United Nations

Russia: 129 vetoes. United States: 89 (51 specifically protecting Israel). United Kingdom: 29. China: 19. France: 16. As of September 2025, the Security Council's five permanent members have cast 282 vetoes—each one blocking action that a majority of the world's nations wanted to take.

The UN operates through quorum-sensing on a planetary scale, enabling 193 member states to signal preferences and build coalition-formation around global threats. Like bacterial colonies coordinating through chemical signals, it generates alarm-calls that no single actor could broadcast alone—climate warnings, pandemic alerts, proliferation concerns. But the Portuguese man-of-war parallel is precise: this colonial organism appears unified, yet individual zooids can impede collective action.

The costly-signaling of Security Council resolutions theoretically demonstrates major-power commitment. In practice, coalition-defense allows any P5 member to protect its interests. Four vetoes were cast in 2025 alone. Resolution 76/262 now triggers General Assembly meetings after each veto—17 vetoes have triggered 17 meetings since 2022—but the assembly has no enforcement power.

Reform proposals proliferate as the UN turns 80. France and Mexico's 2015 initiative (now supported by 107 countries) would regulate veto use in mass atrocity cases. African nations demand two permanent seats with veto power if maintained, plus five non-permanent seats. But credibility-collapse threatens the entire architecture: the P5 can veto reforms to their own veto power. The coral reef that is supposed to shelter smaller nations calcifies when major powers refuse cooperation.

Commission President von der Leyen's September 2025 call to abolish foreign policy vetoes in the EU highlights the paradox: unanimity is required to abolish unanimity. The biological lesson from colonial organisms: when polyps disagree, the man-of-war cannot move. It generates signals but cannot compel coordinated response. The question is whether signal-generating capacity alone justifies the institution's existence—or whether paralysis has crossed into credibility-collapse.