The scramble for the 10th UN secretary general is under way. States seek a leader-manager-diplomat-communicator of unassailable integrity and faithfulness to UN values. Surely, many could tick the right boxes in our richly talented world of eight billion people?
However, the real task is much harder: how to find someone who understands that their aspired office has, for eight decades, punished its finest occupants and rewarded its most forgettable ones. This uncomfortable lesson should discipline the present debate.
With several crises engulfing the UN – credibility deficit, geopolitical fragmentation and funding collapse – idealists demand a courageous reform catalyst rather than a weak follower of decline. But this could be a career-limiting prescription given the experience of nine men who held the job.
Consider their record. The most consequential secretaries general were not expected to lead. Dag Hammarskjold (Sweden, 1953-61) was chosen as an unobtrusive technocrat-administrator. But he invented peacekeeping at Suez, asserted the office’s independent authority under the UN Charter and died on a contentious mission to war-torn Democratic Republic of Congo. His independent stance there so unsettled Moscow that it demanded the post be abolished and replaced by a committee.
U Thant (Burma, now Myanmar, 1961-71), another “safe” compromise, ran the discreet back-channel that gave Washington and Moscow their face-saving exit from the Cuban missile crisis. But when he pressed publicly for ending the Vietnam War, American warmth curdled into estrangement.
Neither was selected for greatness but somewhat grew into it. But consider what happened to those who claimed greatness too openly. Boutros Boutros-Ghali (Egypt, 1992-96) told inconvenient truths and championed UN preventive diplomacy, earning suspicion in Washington which vetoed his second term. The public charge was that he had failed in the Balkans and Rwanda, the truth being that the resources and authorisations required were withheld by the UN Security Council under US pressure.
That asymmetry – holding the secretary general personally responsible for failures that are structurally the Security Council’s – is the central hazard of the office, recurring whenever incumbents stray far from the will of the powerful. This was baked-in with the first incumbent, Trygve Lie (Norway, 1946-52), who backed UN intervention on the Korean Peninsula and was boycotted into resignation by the Soviet Union, while anti-communist purges hunted his staff from the American side.
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Then-UN secretary general Trygve Lie, left, receives the deed for the property that will house the organisation's headquarters in New York. All photos: UN Photo -
Trygve Lie, left, seen here in a meeting with Turkish leaders, backed UN intervention on the Korean Peninsula and was boycotted into resignation by the Soviet Union, while anti-communist purges hunted his staff from the American side. -
A portrait of Dag Hammarskjold, who was secretary general from 1953 to 1961, inside the UN office. -
Dag Hammarskjold, seen here in Gaza spending Christmas with UN troops in December 1958, died on a contentious mission to war-torn Democratic Republic of Congo. -
U Thant, who took over as secretary general in 1961, was also known as another 'safe' compromise. -
U Thant, who served until 1971, ran a discreet back-channel that gave Washington and Moscow their face-saving exit from the Cuban missile crisis. -
When U Thant – seen here with then-Malaysian prime minister Tunku Abdul Rahman – pressed publicly for ending the Vietnam War, American warmth curdled into estrangement. -
Kurt Waldheim, seen here during a trip to the Middle East, served two full terms as UN secretary general, from 1972 to 1981. -
Kurt Waldheim, seen here at Cairo Airport, had a Nazi past that was discovered much later, in the process disgracing the office retroactively. -
Javier Perez de Cuellar, who served from 1982 to 1991, is remembered as well-contained, managing sensibly without enlarging the office’s role. -
Javier Perez de Cuellar, seen here in a meeting with Yasser Arafat, was known for his quiet space-creation for human rights. -
Boutros Boutros-Ghali, secretary general from 1992 to 1996, told inconvenient truths and championed UN preventive diplomacy. -
Boutros Boutros-Ghali, seen in a meeting with Mother Teresa, was so outspoken that Washington vetoed his second term. -
Kofi Annan, who served from 1997 to 2006, was initially popular with the UN Security Council’s western members for 'flexibility' in allowing Nato intervention in Bosnia. -
Kofi Annan, dancing with a resident of Laayoune in Western Sahara, was personally castigated for UN failures over the Srebrenica and Rwanda genocides. -
Ban Ki-moon, addressing a news conference in front of the damaged warehouse building of an UNRWA office in Gaza, was secretary general from 2007 to 2016. -
Ban Ki-moon, standing among a group of children in Tripoli, Lebanon, was known for his climate activism. -
Antonio Guterres, the current UN Secretary General, will step down at the end of his second term later this year. -
Antonio Guterres, seen here in the outskirts of Kabul, has spent his second term absorbing many pressures – managing American funding cuts and hostility to multilateralism, and drawing sharp pushback from Washington over Gaza.
Kofi Annan (Ghana, 1997-2006), initially popular with the Security Council’s western members for “flexibility” in allowing Nato intervention in Bosnia, was personally castigated for UN failures over the Srebrenica and Rwanda genocides. As well as the Darfur genocide that I forewarned him about as his top representative in Sudan. His second term never recovered after calling the US-led invasion of Iraq illegal, albeit after the event, and Washington’s deliberate amplification of questions on his judgment over the Oil-for-Food scandal.
The pattern is almost mathematical. Superpower discomfort tracks the independence of the secretary general with uncanny precision. The holders who generated serious hostility – Lie, Hammarskjold, Thant, Boutros-Ghali, Annan – asserted the autonomy of the office or challenged the great powers over their wars or interventions. The holders who kept them comfortable – Javier Perez de Cuellar (Peru, 1982-91) and Ban Ki-moon (South Korea, 2007-16) – are remembered as well-contained, managing sensibly without enlarging the office’s role.
This is the context that the next secretary general will enter, sharpened further by the present. The departing incumbent, Antonio Guterres (Portugal, 2017-26), has spent his second term absorbing many pressures – managing American funding cuts and hostility to multilateralism, and drawing sharp pushback from Washington over Gaza.
A UN facing insolvency, a paralysed Security Council and collapsed trust will hand its new leader an institution primed to attribute every failure to the top person. And a further hazard intrudes: any new leader breaking the historical mould could receive less benefit of the doubt and get blamed faster when the next debacle arrives.
So what to look for? Not the demographic box-ticking that dominates the current campaign. This has started with four Latin American women and one man, and an African man. Other candidates may yet emerge. While gender and geographical rotation are good arguments about global fairness, the evidence that a woman or a Latino or African would perform better by virtue of their identity is simply not supported by studies of top-level international and national leadership. Conversely, there is no evidence that maleness or western orientation brings an automatic competence premium.
Meanwhile, with the record numbers of conflicts raging worldwide, it is timely to recall the UN’s original raison d’etre – a focused, hard-nosed perspective on peace. But nowadays, the UN’s exclusion from the top peace tables is normalised as in the Gaza, Ukraine and Iran conflicts.
What can a future secretary general learn here? They will be criticised for political failings regardless of any other great things they do. Such as Annan for HIV/Aids and development, Perez de Cuellar’s quiet space-creation for human rights, Boutros-Ghali’s birthing of the humanitarian system, Thant’s environmental awareness-raising, and Ban and Guterres’s climate activism.
These global goods are better advanced by today’s many specialised agencies, freeing the future secretary general for their core task, with history also suggesting that “character” more than credentials will determine their success.
First, calibrated, disciplined judgment around survivable independence by not picking fights that forfeit the office’s usefulness. Annan is the model here and Boutros-Ghali the warning.
Second, the temperament to lead by influence not command, because the secretary general has little beyond moral authority to persuade parties who distrust one another. Hammarskjold, the only posthumous winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, is the obvious model.
Third, a track record under pressure, because vision statements are just promises and only crises navigated resolutely through thick-and-thin provide meaningful evidence. Hammarskjold was the original master of this virtue and Annan his modern successor.
Fourth, the managerial nerve to decide what a broke institution will stop doing, without mistaking austerity for reform. There is no clear model here, but useful insights come from Hammarskjold who conceptualised the original “neutral, competent, independent” UN civil service. Boutros-Ghali had more radical ideas, but Annan – the first secretary general to come from within the UN bureaucracy – was more effective. Guterres has enforced emergency financial cuts, but his long-term therapy remains half-hearted.
Fifth, a record that survives forensic scrutiny: Kurt Waldheim (Austria, 1972-81) served two terms before his concealed Nazi past was discovered – disgracing the office retroactively. The public disclosures and hearings of the modern process should be used for ruthless examination, not ritual.
And sixth – the rarest quality of all – resilience under undeserved blame. This is the capacity to absorb the Security Council’s failures without collapsing or lashing out at the very powers on whom the office depends. Annan is the exemplar and Boutros-Ghali the warning.
The selection machinery is built to converge on the candidate acceptable to all and threatening none. But the world needs the electors to demonstrate the much higher wisdom demanded by this historic moment. The “right” secretary general is not a superwoman or man but one still standing tall and undeterred when global frustrations around inevitable future crises swirl around them.
