UNODC and the Global Programmes

Seminar paper from the year 2006 in the subject Politics - International Politics - Topic: International Organisations, grade: 2, University of Vienna, 11 entries in the bibliography, language: English, abstract: Transnational Organized Crime is a relatively new problem that concerns the international community and its transnational relations. In this context, international organizations have a very important role in the fight against this global problem. The most important actors are still the governments themselves as they control what needs to be done to conquer the problem. An international organization as the United Nations can only be as strong as the Member States in its organization. Since organized crime is an international problem all countries and organizations need to work together to get control back. Governments alone will not be able to combat the problem along as organized crime is having an impact all over the world. Therefore awareness needs to be raised so that everyone knows what impact organized crime is having on governments and peoples lives.Whole societies and countries can be destroyed since organized crime results in heavy sideaffects such as money-laundering, corruption, trafficking in human beings and terrorism. With the Global Programmes the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, which is the leading body in this fight, it tries to contain organized crime. I picked this topic as it is very interesting for me to see what possibilities a world organization like the United Nations is having to fight that problem and what efforts are undertaken to stop this vicious circle. Organized Crime is endangering the international security. In this context, I tried to point out the efforts of UNODC and its Global Programmes and looked what impact it actually has.