Ghali, Peacekeeping, and American Influence Over the United Nations Secretariat in the Early 1990s

This article reviews the creative ways in which the sixth Secretary-General of the United Nations, Boutros Boutros-Ghali, used the UN Secretariat to achieve his goals, as well as the obstacles he faced in doing so. Using new sources - including confidential UN memos, elite interviews, and private archives - the paper suggests that, in the context of peacekeeping, the former Secretary-General engaged in parallel processes of 'politicization' and 'depoliticization': on the one hand he minimised, avoided and concealed the substantive dimensions of certain decisions, units and issues with the aim of marginalising those departments and officials that he saw as too close to the United States, while on the other he empowered those bureaucratic units which he felt he could more easily control. Specifically, by bestowing upon the Department of Political Affairs (DPA) a sweeping mandate while painting the role of the Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO) as merely 'operational', Boutros-Ghali used 'technicization' as a means to strengthen the Secretary-General's office.