The next UN chief must architect a new era of multilateralism

The election process for the next United Nations secretary-general is now underway. By the end of this year, a new leader will assume office at one of the most consequential junctures in the institution’s history. The global landscape is undeniably turbulent: geopolitical shifts, proliferating conflict, persistent poverty and climate risk, and strained public trust in multilateral institutions. Still, it’s worth focusing on what multilateralism has delivered over the last century: A world that is more connected, more interoperable, and more capable than at any other point in human history. Global development gains, international health coordination, aviation and maritime safety standards, and digital interoperability, to name a few, are all rooted in international agreements. They are the invisible infrastructure of modern life and taken for granted. The United Nations system has been central to this architecture of cooperation. The challenge now is not to defend its past, but to design its future. “The next secretary-general must be a reformer who executes, a modernizer who adapts, a communicator who persuades, a strategist who balances power realities, and a peace architect grounded in the [U.N.] Charter.” --— The next U.N. secretary-general will therefore need to serve as a strategic reformer, a peace architect, a defender of human dignity, and a modernizer of multilateralism. Five priorities should define that mandate. 1. Rebuild trust through transparency, delivery, and communication Public confidence in international institutions has been eroding for years now. This impacts not just the legitimacy of multilateral institutions but also the morale of the thousands of staff undertaking the work of the institutions. Rebuilding trust must begin with radical transparency, demonstrating institutional efficiency and effectiveness, and persuasively communicating impact to the average person, not just to the diplomatic elite. The U.N. must demonstrate measurable delivery and make its often-invisible contributions visible. Strategic communication should explain, plainly and proactively, the immense value that multilateral cooperation brings to daily life. At the same time, the next secretary-general must invest in an effort to uplift staff and inspire them with renewed ambition and sense of purpose. 2. Drive systemic reform and modernization Reform and modernization are distinct but interlinked agendas. Whereas reform addresses governance and political architecture, modernization transforms how the system operates. Both influence trust. On reform, the next secretary-general must be prepared to convene — and drive to conclusion — difficult conversations about institutional legitimacy and structure. Security Council reform remains overdue. Beyond the council, duplication and fragmentation across treaty bodies and agencies weaken coherence and erode trust. The next secretary-general will need to build upon the UN80 process, rationalize mandates, consolidate where feasible, and align governance structures with contemporary realities. Modernization, meanwhile, must build on recent reform efforts but move decisively from early action to broad-based, thoughtful, and sequenced implementation. The next secretary-general should consolidate the myriad of partially connected reform efforts into a single, evidence-based road map focused on efficiency and effectiveness. Digital tools, artificial intelligence, greater agility and new ways of working, and willingness to take on purposeful risk must be embraced. Achieving these reforms will require active investment in changing mindsets and ways of working across the system. 3. Deliver on global public goods and actively define the post-2030 agenda The U.N.’s relevance in the coming decade will be judged by its ability to coordinate collective action on systemic risks, such as poverty and climate change, and shared opportunities such as AI standards and pandemic preparedness. The Sustainable Development Goals have provided one of the most powerful shared frameworks for development cooperation to date. Yet, the SDG framework and its measurement architecture are too cumbersome to drive accountability. As 2030 approaches, the next secretary-general must lead a coherent process to define what comes next. A post-SDG framework should be more streamlined, more measurable, and more focused on implementation and financing. It must also reflect the realities of an AI-driven world. Equally serious, the post-2030 climate architecture must be reshaped. Implementation mechanisms, financing structures, and the effectiveness of existing processes, including the annual Conference of Parties model, deserve careful reassessment. Climate action must be integrated with development, security, and economic resilience. Beyond these pillars, the next secretary-general must organize the multilateral system, and indeed member states, around growing needs for global public goods, including pandemic preparedness, AI governance, food and water security, and biodiversity protection. 4. Navigate a fragmented and multistakeholder world After decades of accelerating globalization, the world is now on a path of systemic fragmentation and geopolitical competition. As a result, the global interoperability we have enjoyed since the end of the Cold War will increasingly be tested by competing regulatory regimes, divergent technology standards, and geopolitical decoupling. Preserving space for coordination, even among adversaries, will require diplomatic agility and strategic clarity. At the same time, the world is no longer exclusively state-centric. Member states remain the foundation of the U.N. system, but corporations, civil society, faith-based organizations, and transnational coalitions increasingly wield influence. The next secretary-general must evolve multilateral engagement from state-only diplomacy toward structured multiplayer governance, implementation, and accountability. The private sector in particular should be engaged as a genuine partner in innovation, implementation, and accountability, not merely as a funder. 5. Reassert the core mandate enshrined in the U.N. Charter Above all, the United Nations exists to maintain international peace and security and to create the conditions of stability and well-being necessary for peace and human dignity. Peace and development are thus not one priority among many — they are the institution’s founding purpose. The next secretary-general should strengthen the U.N.’s doctrine on conflict prevention and development, invest in early warning and diplomatic capacity, and modernize peace operations for today’s complex conflicts. Bridging the divide between humanitarian response, development efforts, and security interventions is essential to sustaining peace. Early in the term, the next secretary-general should reaffirm the U.N. Charter and take the opportunity to interpret its principles for the era in which we live. The charter does not need rewriting. It requires faithful interpretation in light of contemporary challenges, anchoring reform, global public goods, and geopolitical navigation in its enduring commitments. The world is advancing rapidly, but without coordination, progress will fracture. The next secretary-general must be a reformer who executes, a modernizer who adapts, a communicator who persuades, a strategist who balances power realities, and a peace architect grounded in the charter. In this moment of turbulence and possibility, the world does not need a custodian of inherited structures. It needs an architect capable of building the next era of multilateralism.