Currently the United Nations is an organization devoted to bringing together nation states from around the world. However, the establishment of the European Union may signal a change to that formula.
The EU is a union of nations that is often referred to these days as a United States of Europe. The union has brought prosperity, not that there has been some problems, to the region along with relative peace and a seamless almost borderless entity. In fact, many believe that the road to peace will be attained by the creation of other regional unions in say Africa, the Mideast, East Asia, South Asia, North and South America that will eventually all merge into one peaceful and prosperous whole.
What does this mean for the UN? Well the organization will have to devote some of its attention away from nation states and towards these regional unions. Though its General Assembly will still be composed of nation states perhaps its security council will be made up of unions like the EU. There is even talk today of the EU taking the place of Britain and France on the Council.
The UN was created in 1945 in the aftermath of World War II and much has changed today with the fall of the Soviet Union and the rise of China, Asia and the EU. In order to survive the UN must now adapt to these changed circumstances. With UN recognition of regional unions the world will be a step closer to a greater whole beyond what we see today at the organization.
Steps can be taken by the creation of new committees devoted to this new world in the UN and all its sub agencies. The UN will in fact go from a united nations to a united unions format. For these regional unions to take hold new treaties will have to be signed among those nations and even, like the EU, a constitution created for each so as to lock the individual unions into place. Perhaps then the UN will have its members sign a new accord ushering in this new world of global peace and prosperity through unions.