In what way does the predominance of the USA in the UN funding affect its decision-making?
How the answer moves
The flow snapshot — the routes in, the body, the counter-view and the routes out.
Route 1 one member, one vote whatever it pays → US at the 22% ceiling + nearly 27% of peacekeeping → influence travels through the budget, not the ballot
Route 2 Charter gives no weighted vote → so leverage is built outside the rules → through assessments, arrears, earmarked funds
1986 Kassebaum-Solomon threat → Assembly gives way → Res. 41/213 → Fifth Committee to seek “broadest possible agreement” = consensus in practice → informal budget veto without any weighted vote → Mearsheimer: institutions mirror the distribution of power → withholding/arrears → Secretariat kept short of cash → earmarked money → agencies follow donor priorities
votes stay outside the purse: Jerusalem, 128–9 (2017) → and the leverage is not costless to Washington itself
Route 1 the purse settles what the UN can afford to decide, not what it votes
Route 2 Patz (2026): structural political payment failure → 2026 budget down 7%, 2,900 posts cut → Washington now shapes the UN by shrinking it
Model answer
Handwritten, in the form it would be written in the examination hall.
