| With the fall of the Berlin Wall, the collapse of many Warsaw Pace Communist regimes (all in 1989) and the death of the Soviet Union (1991), the world changed dramatically. In the decade after the end of the Cold War (1989), Capability Theory predicted that highly capable nations would be less supportive of the United Nations in general, and the General Assembly in particular, and more supportive of the Security Council which they identified as the protector of the status quo. All five permanent members of the Security Council are highly capable nations with the double veto (procedural and substantive) and are able to block legislation.; Less capable nations use the United Nations to help even the playing field in relation to economics, politics, and military presence (peacekeeping troops). The overall macro-hypotheses data confirms that concept variables of Wealth, Power, Cooperation, and Conflict are statistically significant predictors of how highly capable nations, or at least their delegates, taking surveys about the United Nations and its organs, have more negative attitudes towards the United Nations and its organs than less capable nations.; On the micro-level, making up the most important and pertinent questions involving primarily the Security Council and the General Assembly, Wealth, Political System, Cooperation, and Conflict are consistently statistically significant.; Overall, Wealth and Power, both characteristics of highly capable nations, tend to be going in opposite directions. When Wealth is statistically significant, Power is not and the opposite is true.; One explanation for this is that second-tier highly capable Power states are "tweener" states and they do not support either the present voting system of the Security Council (veto, they have no veto) and the General Assembly (one nation, one vote; get outvoted). Plus, the make-up of powerful states has changed over time. "Tweener" states have different agendas than major powers or developing nations and that is why, in part, Power and Wealth have divided.; The Negative Shift hypothesis that all nations, especially highly capable nations, are becoming more and more negative in their attitudes toward the United Nations over time was confirmed in 2000 (especially towards the Security Council). |
