Model United Nations, also known as Model UN or MUN, is an extra-curricular activity in which students typically roleplay delegates to the United Nations and simulate UN committees. This activity takes place at MUN conferences, which is usually organized by a high school or college MUN clubs.The MUN aims to be an authentic simulation of the United Nations – complete with Security Council, General
Assembly, an ECOSOC committee as well as a wide range of other sub-committees, a Secretariat headed by the Secretary General, a Press Corp and of course the delegates.For the duration of a Model United Nations conference, every participant or ‘delegate’ represents a member state of the United Nations in one of the committees of the UN system.Thousands of school and college students around the world participate in Model United Nations, which involves substantial researching, public speaking, debating, and writing skills, as well as critical thinking, teamwork, and leadership abilities. Preparing as a MUN delegate requires determination, research and organizational skills, depending on the level of the MUN.Besides that, you are heading into a competetive atmosphere where each and every other delegate is well equiped with Knowledge and facts on the issue to be simulated. This therefore means you willl have do elaborate research on the issue so as not to be over-shadowed during the simulation. Experience has shown that some participants even go as far preparing working papers to introduce during the simulation and hence pulling the entire simulation to his/her tune. This has a chance of happening in committtees where other delegates are not well vest with the issue or did not fully prepare on the issue.The ultimate objective of every delegate is to produce, lobby support for, debate and ultimately have passed a resolution on one of the topic areas within their committee. A resolution is the proposed solution to a problem and forms the main focus of the debate. The delegates aim is to represent the views of their country on the issue while at the same time making it as acceptable as possible to as many member states as possible. What is a Committee? The number of possible committees in Model UN is very large, limited only by the creativity and vision of conference organisers. In spite of differences in type and topic, most all committees share a few common characteristics. An example of this would be a dais (also known as a committee staff), which facilitates the smooth running of a committee. A dais is headed by a chair and/or director who presides over the committee, maintaining decorum, ensuring delegates follow the established procedures in committee, and guiding delegates through the resolution or directive-writing process. Another example of a common characteristic would be note passing, which allows delegates to discreetly communicate with one another and the dais during debate. Committees in Model United Nations can be divided into a variety of categories, based on
how they are run (traditional committees and crisis committees),
when they occur (historical, contemporary, and futuristic committees),
whether or not they are based on the real world (realistic and fantastical committees),
who the principal actors are (countries, country subdivisions, organizations, or individuals),
their powers (executive, legislative, judicial, etc.), and
their area of focus (political, economic, social, etc.) their size (large, medium, small, etc.) Committees at Model UN conferences can simulate a variety of bodies. From the more commonly simulated six main committees of the United Nations General Assembly and the UN Security Council, to corporate executive boards and national cabinets, Model UN committees reflect the diversity of the delegates who participate in them. General Assembly committees (such as DISEC, SPECPOL, and ECOFIN)
Other UN bodies (such as the Security Council, the ICJ, and ECOSOC)
Regional bodies (such as organs of NATO, the OAS, or the EU)
Model United Nations committees may be modern, historical, futuristic, or fantastical. A special committee that does not have a parallel in the actual United Nationswhich deals with a crisis is known as a 'Crisis Committee.In this committee, a crisis is given to a team of students and the teams must come up with solutions.The Crisis Committee focuses on a single historical event. The event may be fictional or non-fictional.
