Talk:United Nations Parliamentary Assembly

No mention of General Assembly dictator's club?
It seems odd that there's no mention of one of the driving forces behind this -- disgust that the UN General Assembly had become a "dictator's club" or self-protective defensive alliance of despotisms and dictatorships during the 1970's and 1980's (with some lingering effects even today). AnonMoos 09:23, 24 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Do you have a source for this being a driving force? 24.54.208.177 05:31, 28 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Dude, there was no need for you to condescendingly quote my own words back at me on my User talk page -- that does nothing whatsoever to impress me with your discussion style. And frankly, the only reason that the idea of a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly receives any significant political support in the United States from people who are not already committed peace advocates or one-worlders is disgust with the current state and/or recent past state of the General Assembly (the "dictator's club" aspect being one strong part of this).  Just look at papers at URLs such as http://www.centerforunreform.org/reformtopics/basicorgans/areaderonsecondassembly.htm, http://www.centerforunreform.org/publications/booksbasicorgan.htm , http://www.globalsolutions.org/programs/intl_instit/UN_ref/Schwartzberg_Weighted_Voting.pdf etc. for politely nuanced and scholarly qualified statements of things that many other people would state in much more categorical and emphatic language.  AnonMoos 06:56, 5 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Is it really accurate to refer to it as a dictators' club, when a large (and growing) number of members are democratic? Captain Zyrain 12:40, 14 December 2005 (UTC)


 * That's relatively recent -- as recently as a dozen years ago, the balance was somewhat different than it was today, and even in Schwartzenberg's 2004 report, only 46.4% of UN members are "fully free". In any case, I didn't include the phrase "dictators' club" on the actual article page. AnonMoos 14:35, 14 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I think the main criticism (and the one I saw in the Schwartzberg Weighted Voting article) is that the East and South tended to oppose the U.S. on issues such as Zionism, economic development, and international trade. Who's to say that representatives in a UN Parliamentary Assembly wouldn't also oppose the U.S. on these issues? Captain Zyrain 12:40, 14 December 2005 (UTC)


 * If they did, then it would because the people of those countries democratically voted in representatives who expressed such sentiments, not merely because of highly-dubious sleazy backroom deals between highly-dubious governments, which have given us such results as Sudan being elected to the UN Human Rights Commission at exactly the same moment that it was beginning its genocide campaign in Darfur(!!), Libya actually being elected to the chairmanship of the UN so-called "Human Rights" commission (at the name of which even buzzards gag) etc. etc. Furthermore, it was only because of unrelenting United States opposition that Sudan was not elevated to a seat on the Security Council(!!!): http://southsudanfriends.org/News/SecurityCouncil1.html, http://archives.cnn.com/2000/WORLD/africa/09/30/un.councilcampaign.ap/ etc. etc. ad nauseam.  The real criticism of the United Nations General Assembly is that it goes through yearly repetitive stylized ritualistic votes rather than confronting the real issues of the day, and that the structure of the body creates permanent majorities and minorities which make it easy for many countries to escape all scrutiny, while resulting in a perpetual ganging up against other countries that has very little to do with the actual facts.


 * Are you using the word "Zionism" because you don't recognize the existence of Israel? AnonMoos 14:35, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
 * The U.S. makes those criticisms (that the UN is ineffective, that it passes resolutions that are opposed to American interests, that tyrannical regimes are appointed to human rights positions, etc.) yet we don't see people like John Bolton, the Cato Institute, the Heritage Foundation, etc. lining up in support of a UNPA (instead, the typically favor either withdrawal from the United Nations or starving it of funds until it reforms). Rather, the groups supporting the UNPA are liberal NGOs such as Global Policy Forum, World Federalist Movement, etc. So, I question whether that is a "driving force" behind the UNPA, as you say it is. Captain Zyrain 21:02, 14 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Although I don't think it would be NPOV to call it a dictator's club nor would the impetus for such a body need to be limited to this aspect, I do think that it may be helpful to refer to there being some motivation in this regard. Also, while I don't believe Captain Zyrain would necessarily degree, in my opinion, "liberal" (as well as "conservative") is a most tired label which skips over the nuances many individuals or groups hold (not to mention contrary to the truth-seeking requirements of justice). I don't know why groups that support a more proportional representation (e.g., presumably populous, non-veto-wielding members such as India or even the U.S., were the UNPA closer to being an inevitability) would need to be also necessarily opposed to enhancing the democratic say of currently oppressed peoples; on the contrary, the desire for justice could be an impetus for both. At least one organization, the Baha'i International Community, has made proposals addressing both points . Speaking of which, I wonder whether specific proposals to progressively reform within the U.N. system (such as made in the latter document--e.g., limiting the domain of the veto, restricting membership in the General Assembly to those with a minimum of rights, etc.) ought to be added to the article here as well. Brettz9 02:26, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Comments transferred from wrong location
I removed this statement because no source was provided. Captain Zyrain 02:51, 13 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Please look at the above. AnonMoos 13:51, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Schwartzberg-centered?
To me this whole article seems to be a little bit too centered on the ideas of this Joseph Schwartzberg which I think is inappropriate. 62.104.150.238 18:58, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Who are some other scholars who have analyzed this issue? Captain Zyrain 20:52, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
 * A number of scholars and groups have written on possible structures for a global parliament, the most widely known being Richard Falk and Andrew Strauss. Robert Sheppard, George Mondiot, and Daniele Archibugi are others. The Comité d'action pour un Parlement Mondial and the E-Parliament Initiative are also promoting the concept. Each of these efforts should be referenced in the article. Here are some relevant links to the research:


 * Toward Global Parliament by Richard Falk and Andrew Strauss, Foreign Affairs
 * "Toward a UN World Parliament", by Robert Sheppard, Asian-Pacific Law Journal
 * An E-Parliament to Democratize Globalization, by Robert Johansen, Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies at Notre Dame
 * "Demos and Cosmopolis", by Daniele Archibugi, New Left Review
 * A Parliament for the Planet, by George Mondiot, New Internationalist magazine
 * The Global Accountability Project A study by One World Trust
 * The E-Parliament Initiative
 * Summary Report Comite d'action pour un Parlement Mondial (COPAM )
 * International Bill of Rights Project at the University of California
 * Tfleming 00:55, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
 * These sources look super useful. I might have a read through them in coming months and try to improve representation of their perspectives in the article.
 * Sadly, all of these links appear to be broken due to linkrot. :( I'll post some updated links here if I can find them.
 * Toward Global Parliament by Richard Falk and Andrew Strauss (They also co-edited a book entitled A Global Parliament: Essays and Articles the intro to which is here
 * Toward a UN World Parliament by Robert Sheppard - no idea where this is on the internet. The journal seems to now be called the Asian-Pacific Law & Policy Journal
 * An E-Parliament to Democratize Globalization seems to be found here. There is also this related paper
 * Demos and Cosmopolis
 * A Parliament for the Planet
 * 20WattSphere (talk) 01:29, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
 * Global Accountability Project materials from One World Trust appear to be here with a summary report here
 * The E-Parliament Initiative has gone missing. I don't know what this was.
 * The COPAM Summary Report may be out there somewhere, but web trawling in French will take me some time.
 * At first glance, the International Bill of Rights Project at the University of California may have become the Civil Rights Project UCLA or the International Bill of Rights Project at the American Law Institute
 * Also, various sources have referred to this 2018 book as important - World Parliament 20WattSphere (talk) 05:50, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

GDP as a factor in weighted voting
Is GDP an objective enough measure to use in weighted voting? GDP depends at least partly on estimates, doesn't it? Captain Zyrain 18:00, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

Comparison of representation of various states
The apportionment chart currently compares Israel, North Korea, the United States, India, and China. Does anyone have any other suggestions for comparions? I compared Israel and North Korea to show how North Korea's population advantage is neutralized by its "Not free" status under the Provisional People's Assembly method and by its relatively weak GDP under the Schwartzberg Weighted Voting method. Captain Zyrain 05:49, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
 * I changed it so it now compares Brazil, Indonesia, United States, India, and China, the five most populous countries. Captain Zyrain 05:31, 19 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Could it be amended to include a group of small countries - perhaps Africa, to show how their say would decline under this proposal. AndrewRT(Talk) 19:43, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Upper Assembly
I know as Wikipedians we shouldn't post articles for our own ideas, but I've recently had one that I think is worth mention:If the UN legislative body was modeled after that of Europe, then there should be an upper legislative organ composed of delegates appointed by the government of each nation. This World Council would distribute members by nation on the next logical step of the Penrose Method:The cubic root of the millions place. This would similar to the European Council as the UNPA would be to the Europarl.--SuperWikiman 01 03 2006 4:00 (UTC)


 * And what about the General Assembly? It's quite like what you have been thinking of...

Direct election
I was thinking about adding a qualification that a UNPA need not, strictly speaking, be directly elected. I mean, it would be possible, for example, for peoples to specifically vote for delegates who would in turn chose the official international representatives (whether in the rubber-stamp mode of the current U.S. electoral college, or as a conscience-voting intermediate body. This would still be different from the current U.N. system in that people around the world would have a specific vote pertaining to international issues and the intermediate body would necessarily be an elected one (and not through the executive). Brettz9 02:24, 26 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Delegates for internal affairs are different of these for external affairs. They can be elected the same day, in different votings. --Nopetro 12:55, 1 October 2007 (UTC)


 * The CDUN proposal is explicitly that UNPA members would not be directly elected - at least at first - just as the europarl wasn't. AndrewRT(Talk) 19:42, 11 December 2007 (UTC)


 * If they aren't directly elected it would be possible for a country like china to interfere with the election process in their own country and appoint only delegates from the Communist Party of China instead of an independent who would have been elected were this not the case. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.220.185.75 (talk) 10:14, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

2.1.1 Implementations -
One World Now is a non-profit organization that is promoting the amendment of the United Nations Charter via article 109 and has established forums to discuss methods of empowering the United Nations. While One World Now's web pressence is fairly new, Mr. Musslewhite, the president of One World Now, been campaigning, under the banner of One World Now, for an empowered UN since 1992.

Mr. Musslewhite would like for One World Now to be listed as an organization promoting amendment of the UN Charter if this would be appropriate. OneWorldNow 06:57, 17 December 2006 (UTC)


 * An effort to establish a parliament through Article 109 is uninformed and doomed to failure. Sorry to be blunt in response to such idealism, but that really is all it amounts to. Any amendment to the UN Charter (under Article 108) requires the assent of all five permanent members of the UN Security Council and approval by two-thirds of all member states' parliaments. This degree of difficulty has resulted in only five amendments ever being adopted, all of which simply expanded the membership of the Security Council and Economic and Social Council in response to increased UN membership.


 * Invoking Article 109 is all the more unwise as it would open up discussions on EVERY aspect of the Charter. Given present global politics, such a discussion would only result in gridlock and failure. And, no, civil society is not sufficiently organized to force goverments to act against their immediate political interests. Such organizations as Mr. Musselwhite's (less an NGO than an NGI - non-governmental individual) are even more poorly connected or organized.Tfleming 01:11, 5 January 2007 (UTC)


 * While it is commendable that you are familiar with the Article 109 process, as well as, at least superficially, with Mr Musslewhite, your opinion as to the wisdom of invoking an Article 109 review conference is of no relevance to the merit of including a reference to One World Now in the article, only the Wikipedia Policies and Guidelines and the consensus opinion as to the applicability to the article are relevant. As I am mentioning the website with the intention to promote the One World Now, I can understand if it is decided that it falls under "links that should be avoided." however, due to the website's goal of increasing awareness of global issues, methods to address those issues (both via UN ammendment and not, though primarily through article 109), in addition to raising awareness of One World Now itself, I hope that an exception will be made.OneWorldNow 03:30, 9 January 2007 (UTC)


 * If you wish to promote public awareness of Article 109, you should do so in an article on that topic. It is too specific for this article, which broadly describes the concept of a UN Parliamentary Assembly. However, if you choose to do this, you must comply with Wikipedia's NPOV rules, and not promote one OWN's side of the argument. No doubt others will criticize the utility of approaching UN reform through Article 109, but it would be to your credibility if you did so from the beginning. Tfleming 16:11, 20 January 2007 (UTC)


 * My understanding is that the UNPA proposal (or at least CDUN's UNPA proposal) is explicitly a proposal for the creation of a UN without any Charter changes required. It's this fact that makes it so attractive as it means it's easier to implement. AndrewRT(Talk) 19:40, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Secretary-General
What about the UN Secretary-General direct presidential voting (this is, the citizens could vote to the UN Secretary-General candidates in democratic countries. --Nopetro 12:50, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Do we really want to do that, though? That would basically be setting up a presidential system as opposed to a parliamentary system. And presidential systems tend to be inefficient because you typically have the executive clashing against the legislative branch. Some would say that's a good thing because it's an additional check and balance, but in my experience in student government, it's just annoying because the legislature can pass something by a large margin and then the executive can stonewall it (e.g. using the pocket veto, or by simply failing to implement it). Or the executive can do unconstitutional stuff, and it's hard for the legislature to stop them – especially when there are a large number of supreme court justices who were chosen by that president.


 * Notice that county governments in the U.S. typically don't opt for the presidential system either – they have a board of supervisors that is an executive/legislative body rolled into one. And the board appoints the county executive. Some jurisdictions have a separately elected sheriff, but the tendency is to limit his power to running the county jail and other duties specifically assigned to him by the state constitution, and to have most law enforcement done by a county police department that reports, directly or indirectly, to the board.


 * Anyway, point being, the presidential system is lame. We should instead have the secretary-general chosen by a democratized General Assembly and/or Parliamentary Assembly. Captain Zyrain 14:06, 1 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Not really relevant to this article anyway! AndrewRT(Talk) 19:37, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

UNA-USA
Does UNA-USA continue to oppose a UNPA? I was wondering whether they might have changed their policy, in the wake of WFUNA announcing its support of a UNPA. Captain Zyrain 03:31, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Can you provide a link to a statement from WFUNA or a news article about their support? Tfleming 16:39, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
 * http://www.wfuna.org/news/plenary_assembly/pa38_resolutions.cfm#UN_Parliamentary . It is currently a footnote in the article. Captain Zyrain 17:38, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Editorials
Here are some pertinent editorials:
 * Why the UN Needs a Parliamentary Body, Andreas Bummel, Mail & Guardian, 25 Oct. 2007.
 * Sharing UN power with the people is a timely idea, but won't happen easily, Barbara Yaffe, Vancouver Sun, Oct. 16, 2007
 * Global Problems Demand Global Democracy —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sarsaparilla (talk • contribs) 13:59, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
 * http://static.scribd.com/docs/1utfjoeze97ba.swf?INITIAL_VIEW=width

Lead
Is it necessary to include citations in the lead when those issues are addressed and sourced in subsequent sections? Sarsaparilla (talk) 00:49, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
 * I tend to be lax on that so long as it is covered elsewhere, but there is no harm in copying up the citation just to cover your bases.- J Logan t: 10:05, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

Which link is better?
Sarsaparilla (talk) 19:10, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
 * http://www.wfm.org/site/index.php?module=uploads&func=download&fileId=130
 * http://roche.apirg.org/public_html/writings/documents/nuclear/UNParReform.pdf

Pro & Con
I'm not sure if there are any policies/guidelines on this, but I dont personally like articles which are structured around pro/com arguments. Could they be split out instead into the lines - e.g. Democracy, Legitimacy, Efficiency etc. AndrewRT(Talk) 19:36, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
 * So you are saying that instead of being organized like:
 * Pros
 * Democracy-related argument
 * Legitimacy-related argument
 * Efficiency-related argument
 * Cons
 * Democracy-related counter-argument
 * Legitimacy-related counter-argument
 * Efficiency-related counter-argument
 * It should be organized like:
 * Democracy
 * Argument
 * Counter-argument
 * Legitimacy
 * Argument
 * Counter-argument
 * Efficiency
 * Argument
 * Counter-argument

I think that does make more sense and would make for an easier read. Sarsaparilla (talk) 00:22, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Structure, cont'd
I am trying to figure out the best way to hierarchically structure this article. I got rid of the "pros and cons" organization but now it's not clear under what headings to put all these different topics. Maybe they can all be top-level headings, as is the case with US Senate. Sarsaparilla (talk) 11:02, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Pics
I'm having trouble finding acceptably-licensed pics to use in this article. Can anyone find one of the National People's Congress? Sarsaparilla (talk) 11:41, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Wikisource
In reference to the comment that wikisource is not a reliable source, the last time I nominated an article for FAC, I ran into objections for not using Wikisource because the external source moved its page, causing all the links to the treaty text to become broken. See Featured_article_candidates/Convention_on_Psychotropic_Substances/Archive1. Sarsaparilla (talk) 13:27, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

United Nations Parliamentary Assembly
Hi Sarsaparilla! I am excited to see that someone is working on some UN articles. Unfortunately I'm about to head out for the evening and won't be able to review until later this weekend. Thanks for the heads up and I'm looking forward to reading this! --JayHenry (talk) 01:22, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Yikes, look at this sentence in the lead, which goes on for six lines:
 * This would represent a fundamental change in the nature of the UN, whose structure currently reflects the world order that existed at its founding in 1945, in which the relatively undeveloped state of communication technology in most countries limited citizens' participation in diplomacy; a large portion of the world population lived in colonies whose foreign policy was controlled by imperial nations; and power was held by the victorious countries of World War II, whose primary concerns included a wish "to unite our strength to maintain international peace and security".
 * Have you seen User:Tony1/How to satisfy Criterion 1a? Sandy Georgia  (Talk) 05:56, 14 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Better, but there are still textual redundancies and unnecessary verbosity, and vagueness and lack of attribution which lead to POV. I left just a few sample edits indicating the work still needed. Sandy Georgia (Talk) 10:52, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Area ruled
Does this proposed body not take into account the area ruled by a country? If it is only taking the population into account, then densely populated and small country X could steal sparsely populated and large country Y's resources.

ie. Mexico could vote to strip Canada of it's resources.

And if economic production is all that is taken into account, then the US could vote to strip Russia of its resources.


 * population
 * area controlled
 * economic production
 * inherent natural resources
 * heritage resources

need to be taken into account.

132.205.44.5 (talk) 02:50, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

New Section
Any objections to me creating two new sections on "supporters" and "opponents" - a simple list of people/organisations that support or oppose the proposal and their arguments for or against? AndrewRT(Talk) 20:41, 13 May 2008 (UTC)


 * I am against. There are just too much out there to be mentioned. 89.60.253.71 (talk) 13:05, 2 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I second the opposition, for the same reasons, and because it places the focus on the supporters/opponents rather than the proposal. Tfleming (talk) 01:10, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
 * I also oppose as it will degrade the quality of the article. Eklipse (talk) 17:39, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

how it is a feature article?.there is no criticism section
I am dreaming.THis is the first Fa article i have seen which does not have any criticism.What about removal of national sovereignty? -- (User:122.163.149.42, 11:42, 18 December 2008 -- sig added by 201.53.7.16 (talk) 21:09, 18 December 2008 (UTC) )


 * First, congratulations to the authors on the FA status. Now to this question (you didn't sign your name with the four tildes, so i don't know whom i'm addressing), how does making an until-now undemocratic UN system more representative of the governed "remove" national sovereignty? Also, are you suggesting, despite centuries of evolving political architecture from city-state to nation to federations, that national sovereignty is a concise package that is all or nothing? Tfleming (talk) 14:28, 18 December 2008 (UTC)


 * I didn't write the above comment, but giving the UN a democratic mandate would give it popular sovereignty creating conflicting mandates between tiers of government. It would be allowed to go over the heads of national governments and create incoherency. What about national parliaments that represent the governed within their countries? Their roles would be diminished at the expense of better representation. To an extent sovereignty is all-or-nothing as it's a question of where ULTIMATE power lies. 79.72.129.231 (talk) 17:39, 18 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Yes, you are suggesting that the democratic mandate would be all-inclusive and that sovereign authority confers ultimate authority. I and others don't view in this regard. My local town council exercises a reasonable degree of sovereignty, as does my state legislature. While one can debate where the line is, these sovereign authorities nonetheless protect my interests as a citizen not only directly, but by limiting other actors (i.e. Congress) from more easily exercising sovereigntly over me; the U.S. founders referred to this and other limits as checking ambition with ambition. It is less a conflict between tiers of governments as it is a competition between sovereign authorities. Likewise, I am supportive of establishing yet another authority, with direct authority on trans-border concerns (i.e. terrorism, climate change), to compete for my vote with my local, state and national authorities. I'm willing in the short term to allow this global democratic body to be appointed by my national legislature, just as the U.S. Senate was originally appointed by state legislatures; eventually, however, it should derive its mandate from direct elections around the world. Tfleming (talk) 21:45, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Article not Balanced at all ... dangerously so.
Not only does there needs to be a Criticism section, but this article needs to be more Critical to balance this article out (which discusses some dangerous ideas, that do need to be aired). For example ... Over-population is destroying our planet … yet One Person = One Vote could be an insane rubber stamp rewarding all nations who over populate (that makes sense). No checks and balances to ensure only well-informed and well-educated populous either. Next … let's rubber stamp all non-democracies (theocracies, oligarchies, you name it) … because that is sane too (can you believe people believe these all deserve fair hearing … or worse yet claim most states are democratic; when that is so wrong). It is scary that people support this monstrous mess … but scarier still that the information in this article is so lacking on important points brought up here (and giving things the just balance it needs … NPOV is key). Nonprof. Frinkus (talk) 22:16, 18 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Was kind of interesting to see this as todays featured article, it clearly has alot of problems. I have only read through parts of it, theres far too much text in each section for me to read at 4am but may main problem is countries opinions on these proposals should be more clearly laid out in their own section. Especially the permanent members of the Security Council, most of whom would veto and block many of these proposals. As mentioned by Frinkus on a major proposals like this article there should be a criticism section (theres clearly plenty of negatives to whats being suggested) so people get a balanced view. BritishWatcher (talk) 04:41, 19 December 2008 (UTC)


 * I don't understand why Frinkus is insisting that the proposal must be a one-person,one-vote system. That is only one suggestion, and not even strongly endorsed. Of course, no one is going to back that nor would they back sitting any delegates not chosen in a free and fair election. See the section on Election Standards. China might want to appoint delegates, but there's nothing to suggest they'd be allowed. In any case, the parliament wouldn't be nation-based. Chinese delegates wouldn't sit only with other Chinese. They's sit with their political compatriots. American liberals would prefer to sit with South African liberals than American conservatives, just as in the European Parliament, delegates sit by party.


 * As to BritishWatcher's interest in whether governments would support it, this article only discusses the concept of a democratic global parliament. You might want to visit the website for the Campaign for a UNPA and review the statements of support. Regarding specifically the support of the Permanent 5 members, my understanding is that the Campaign is proposing a separate treaty body, not an amendment to the UN Charter, so the P5 members could accede to it, but would not be legally able to veto its creation. You can compare this approach to that which created the International Criminal Court. Tfleming (talk) 17:05, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

As a Proud American...
As a Proud, Unapologetic American I need to say that I am non-negotiably opposed to something European like a "parliament" being forced on MY country to be funded, of course, with MY hard earned tax dollars. No doubt they'd start passing measures left and right to curtail the Freedom that my Country has the unique custom of enjoying, taking away my Right to love my Country. Out go American rights, in come European rules. This article needs to represent the view of real Americans like me and my family who are sicker then a dead pig at the thought of this!


 * A parliament is not European anymore than a congress is American. They are both simply legislatures. China's legislative body is called the National People's Congress. And please, stop playing the victim; you're no more "real" or "proud" an American that the rest of us who also vote, pay our hard-earned taxes to the government, and learn about political terms so as to make an informed decision. Tfleming (talk) 15:58, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

So your country has the "unique custom" of enjoying freedom does it? Really? Unique? The only country? This is why people hate America. Go and learn something you ignorant, arrogant, self-righteous fatass. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.74.185.57 (talk) 09:23, 29 May 2009 (UTC)
 * I agree, being "proud" and "unapologetic" is not a good thing. But you shouldn't swear at them then it looks like a mudslinging match.--99.141.190.71 (talk) 23:25, 23 November 2010 (UTC)
 * There's very little difference between a congress and a parliament beyond the name. Also, I have real difficulty believing you are a real person and not a troll, such a ridiculous caricature as you are. 66.183.11.233 (talk) 20:09, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

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Where is the criticism section for this insane idea?
As was pointed out 13 years ago here, there is no criticism section. This is a lunatic idea only entertained by fantasists, and for a number of extremely obvious reasons will never come to pass, this should be detailed in the article. 84.211.58.90 (talk) 00:55, 14 February 2021 (UTC)


 * I notice you haven't created a criticism section. Perhaps you're not aware of any criticism that can be explained in detail using trustworthy secondary sources? 20WattSphere (talk) 00:35, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

Sizable issues
This 2007 promotion has quite significant issues:
 * "A directly elected UNPA might have common election standards if it follows the example of European Parliament (EP)." - blatant original research; the source for this is the EP's election standards themselves
 * "There are five main options for creating a UN Parliamentary Assembly, according to various assessments." - says who?
 * "Amending the UN Charter, possibly through a Charter Review Conference under Article 109 of the UN Charter, is a commonly cited possibility" - cited to a group proposing to amend the UN charter in this method
 * "There have been only five amendments to the UN Charter since 1945, and none of them were done through the Article 109 process" - it sure feels like the fact that one of these amendments was to Article 109 itself should be mentioned
 * "Another possibility is establishing the UNPA as a subsidiary body of the UN General Assembly. The General Assembly has authority to do this under Article 22 of the UN Charter" - we should be sourcing General Assembly authorities to a scholarly source about UN governance, not a group advocating for the creation of the subject of this article
 * "Another possibility is establishing the UNPA as a subsidiary body of the UN General Assembly. The General Assembly has authority to do this under Article 22 of the UN Charter" - why is this sourced to the membership rules of Parliamentarians for Global Action
 * "As of June 2017, CEUNPA's appeal was endorsed by thousands of signatories from over 150 countries, among them hundreds of parliamentarians, civil society leaders, leading academics and distinguished individuals such as former UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali, the President of the Pan-African Parliament, Gertrude Mongella, Academy Award winner Emma Thompson, SF-author Sir Arthur C. Clarke and Edgar Mitchell, former NASA astronaut and sixth human being to walk on the moon" - sourced to a group making an appeal for the existance of this proposed organization, definite promotional tone
 * "A UNPA could be created through a stand-alone treaty. This would have the advantage that as few as 20 or 30 economically and geographically diverse countries could establish a UNPA" - yes, there's two citations here, but there's absolutely no reason to cite "Committee for a World Parliament" here
 * Take a look at the sourcing for the second paragraph of the "powers" section - this is horribly POV. To source a section that seems to be praising the organization, we have the Democratic World Federalists, the "testimonials" page of Committee for a Democratic UN, another webpage by the Committee for a Democratic UN, something called "the new world parliament.org", and a contextless Cronkite quote.
 * For a proposed political polity like this, we need actual scholarly and legal analysis. We get slight touches of academic sourcing in a few rare spots, but this is almost entirely sourced to political groups that have obvious connections to the subject.  The result is a strong POV issue.  In no way is this article even close to the FA standards. Hog Farm Talk 23:02, 30 March 2022 (UTC)


 * Re the last dot point: secondary sources are preferred over primary (academic) sources. I understand there is only limited discussion of UNPA in media, but this isn't the fault of the UNPA concept. You've criticised virtually all civil society organisations which have weighed in on the idea (various dot points) - aren't these the best we can do? Having said that, there are various academic sources which could be integrated listed under the heading "Schwartzberg-centered" above. 20WattSphere (talk) 00:44, 24 April 2023 (UTC)
 * The UN High Commissioner on Human Rights commissioned a report in 2013 on this idea - this could contain useful sources https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2013/10/time-global-united-nations-parliamentary-assembly-un-independent-expert 20WattSphere (talk) 10:27, 25 May 2023 (UTC)

POV tag added
See Featured article review/United Nations Parliamentary Assembly/archive1 Sandy Georgia (Talk)  06:11, 8 April 2022 (UTC)

Clean up talk page
Hi all. I've noticed that a large number of topics on this talk page are actually about editors' personal opinions on the article's subject, rather than the quality of the article. I propose to delete any topics like this, to make it easier to navigate. Thanks 20WattSphere (talk) 22:44, 27 July 2023 (UTC)