Treasurer Anthony Chiarito on his Experience at the Department of Political Affairs at the UN:

Over the summer, I interned with the Department of Political Affairs, within a branch of the Security Council Division devoted to maintaining records of the Council’s practices, procedures, and decisions. The research is important for at least two reasons. First, since the Security Council has never formalized any of its working procedures, there is no formal institutional memory of meeting procedures, agenda items, or decisions made by the Council. This is not a problem for the five permanent members, as they always have staff dedicated to the Council’s activities. It is a problem, however, for every other member of the organization, as many members serve on the Council irregularly, and some never at all. Thus without a record of the Council’s practices, they would be woefully unprepared for the responsibilities of the monthly Council presidency. Second, attempts to reform the Security Council make little sense without a grasp and understanding of what the Council has done, managed poorly, or disregarded completely. The research of my branch has been very useful for working groups dedicated to finding feasible and sensible reforms of Council practice.

I cannot stress enough how informative and rewarding was this internship. Given that the branch is concerned with recording Council practice, I had many opportunities to attend Security Council meetings, meet with high level staff of several country missions, and participate in talks and brown bag discussions of current Council agenda topics; from women, peace, and security to the conflict in Syria. The highlight however was attending a Q&A session with the Permanent Mission of Iran to the United Nations. There the Iranian mission invited all attendees to ask frank and pointed questions about their publicly stated foreign policy. It turned into a discussion of the misunderstandings between Iran and the West, and being able to hear the Iranians provide their reasoning on issues as varied as nuclear technology, diplomacy, Council practices, and human rights was incredibly insightful. We left feeling less tense and more understanding than when we walked into the meeting, and that, if anything, is what work at the UN is all about.