Majorities, Not Consensus: Reforming UNCCW Decision-Making

Abstract

The United Nations Conference on Certain Conventional Weapons (UNCCW) is the only multilateral humanitarian arms control forum. Yet the consensus principle by which it makes decisions has repeatedly thwarted progress and is endangering the current process on the use of autonomy in weapons systems: if negotiations for a legally binding instrument are not launched in 2021, this goal is likely to be pursued outside the UNCCW. Failure to ban inhumane technology for a third time in a row would considerably damage the legitimacy of the UNCCW. Emphasizing that the UNCCW must remain the main venue not only for discussing but also for resolving humanitarian arms control issues, this policy brief argues for an alternative: a procedural reform that would replace consensus voting with two-thirds majority voting.