The Specialized Agencies and the United Nations: Progress Report I

The pattern of relations between the United Nations and the specialized agencies has now been developed to a point where some comparison of the theory of the Character with emerging practice may be useful. By midsummer 1947 the Economic and Social Council had held four sessions. Its structure of commissions and subcommissions had been substantially established and the first round or so of meetings completed. Formal agreements, as envisaged by Articles 57 and 63 of the Character, had been concluded with four specialized agencies — ILO, FAO, UNESCO, and ICAO — all of which were going concerns. Negotiations to this end were slowly progressing with the Bank and the Fund. A seventh agency (WHO), although still in the preparatory stage, had begun negotiations with a view to the eventual conclusion of an agreement, while the constituent instrument of the International Trade Organization, then in the final drafting phase at Geneva, was certain to call for the establishment of a formal connection between ITO and the United Nations. The IRO, though a United Nations creation and declared by its basic instrument to be a “specialized agency†within the meaning of Article 57, belongs in a different category because of its temporary character.