We Did Nothing: Why the truth doesn't always come out when the UN goes in

Polman provides an eye-opening account of how the UN really works, how powerful nations manipulate it for their own gain, and who pays the price. She was on hand during the aftermath of the Rwandan genocide and so many other humanitarian disasters to which the UN tried its best to respond with always mixed results--sometimes just bad results--and so is able to provide first-hand accounts and insightful, boots-on-the-ground reportage. By providing a window on the politics that drive the UN, the reader comes to understand why a well-intentioned UN always seems ineffectual when it's most needed. This book is singly the most harrowing piece of journalism I've ever read and it indelibly changed my understanding of how the world works. I'd recommend it to anyone who is serious about understanding world affairs.

One of the main things I took from this book was just how powerless the UN really is: it's a forum for countries to work together, but if the member countries don't want to do something, there's nothing the UN can do.Linda Polman's personal insight into what happened on the ground in Haiti and in Africa is gut-wrenching, but her journalistic integrity is fulfilled by researching what happened in the UN while she was on the ground amidst the attrocities.A must-read for anyone who wants to know how the UN works and why it reacts the way it does to attrocities around the world.