The League of Nations, created after the end of the First World War, has generally been considered by many to have achieved very little. The League is generally considered to have failed in its mission to achieve disarmament, prevent war, settle disputes through diplomacy, and improve global welfare. However, it achieved significant successes in a number of areas.

Successes

Before the outbreak of the First World War, there was no standard in Europe concerning the treatment of employed individuals. In order to improve labour conditions throughout the world under the INTERNATIONAL LABOUR ORGANIZATION (I.L.O), the league managed to fix maximum working hours per day and per week. This, indeed, was a success.

Apart from this, the league also persuaded member countries to specify minimum wages, sickness and unemployment benefits and to introduce old age pensions. This made it possible for the underprivileged people in member countries to be taken care of by their respective governments.

It was also in the area of refugees that the League of Nations recorded some success. THE REFUGEE ORGANIZATION, led by Fridtjof Nansen from Norway, solved the problem of thousands of former prisoners of war and managed to resettle about 500000 prisoners of war who were marooned (stranded or abandoned) in Russia after the First World War ended.

The League also worked to combat the international trade in opium and sexual slavery and helped alleviate the plight of refugees, particularly in Turkey in the period to 1926. One of its innovations in this area was its 1922 introduction of the Nansen passport, which was the first internationally recognized identity card for stateless refugees.

Many of the League's successes were accomplished by its various Agencies and Commissions. The HEALTH ORGANIZATION did good work in investigating the causes of epidemics. For example, it successfully investigated and dealt with the Typhus fever in Russia and did a research on leprosy. The Mandates Commission supervised the territories that were obtained from the central powers.

The league ensured that the territories were both well-governed and prepared for their own independence. For instance, the League administered the Saar region and organized a plebiscite in 1935 that voted in favour of the region going back to Germany. This was done efficiently and successfully by the league.

When it came to intervening in some disputes, the league effectively resolved the quarrel over Aaland Islands between Sweden and Finland in 1920. Aaland is a collection of around 6,500 islands mid-way between Sweden and Finland. The islands are exclusively Swedish-speaking, but Finland had sovereignty in the early 1900s. During the period from 1917 onwards, most residents wished the islands to become part of Sweden; Finland, however, did not wish to cede the islands. The Swedish government raised the issue with the League in 1921. After close consideration, the League determined that the islands should remain a part of Finland, but be governed autonomously, averting a potential war between the two countries.

Apart from this, Germany and Poland had rival claims over the industrial area of Upper Silesia. The league successfully decided that it should be partitioned or divided between the two countries in 1921. The Treaty of Versailles had ordered a plebiscite in Upper Silesia to determine whether the territory should be part of Germany or Poland. In the background, strong-arm tactics and discrimination against Poles led to rioting and eventually to the first two Silesian Uprisings (1919 and 1920). In the plebiscite, roughly 59.6% (around 500,000) of the votes were cast for joining Germany, and this result led to the Third Silesian Uprising in 1921. The League was asked to settle the matter. In 1922, a six-week investigation found that the land should be split; the decision was accepted by both countries and by the majority of Upper Silesians.

The league quickly intervened when Greek invaded Bulgaria after some shooting incident on the frontier. After an incident between sentries on the border between Greece and Bulgaria in 1925, Greek troops invaded their neighbor. Bulgaria ordered its troops to provide only token resistance, trusting the League to settle the dispute. The League did indeed condemn the Greek invasion, and called for both Greek withdrawal and compensation to Bulgaria. Greece complied, but complained about the disparity between their treatment and that of Italy. Greek troops were withdrawn and Bulgaria was paid damages by Greece.

The border between Albania and Yugoslavia remained in dispute after the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, and Yugoslavian forces occupied some Albanian territory. After clashes with Albanian tribesmen, the Yugoslav forces invaded farther. The League sent a commission of representatives from various powers to the region. The commission found in favor of Albania, and the Yugoslav forces withdrew in 1921, albeit under protest. War was again prevented.

On the other hand, when Turkey claimed the province of Mosul, a British mandate territory of Iraq, the League intervened and successfully decided in favour of Iraq.

Following the First World War, Austria and Hungary were facing bankruptcy due to all the reparations they had to pay. The League arranged loans for the two nations and sent commissioners to oversee the spending of this money. These actions started Austria and Hungary on the road to economic recovery.

The port city of Memel (now Klaipeda) and the surrounding area was placed under League control after the end of the World War I and was governed by a French general for three years. Although the population was mostly German, the Lithuanian government placed a claim to the territory, with Lithuanian forces invading in 1923. The League chose to cede the land around Memel to Lithuania, but declared the port should remain an international zone; Lithuania agreed. While the decision could be seen as a failure (in that the League reacted passively to the use of force), the settlement of the issue without significant bloodshed was a point in the League's favour.

Failures:

Several factors have been given to explain why the League of Nations did not achieve as much success. Firstly, the league failed because it seemed to be an organization created for the benefit of the victorious powers. It was closely associated with the Versailles Treaty which was hated by many countries. The league was further weakened because it had no army to effectively take action when there was a military dispute.

Apart from the above mentioned reasons, most of the great powers did not join the League of Nations. The United States of America and Russia did not join[1].Japan and Italy withdrew denying the League the psychological and financial assistance.

The League had weak constitution. This made it difficult to take any decisive action on aggressors. Also, the League only met once a year and decisions were made unanimously. As a result, it could not effectively deal with certain issues that arose way before or way after the meeting.

The rise of dictatorship in Germany, Italy, Russia and Japan made the League to fail because this made the ruling against the big powers difficult as they ignored the decisions of the League. In addition, there was no co-operation among the member states due to nationalist feelings and aspirations, which outweighed international peace as seen from the failure of the disarmament process.

The policy of appeasement adopted by France and Britain of not wanting to antagonize Germany and Italy encouraged aggressive behaviour in these countries. They defied the League. Britain and France were not ready to help the League take decisive economic measures. The League failed to foster a sense of co-operation among the member states.

Finally, the league looked like the winners organization hence the defeated nations never joined. Even if the league was an initiative of President Woodrow Wilson of America, the United States Senate rejected both the Versailles Settlements and the league in 1920. The league was therefore deprived of a strong member. Other important powers like Germany and Russia were initially not involved. Germany was only allowed to join in 1926 while Russia became a member in 1934 (when Germany left the league).

The world economic crisis which began in 1929 contributed to the decline of the league. It brought unemployment and reduced living standards in most countries. As a result, extreme socialist and communist governments in Japan and Germany came to power and together with Italy’s Mussolini[2]; they refused to keep to the rules and decided to take certain actions that revealed the weaknesses of the league.

Another weakness of the league was that the World Disarmament Conference of 1932-33 was a failure. The countries present could not agree on how to disarm their armies.