"Why would over 2,000 college students give up two days of classes and their weekend to accomplish, in five or six rather grueling and frustrating committee sessions, what they know the real United Nations cannot do with almost unlimited time?"
The conference program for the 1996 Harvard National Model United Nations (HNMUN) answers its own question in terms of the stellar ability and dedication of the typical student delegate -- "part diplomat, part debater, and part idealist."
The members of Ithaca College's delegation are an outstanding case in point. Getting the better of teams from institutions including Yale and Cornell Universities, Ithaca's 15-member delegation received an honorable mention award, placing it in the top four out of 157 teams. In addition, five team members -- seniors Brian Dautch, Brian Evans, head delegate Michelle N. Fraser, Daniel Lesch, and Eric Sherling -- were recognized with individual awards.
Martin Brownstein, associate professor and chair of the Department of Politics, has served as adviser to Ithaca's Model UN teams since 1983. In the role of "institutional memory and crucible for the integrity of the team," he has built the team over time by recruiting students early in their college careers and retaining them for years to come.
Representing a number of majors, team members bring a rich range of talents and expertise to the effort. Brownstein judged this year's group "clearly the most productive" ever: although team members had received a total of 14 individual awards since 1987, no previous team had won a delegation award.
Ithaca's Model UN team included (above, front row, left to right) Heather Duncan '98, Daniel Lesch '96, Keith Tylecki '99; (middle row) Eric Sherling '96, Mervé Berkant '96, Michelle N. Fraser '96, Jennifer Mancini '96, Michele Moritis '99; (standing) Marc Berman '96, Elizabeth Dawson '97, Larry Decker '97, Professor Martin Brownstein, Eliza Minsch '98, Brian Evans '96; (not pictured) Brian Dautch '96 and Marc Simonetti '96.
Convening at the Boston Park Plaza Hotel for four days in February, the HNMUN closely simulated much of the work and many of the frustrations of the real United Nations. Most of the activity took place in committees, usually the same committees of the UN General Assembly, Economic and Social Council, and specialized agencies to which the nations represented by the college teams are actually assigned.
In their committees HNMUN delegates caucused, debated, and drafted working papers and resolutions, striving both to reenact the dynamics of a real United Nations session and to develop practical solutions to complex international problems. After putting in 12-hour committee sessions, delegates often stayed up working on their resolutions well into the early morning. As Fraser describes the experience, "You're working the hardest you ever worked, but you're loving your life."
It was nearly a year in advance of the HNMUN competition when each team submitted to Harvard a list of nations it wished to represent. (Ithaca was granted its first choice, Algeria.) Under Brownstein's demanding coaching, team members began to prepare at the start of the academic year; the workload intensified in January, with four-hour sessions Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Sundays.
Unlike some other HNMUN teams, Ithaca's participants do not receive course credit for their months of independent research. All the same, Fraser comments, "as much as you love it, it can seem like another three-credit course."
After Harvard had informed the Ithacans of the committees Algeria would serve on and the topics they would address, the team decided as a group what individual members' assignments would be. One stage of the preparation was a visit to the Algerian embassy in New York City to receive firsthand information about the country's positions on the issues. And as a trial run for the Harvard event, five teammates took on the assignment of representing Tunisia at another competition, the University of Pennsylvania Model United Nations Conference. Though they went on only two weeks' notice, Fraser won a best delegate award for her work on rewriting the UN charter.
Having mastered a high level of individual preparation and team coordination, the Ithacans were ready to take on the problems of the world when the Model UN opened on February 15.
Mervé Berkant '96 had participated in Model UN conferences when she was in high school in her native Turkey. Assigned to the Organization of the Islamic Conference at the Harvard event, she worked with delegates from several other countries to draft resolutions dealing with the topics of Islamic militancy and the administration of Jerusalem. Her committee also had to deal extemporaneously with a crisis situation: a terrorist bombing that led in turn to American retaliation against those presumed guilty and an Iranian blockade of the Persian Gulf.
Serving on the Legal Committee of the General Assembly, Dautch and Fraser helped draft a resolution concerning policies for the use of the geostationary orbit, an area 26,000 miles above the equator into which satellites must be launched if they are to orbit over a fixed point on earth. Because the limited slots in the geostationary orbit are of great economic value, Fraser says that deciding which nations will receive orbital slots is an important equity question.
Evans assumed the role of the justice representing Algeria on the International Court. He and his fellow "justices" wrote a decision on a simulated case arising out of the real-life bombing of a Pan American Airlines flight over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988.
Lesch and Sherling sat on the Special Political and Decolonization Committee, where they addressed the problem of the peaceful settlement of refugees from various war-torn countries, including Rwanda and Bosnia. According to Sherling, the two were "very comfortable" taking a leadership role on the committee, both because Algeria historically has been involved in the issue of refugees and because they were "better researched than some of the teams." The two led in drafting a comprehensive plan for both short- and long-term refugee resettlement and presented a formal resolution in the General Assembly to an audience of over 1,000. "It's a real rush talking in front of that many people," Sherling remarks. Exercising all their skills of diplomacy and debate, he and Lesch helped win narrow approval of the refugee resettlement resolution.
In the course of achieving constructive responses to world issues in a way that, to echo the HNMUN program, "the real United Nations cannot do," the Ithacans achieved more than a deeper knowledge of Algeria. Without exception, Brownstein observes, they came back "exhilarated in terms of how they see themselves," having tested themselves in competition against their peers.
Individually, the delegates suggest other good reasons for sacrificing so many hours for the event. Working with the team, says Evans, has "helped me to better hone my diplomatic and research skills and ability to work with total strangers." He recommends the HNMUN as "a great academic experience. I'm a strong proponent of active learning, where you practice what you're learning instead of just sitting down in the classroom."
During her three years on the team, Fraser acquired an extensive understanding of the foreign policy of four nations, polished her public speaking skills, and found "probably the best friends I've had at IC." And the Model UN experience, she says, shaped her decision to pursue a career in international law.
Berkant stresses the necessity of developing creative presentation skills: "When there are 20 people trying to get their point across, it's very important that you have a different way of getting people to listen to you. Sometimes you need to yell, but you also need to learn to listen. You have to have a balance."
Sherling agrees, identifying sensitivity to the art of compromise as his most important gain. "If there's some kind of conflict, you have to continue to deal with people in a very calm manner." But foremost, he says, "when people talk to you, you've got to listen to them and hear what they're saying, or it really turns them off."
Noting that his committee's refugee resolution passed by only four votes, Sherling adds, "What would have happened if we had turned off four nations?"
Ultimately, Ithaca's HNMUN delegates may have reconfirmed, if they had ever doubted it, the value of working together to get issues addressed. Real-world UN delegates would do well to emulate that lesson.
Professor Martin Brownstein with four of the individual award winners (from left): Brian Evans '96, Daniel Lesch '96, Eric Sherling '96, and Michelle N. Fraser '96