Universal Postal Union

The Universal Postal Union (UPU) is an international governmental organization that oversees the world's public system of cross-border circulation of postal products and services. It was established by the Treaty of Bern in 1874. Its stable and uninterrupted 130-year history is an outstanding example of international socioeconomic collaboration.

The history of the UPU tracks the rise and development of modern nation-states, which nationalized postal services and created state postal monopolies—public post offices (PPOs)—for their specific national security and economic benefits. In pursuing their national interests, a proliferation of bilateral postal agreements seriously complicated the evolution of international commerce and postal markets. Rowland Hill's postal reforms in the United Kingdom in the 1840s—based on the idea of prepaid mail at uniformly low rates—provided a needed conceptual framework for the creation of a single international postal market. After an international postal conference in Paris in 1863, 22 leading commercial nations signed the Treaty of Bern (1874), creating the General Postal Union (renamed the Universal Postal Union in 1878). The UPU standardized and simplified the postal market and postal rates. It created a single postal territory for the free transit and reciprocal international exchange of letters in a uniform manner, and established and managed a system of financial accounts for balancing asymmetrical international postal traffic. The UPU established a program of rules and regulations that guided the expansion of the international postal market, notwithstanding the reality that it enjoyed no sanction or compliance authority.

The UPU's state membership is not universal but includes more than 190 nations. It became a UN specialized agency in 1948. It is the smallest UN agency, with a modest budget of 35 million Swiss francs and a small staff in its International Bureau in Bern that reflects its essentially voluntaristic character. It holds a congress every 4 years, which acts as a postal parliament to establish postal rules and regulations, following consensus decision making (two-thirds majorities) and voluntary sign-on to new policies and products. Between congresses, its work is carried out by two representative bodies. The Council of Administration acts as a cabinet with executive powers, and the Postal Operators Council focuses on specialist and operational issues. The professional International Bureau staff provides administrative support and has taken a leadership role in technological, development, and quality issues. At [Page 1711]the most recent congress(es), UPU members have concentrated on general strategy and policy issues.

The UPU was highly successful in getting nations to establish a single, world postal territory that would be guided by three important shared principles: (1) that international mail should be handled uniformly like domestic mail; (2) that postal products should enjoy free transit and circulation; and (3) that postal products, rates, and regulations should be standardized and simplified. Its voluntaristic and collaborative approach minimized conflicts and disputes among nations, while encouraging technical cooperation, postal reform, and (recently) improvement in postal quality. It negotiated common standards and compatibility to maximize the benefits associated with new technology (e.g., sorting machines) and has managed to embed the postal system in the Internet system through the development of an electronic postmark. However, the UPU never really set a uniform price (which typically comprises a minimum/maximum range) and has never eliminated transit charges. Moreover, the long-standing poor quality of international public postal service reflected the ultimate reality that the UPU lacked authority over domestic postal matters.

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