Published on September 15, 2017

Bolivian Ambassador to the United Nations talks at Eastern about the dangers of unilateralism

To talk about world peace is to talk about war. And why haven't we stopped making war? While the United Nations is supposed to help make countries act multilaterally, Ambassador Sacha Llorenti pushed the point that some nations, such as the United States and Europe, have begun to act unitarily during his visit at Eastern as part of the University Hour program. Because of this, Ambassador Llorenti states, "We are currently in the worst humanitarian crisis since 1945." There are unending statistics that point this out, but to name a few: 40 million people have been displaced due to country conflicts, there are currently 20 million refugees, 1.8 billion people drink contaminated water daily, and about eight people have as much wealth as 3.5 billion people. To make it worse? We are facing a climate change crisis and some of the most powerful leaders in the world are not only ignoring it, but refusing to admit that it exists. Bolivian Ambassador Sacha Llorenti

So, what do we do now? It's hard to tell. Ambassador Llorenti seemed to be a strong advocate for multilateralism, but currently, it's not working. The United States has refused to comply with the Paris Agreement, which will not only impact themselves but also the rest of the world. In his question and answer section, Ambassador Llorenti stated that regardless of where we are in the world, countries seem to always put "profit over solving problems." We have made ourselves focused on money rather than on curing cancer or Alzheimer's. Because of this, because of our love for money and lavish things over anything else, we have made ourselves unsustainable. If every single country in the world consumed goods the way that the United States and Europe does, we would need four planets in order to sustain ourselves.

To act multilaterally, we would have to come together globally. To do that, we would have switch our way of thinking and put solving problems over profit. But, as our guest Ambassador Llorenti pushed us to consider, is that even possible when so many major world powers have insisted on acting alone?

Written by Zoe Marien