Trump is right – the UN can't go on as it is. So, what must change?

Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump on the escalator to attend the 80th UN General Assembly, in New York City, on September 23. Reuters

What are the prospects for UN transformation? The question is in focus as the General Assembly in the past week marked the 80th anniversary of the founding of the UN. At stake is the relevance and functioning of the world’s premier forum for co-operation among 193 member states.

That the question is posed reflects global disquiet that the UN is bypassed or ineffective, at a time of grave multiple crises. Do we still need this over-arching, all-encompassing body?

The answer is not straightforward. The case for sustaining the UN into the future can be argued by judging its track record on the five missions promised in its 1945 Charter: fostering peace and security, upholding international law, protecting human rights, delivering humanitarian aid, and supporting sustainable development.

Past decades have seen considerable progress in these domains although not everywhere nor sufficiently. Nevertheless, the world is safer, richer, healthier, and better endowed than it was eight decades ago. However, most advancement occurred during the earlier post-colonial period from a low baseline of weak human and national capacities. Subsequent progress has reversed or stuttered.

Donald Trump blasts UN: "Empty words don't solve war"

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In any case, is the net global betterment attributable to the UN? The evidence is nuanced. Nations with progressive policies or blessed with natural riches in Asia and Middle East lifted themselves up, smartly leveraging the UN’s “go-between” functions to attract technical assistance, concessional finance, investment and trade.

the core tasks for which the UN was originally founded have been overtaken

Conversely, well-meaning UN strategies have had perverse effects on small, poor African states driving them into unsustainable donor dependency. The associated clientelism generates insecurity. Older powers such as the US and Russia, and new ones like the EU and China compete through opposing notions around rights and liberties in society and use coercive economic, social, cyber, and military tools to advance their ambitions.

Emerging powers such as India, Indonesia, Nigeria, and Brazil aspire to chart their own paths while middle powers such as Egypt, Canada, Mexico, and South Africa engage in tricky balancing. Meanwhile, countries powered by alternative ideologies such as Iran and Afghanistan reject UN norms and strong man rulers such as in Venezuela or Sahelian states are preoccupied with their own survival.

The rules-based international order crumbles as the original rule-makers become rule-breakers with impunity, thereby licensing others to do the same. Thus, human rights retreat and cries of genocide become common. Humanitarian norms erode with escalated suffering among those caught by conflicts, disasters and poverty. The Sustainable Development Goals lag badly behind their 2030 targets even as climate change accelerates and “green” agreements made under UN auspices are dishonoured.

Wars small and large increase in number, duration and brutality. This leads to large scale migration to which nations react with increasing intolerance. UN peacemaking is largely irrelevant as in Ukraine or Gaza. It is accused of becoming part of the problem as in Lebanon or several African missions. UN disarmament is stuck in limbo as powerful new technologies proliferate. UN development is paralysed by shrinking funds. UN trading partners are compromised by sanctions and tariffs. UN humanitarians weep in frustration in, for example, Sudan and Haiti, and UN justice through international criminal and justice courts is decried for lethargy or un-enforceable decisions in Myanmar, Palestine, and elsewhere.

Unsurprisingly, UN-led inclusive multilateralism has stopped working across growing faultlines, and nations must fend for themselves through a multiplicity of alliances such as the G7 and Brics or regional blocks such as the African Union.

In short, the core tasks for which the UN was originally founded have been overtaken. But can the organisation be fairly blamed for this, when it is the collective will of its member states that prescribes what it does? And what do states really want as they make conflicting or unrealistic demands from the UN?

The reality is that the shock of the Second World War imposed a victors’ order, instrumentalising the structures of the UN to maintain predominance. There was no choice for the rest of the bruised and battered world but to follow, despite obvious contradictions with the values of equality, fairness, and inclusivity espoused in the UN Charter. But, in time, as global consciousness and capabilities expanded, the natural aspiration of people to determine their own destiny has come to the fore.

That is to be celebrated because it signifies global maturation although the associated perturbation is discomfiting. A new world order is emerging with diverse pathways for achieving objectives of lesser or greater importance to different people.

This will not necessarily be a universally kind and caring arrangement, and human development and protection aspirations will be tempered by realism on what is prioritised and where. Progress will be slower and unevenly distributed with winners and losers among nations. But that was already the case with the preceding one-size-fits-all globalisation where the big, rich and strong prevailed over the small, poor and weak.

Only time will tell if the emerging order will be better than the fading one. But its substantive promise comes from making all nations responsible for their own destinies and setting them free to chart their own course. Alongside domesticating accountability through to their own stakeholders via their own governance traditions or preferences.

Under this outlook, it is pointless to lament the fading order, and the UN’s diminishing role in that. And unproductive to fight against inevitable and necessary changes. So, what should be the UN’s role in the new dispensation?

In brief, it should be as little as possible. Although UN ideals remain precious by striking the innate chord of mutual belonging within our common humanity, precious things get tarnished if overused, as is happening with the careless use of the UN’s currency.

In the new distributed order, the key to solving problems is to contain them close to their origins, and not to magnify them through the UN’s globalising ways of working. Especially when there are more efficient and less cumbersome means – through other actors and configurations – to achieve the outcomes promised in the UN Charter.

That implies less routine UN involvement in advancing development, delivering humanitarian aid, policing and righting the world’s wrongs, or making and keeping peace when belligerents are disinclined to do so. And cutting down on its most prolific business of conferencing, report-writing, and setting norms and standards while the world deals with the recommendations already made.

Nations can also then stop obsessing with unattainable Security Council reform or scheming over who is to be the new secretary general which are, at best, displacement activities that make marginal difference to the turning of the world’s cogs.

The “UN 80 initiative” is belatedly recognising that business-as-usual is untenable. The proposed downsizing through budgetary and staffing cuts, agency mergers, and relocations to centres less expensive than New York and Geneva are welcome. But will that be enough when corruption, maladministration and misuse of UN privileges and immunities remain deep-rooted and erode global trust? Cleaning up the UN is a tougher challenge than cutting it down.

In his recent address to UNGA, US President Donald Trump challenged: “What is the purpose of the UN?” The correct response remains unclear. But he also concluded, “God bless the nations of the world”. Therein lies, not the answer to this critical question, but the route to finding one.