An interesting comparison of the ro

An interesting comparison of the roles of the Security Council, the OSCE, and
NATO can be found in the international community’s intervention in Bosnia in
1995 and Kosovo in 1999. In both cases, force was used by other countries (most
of the force used in both cases was provided by U.S. air power), leading in effect to
an international administration designed to build local governmental institutions to
the point of viability. In both cases the OSCE was assigned responsibility for most
of the institution-building and civil administration. In the case of Bosnia, the use
of force was sponsored by NATO and approved after the fact by the Security
Council. In the case of Kosovo, it was authorized from the outset by the Security
Council. In Bosnia, NATO’s use of force helped to convince the local combatants
to sign a peace treaty that explicitly invited NATO forces into Bosnia to oversee
implementation of the peace. This invitation suggested a mutual consent to the
presence of outside forces, which is how NATO got around the absence of direct
Security Council legitimation of its military presence in Bosnia.23 In Kosovo, such
an invitation was not necessary, because the Security Council authoritatively legitimized
the presence of the foreign military forces. Although the role of the OSCE
is similar in the two missions (both of which are ongoing as of 2005), because of
their different histories, the OSCE Secretariat coordinates the mission in Bosnia,
but in Kosovo it is subsidiary to the UN Secretariat, which is responsible for overall
coordination there.