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Resolution Writing Guide

Resolutions


Writing a Resolution is surprisingly easy once you get to know their structure and format.
Resolutions consist of the following key elements title, committee, proposing nation, perambulatory clauses and operative clauses.

Title
The title of a resolution consists of 'Resolution' followed by the date of the resolution, the chronological number of the resolution in that year, and the aim or target of the resolution. For example:

Resolution 2009/01 : Concerning the current situation in Somalia


This was a resolution written in 2009, the 1st resolution of the year, and it dealt with issues in Somalia. Simple!

Committee
Selecting which committee a resolution is to be submitted to is a bit more complicated and requires a reasonable amount of intuition.
Resolutions pertaining to international peace and security should be directed to the Security Council.
Others can be directed to the Social, Cultural and Humanitarian Committee if they deal with issues such as refugees or religious matters. Other potential destinations are the Disarmament Committee or the Economic Committee. If you are unsure about which Committee your particular resolution is for, contact the Secretary General. Alternatively, the Secretary General is able to change the Committee once the resolution has been posted.

Submitted by
The next part reads “Submitted by”. The full name of your country should follow here.
Any country can also ask for other nations to be co-sponsors of a resolution. This means that the second nation's name gets added on here. UNOs don’t have the power to fully propose resolutions themselves, so they *have* to have a co-sponsor in the form of a nation.

Preambulatory Clauses and Operative Clauses
Whereas Bills and Acts in national law have a Preamble, Resolutions have Preambulatory Clauses or Phrases. This details the reasons behind the resolution. This is followed by the Operative clauses, which actually detail what the Resolution proposes to do.

There are certain ways to write this. For a start, each clause starts with a verb (sometimes with an additional modifying adverb). This is traditionally bolded or italicized for the Preambulatory clauses and underlined and/or bolded for the Operative Clauses. Preambulatory Clauses are unnumbered but Operative clauses are listed as 1. and 2. and 3. etc Preambulatory clauses should end with a comma, Operative clauses with a semi-colon ( ; ).

Here is an example of a completed resolution (written by Mrgd291190):

ResolutionCommittee : Security Council
Proposed by : Union of the Comoros, Sultanate of Oman

Alarmed by the increase in piracy in Somalia,
Seeking to find a solution to the issue,
Welcoming the deployment of EU, US and Russian naval units to the Gulf of Aden,
Thanking the General Assembly for increasing its donations to Somalia to $250million,
Noting the suspension of Eritrea by the African Union in light of their support of the ICJ,
Reaffirming the MUNs commitment to bettering the standard of living of all its members,
Believing that the only way to resolve the problem is to extend the remit of the units there,

1. Invites all nations with suitable naval power to send units to aid the UN Mission in Somalia;
2. Calls on all nations to cease the arms trade with Somalia;
3. Authorises an arms embargo with Eritrea;
4. Expresses its support for African Union efforts in the Horn of Africa;
5. Expresses its hope that all nations will send suitable aid to better the quality of life in Somalia


It’s mostly, as you’ll notice, written as one long sentence. You can see that it was written in 2009, was the first resolution of the year, deals with Somalia, should be sent to the Security Council, was proposed by the Comoros, co-sponsored by Oman and then you can see how the Preambulatory Phrases show what the Comoros thinks of the current situation and and the Operative Clauses show what it aims to do.


Preambulatory

Spoiler


Operative

Spoiler



In accordance with the Charter, new resolutions should be sent directly to the Secretary General (or Deputy Secretary General when the SG is absent). He or she will check the resolution to make sure it's correctly formatted and then post it on behalf of the submitter.
The Secretary General can be consulted at any time about resolutions (and anything else MUN-related!).

Thanks to thunder_chunky and others for writing this guide. A new one shall replace it shortly.

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