History
While treaties, alliances, and multilateral conferences had existed for centuries, IGOs only began to be established in the 19th century. Among the first were the Central Commission for Navigation on the Rhine, initiated in the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars, and the future International Telegraph Union, which was founded by the signing of the International Telegraph Convention by 20 countries in May 1865. Of notable significance was the emergence of the League of Nations following World War One, designed as an institution to foster collective security in order to sustain peace.
Read more about this topic: Intergovernmental Organization
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“The foregoing generations beheld God and nature face to face; we, through their eyes. Why should not we also enjoy an original relation to the universe? Why should not we have a poetry and philosophy of insight and not of tradition, and a religion by revelation to us, and not the history of theirs?”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)