Description
Book SynopsisA history of colonial legacies in United Nations peacekeeping from 19451971, focusing on the influence of UN staff deployed to conflicts in the Global South. Margot Tudor identifies the unexplored colonial structures, racial prejudices, and organisational politics that shaped UN peacekeeping practices during the instability of decolonisation.
Trade Review'From the Sinai to Gaza, from the Congo to West Papua, Margot Tudor's Blue Helmet Bureaucrats exposes how United Nations peacekeepers inherited the practices and mindsets of colonial administration. Tudor's crisp account of the reality of liberal internationalism is revelatory for students of the United Nations and decolonization.' Timothy Nunan, University of Regensburg
'Margot Tudor is among the brightest of a new generation of historians illuminating a lost international past - in Blue Helmet Bureaucrats she sets her clear eyed vision on the problematic politics of UN peacekeeping in the post-Second World War. This thick history sets the complex truth above all else; we see the legacies of colonialism, the limits of good intentions, and the real humans involved.' Glenda Sluga, European University Institute
'Margot Tudor's account of the early years of UN peacekeeping reveals the power of mid-level UN intermediaries to limit the sovereignty of smaller postcolonial states, thus ensuring their alliance with a liberal internationalist order. Blue Helmet Bureaucrats provides a meticulously researched historical reckoning with the imperial origins of liberal internationalism.' Meredith Terretta, University of Ottawa
Table of ContentsIntroduction; 1. Testing the waters, 1945–1955; 2. Reckoning with Suez, 1956–1959; 3. Imperial aspirations, 1960–1961; 4. Obstructing self-determination, 1962–1963; 5. From stagnation to insignificance, 1964–1971; Conclusion.
