Delegates should be come adequately skilled in the substantive and procedural areas prior to the conference by developing a preparation program that combines research with practice. The following suggestions may be helpful in constructing an outline for your program. To familiarize delegates with what is expected of them, the three major areas that require preparation are presented separately.

The first area concerns the basics in which every MUN participant should be well versed: the structure, purposes and history of the United Nations. Sources of information are the United Nations web site, the local United Nations Association, and the Resources section of the MUNFW web site. A handy source is the Charter of the United Nations that is a pocket-sized booklet. However, the UN web site and the local UNA should be able to give you charts, etc. describing the UN, the General Assembly and its Committees, the Security Council, Economic and Social Council and the many associated agencies and organizations that make up the UN family. This would be helpful as MUN sessions often use UN family members as meeting groups in their simulations. Thus, if a session convenes World Health Organization (WHO), it would be good to find out what the organization does.

Working cohesively as a delegation is helpful during preparation and is essential at the MUN conference. The faculty advisor and/or Delegation Chair should develop a program to coordinate and consolidate research done by the delegates. If preparation meetings are not part of the school curriculum, regular weekly/biweekly meetings for the delegation should be arranged. The focus of each meeting should be determined beforehand to both save time and maintain interest. In developing the preparation program, faculty advisors and Delegation Chairs should take into consideration the particular needs of their delegation.

The value of meetings during the preliminary stages of research is in the constant exchange of information and research tips. Each delegate might be assigned the responsibility of keeping up--to--date on a particular news source, and reporting in this capacity at each subsequent meeting.

Study of the Assigned Country

First country assignments are made by the OED at the beginning of the academic year and are posted on the WEB. Study of a country may begin with the summary treatment offered by any encyclopedia. Good references are almanacs, Facts on File, Political Handbook of the World, Statesman’s Yearbook, Keesing’s and Deadline Data on World Affairs among others. Foreign embassies and newspapers are also important sources on current national and international problems that affect a nation’s stand on specific issues in the United Nations and its relationships with other nations. The more a delegate knows about a nation’s policies, whether political, economic, or cultural in nature, the easier it will be to assume the role of delegate for that nation. Upon receiving country assignments, the work load may be divided further. A study of the country’s foreign policy and activity at the UN are a must.

Early in the students’ research, they should review the salient features of the country’s topography, agriculture, industry, economy, language, customs, culture, religions, political system, and history depending upon the topic each has received. This study culminates in the preparation of the country profile paper, one of the required items as evidence of preparation before conference.

It is crucial to have a clear and complete knowledge of the country. This includes an understanding of the government structure, geography, economy, history, culture, and foreign policy and international relations. Many delegations have found that the best way to initiate the study of the country is to assign each delegate to research and report on one of the above noted topics. This basic information should be continually updated. While acquiring knowledge of a country, delegates should develop a feel for how the selected nation views its neighbors, allies, enemies, and the world in general. It is recommended that time be set aside periodically so that delegates can share new information about their country and discuss various background aspects that will affect their representation of the country. The research efforts of the delegates should result in a three to five page profile of the selected country. Additionally, the delegation should produce a document (for their use) that includes a strategy presenting a defense of your position on the issues, potential arguments against your position and possible responses, a list of supporting nations and opposing nations, and a discussion detailing the most likely path to a compromise position. This information will assist delegates during the informal caucusing session (pictured above) and during debate in the committee. This research and study should cover most of the fall period. The final country profile paper should be completed in the December or January period.

All delegations are required to submit a profile of the country they will be representing at conference. This 2 - 5 page document must be submitted 30 days prior to conference. This profile should be in a narrative form, not a listing of facts. The delegation should work together as a group on this project and it should reflect their knowledge of the country and their ability to communicate that knowledge clearly and concisely. The profile should demonstrate that the delegation has a thorough understanding of the country, both within the United Nations and in the global political arena. The profile should provide an overview of the country including: general information regarding type of government and its relations with its citizens, regional neighbors, and the international community; the type of economy and basic indicators of its condition; type of military, its size, strength, and the governments willingness and capacity to use military force; its recent political history and an analysis of the internal and/or external obstacles facing successful attainment of known political goals and policies; and notable cultural aspects of the society.

Summary background information and a bibliography on agenda items is provided in the Issues Book, which is downloadable from the WEB site after the first of November. For in--depth study of a topic, many types of sources are available. The United Nations Monthly Chronicle gives a summary of the month’s activity at the United Nations and sometimes includes important speeches in summary form. The United Nations Yearbook gives a sense of a topic’s history, providing references to documents, reports, resolutions and votes on all topics discussed by the UN for that particular year. The time lag involved in preparing an annual volume, however, means that most recent developments are not available.

The United Nation’s Official Records include summary accounts of the meetings of the General Assembly, the Committees and Councils, reports and other documents presented to these bodies, and the resolutions adopted at the meetings. The Christian Science Monitor, Current History, Foreign Affairs, the New York Times, Vital Speeches and the Wall Street Journal are among the periodicals and newspapers that are good sources for the most current information. Most UN documents can be found in the United Nations depository libraries and in some college and community libraries. If a document is unavailable in any of these places, it may be ordered from:

Internet sites with country--specific information.

The site is http://www.gksoft.com/govt/en/ 

Select the region of the country you are looking for, then select Worldwide Governments, then click on the name of the country you are reprsenting. They may then click on any of the following to obtain information about their country (these sources are very useful for compiling a country profile):

1. The World Factbook (by the CIA)
2. Atlapedia Online (by Latimer Clarke Corporation)
3. Informtion Please: Countries of the World (by Information Please LLC)
4. Political Information:
5. The Almanac of Politics and Government (by Keynote Publishing Co.)
6. Elections around the World (by Wilfried Derksen)
7. Political Resources on the Net (by Roberto Cicciomessere)
8. Chiefs of State and Cabinet Members (by the CIA)
9. Political Leaders (by Roberto Ortíz de Zárate)
10. Information from Encyclopedias:
11. Encyclopædia Britannica (by Britannica.com Inc.)
12. Funk & Wagnalls Multimedia Encyclopedia (by Versaware Technologies Inc.)
13. Hutchinson Encyclopedia (by Helicon Publishing Ltd.)

To obtain a country's position on a given issue:

In addition to above sources, there are also many departments listed under each country. Students should click on one that may deal with the issue they are researching. Alternatively, they could click on their country’s embassy in the US for country--specific information.

Sometimes, there is an official newspaper with valuable information regarding the country’s position on given issues. An alternative way to obtain info from newspapers is to go to the following yahoo Website: http://dir.yahoo.com/News_and_Media/By_Region/  . Click on your country, and a list of newspapers will come up. You could also go to the yahoo Website that covers news from a global perspective: http://dir.yahoo.com/News_and_Media/World/    Options include ABCNEWS.com: World Index ,BBC World Service ,CNN Interactive: World News, Foreign Report, ForeignWire.com, FOXNews.com: World, International Herald Tribune, MSNBC: International News, Nando Times, USA Today World, Washington Times: International, WashingtonPost.com: World, and Yahoo! News

For each agenda topic, determine: UN action: past, present;
The country’s past policy statements;
The country’s performance and voting (not always the same as its stated policies) -- review relevant resolutions which the country has sponsored, influenced or opposed; General background information found from books, pamphlets, documents, etc., all of course, should deal specifically with one’s topic.

To find a nation’s position on a specific agenda item, the best sources are UN speeches and debates. The relevant speeches can be determined by checking the United Nations Documents Index. Those documents which are labeled A/PV..., A/C.../PV..., A/C.../SR..., will contain the actual speeches given in the Assembly or in the Committees. Position papers and speeches may also be acquired by writing directly to that country’s embassy or information office. A country’s performance on issues, not always identical to its stated policy, can be inferred from a study of the resolutions that the nation has sponsored, supported, or opposed.

Resolutions can be found in the UN Yearbook, the UN Monthly Chronicle or through the Documents Index. All resolutions passed at the most recent General Assembly can be acquired in bound form by writing to the Public Inquiries Unit of the United Nations. The information so gathered has a direct and crucial bearing on a key part of delegate preparation work: the writing of policy statements and draft resolutions. These policy statements are compiled by the Secretariat and will be on file at the conference in April. They will be available to anyone who needs them. This study culminates in a written policy statement of the assigned country’s position on the agenda items. Policy statements are the second required written assignment.

Parliamentary rules are tools for conducting formal sessions. The rules maintain a semblance of order within committee or plenary sessions to smooth and expedite the process of arriving at substantive discussion.

The procedural rules used at the United Nations are designed to facilitate business and do not serve the same function as rules employed in debate tournaments. Using the rules incorrectly (as a tool to aid in the passage of a resolution) or in excess will hinder the proceedings of the committee, and again, will steer the conference off course from its aim of reflecting the UN as closely as possible.

As soon as possible, preparation sessions should be combined with practice in public speaking and presenting policy statements, etc. Mock MUN conferences should be conducted, employing, if possible, the rules of procedure to be used at the next conference and enlisting the help of experienced delegates. These practice sessions can be extremely useful in familiarizing new delegates with the gist of MUN procedure and may also serve as a forum for broadening delegates’ knowledge of the policies of countries they will not be representing. Faculty advisors or Delegation Chairs should review the proper usage of procedural rules during the practice sessions. At each MUN conference, the rules are distributed by the Secretariats and may vary with conferences. The rules are usually forwarded to the delegations well in advance of the conference so that they may be studied thoroughly. The better conferences will offer rules that facilitate debate rather than entangle the delegates.