Eighty years after its founding, the United Nations stands on uncertain ground, wavering between relevance and obsolescence. The organisation once conceived to save humanity from war now battles impotence, cynicism and financial fatigue. And yet, it remains indispensable. In an era of resurgent nationalism and hard-edged geopolitical rivalry, the blue flag may no longer symbolise global authority, but it still represents necessity.
A dream born in wartime
One winter evening in 1941, Winston Churchill was soaking in the White House bathtub when Franklin D Roosevelt walked in. The British Prime Minister, half-submerged in steaming water, looked up as the American President uttered a phrase that would change history: “The United Nations.” In the midst of war, it seemed like a fantasy. Yet the idea for a system to preserve peace Endured.
In January 1942, twenty-six nations signed the Declaration of the United Nations. Three years later, in San Francisco, came the Charter. Its opening line, “We, the peoples of the United Nations, determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war…”, was as noble as Europe’s devastation was profound. The blue flag, designed by Oliver Lincoln Lundquist, became a moral compass for a wounded world.
The long shadow of power
The UN’s structure was revolutionary: a General Assembly representing every member state, and a Security Council of five permanent powers.
“The question of legitimacy has haunted the United Nations since its birth in 1945,” says André Nollkaemper, professor of international law in Amsterdam. “The organisation was built by the victors of the Second World War, the United States, Russia, China, the United Kingdom and France, who together control its most powerful organ, the Security Council. These five hold decisive influence over matters of peace and security, including the right of veto. That imbalance of power lies at the heart of every legitimacy debate the UN has faced since.”
Cedric Ryngaert, professor of international law at Utrecht University, agrees. “The UN was built on state power, not popular will, and that’s precisely what makes reform so difficult.”
Joris Larik, an international law expert at Leiden University, echoes the sentiment: “The permanent members increasingly use their veto not to defend human rights or shared values, but to protect narrow interests. That corrodes the system’s credibility.”
Discontent is also rising in the Global South. “Under-representation has been a grievance for decades,” says Larik, co-author of UN 2.0. “But greater representation alone doesn’t automatically mean better governance, the Global South isn’t a monolith. The challenge is finding reforms that truly move the world forward.”
He points to realistic changes rather than revolution. “Abolishing the veto won’t happen,” he concedes. “But initiatives like a code of conduct, preventing its use in cases of mass atrocity and requiring public justification, could introduce a measure of transparency and accountability.”
From idealism to bureaucracy
In the 1950s, Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjöld famously quipped that the UN “was not created to take us to heaven, but to save us from hell.” By that measure, it has succeeded: there has been no world war since 1945.
Agencies such as UNICEF, UNESCO, WHO and UNHCR became symbols of international solidarity, and, increasingly, of institutional inertia. Yet there were triumphs: the Montreal Protocol saved the ozone layer; peacekeeping in Cambodia and Namibia showed that multilateralism could work when politics and morality aligned.
The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 seemed to breathe new life into the UN. The Gulf War of 1991 demonstrated the strength of collective action; the 2003 invasion of Iraq, conducted without Security Council authorisation, exposed its fracture. “Since then, trust in international law has eroded,” notes Ryngaert. “Whenever rules clash with national interest, the rules lose.”
Rwanda (1994) and Srebrenica (1995) left even deeper scars. The image of helpless blue helmets spoke louder than any resolution. Former Secretary-General Kofi Annan put it bluntly: “The UN is the conscience of the world, but it has no army.”
“The UN can only be as strong as its member states allow,” Ryngaert observes. “And great powers rarely want strong arbitration.”
Leadership under strain
According to Nollkaemper, the Secretary-General plays a role as delicate as it is decisive. “Internally, he leads the organisation and its staff; externally, he is its moral compass. A good Secretary-General must be willing to move slightly ahead of the pack, and to make controversial statements even when not all member states approve. Too bold, and he risks alienating the major powers; too cautious, and he loses credibility.”
Kofi Annan managed that balance. Ban Ki-moon was more reserved. António Guterres must now navigate a polarised world in which that equilibrium is harder than ever to maintain.
The return of nationalism
At UN Headquarters on New York’s East River, fatigue has set in. The Security Council is paralysed. Russia blocks resolutions on Ukraine, the United States on Gaza. When Donald Trump entered the White House in 2016, mistrust deepened: multilateralism was recast as an obstacle.
By 2025, as Trump returned to the global stage for a UN summit, his doctrine was unchanged: America First, even at the UN. Washington slashed funding, froze appointments and withdrew from agencies. The WHO lost nearly a third of its budget.
“The broader multilateral system, with the UN at its core, is under pressure,” Nollkaemper explains. “Many countries now prefer regional or bilateral cooperation outside the UN framework, such as China’s Belt and Road Initiative or the BRICS partnership.”
“Multilateralism and international law are not disappearing. They’re evolving”
Yet he cautions against fatalism: “It would be wrong to say the UN has no future. In areas like health, food security, aviation and agriculture, the organisation remains a vital coordinating force.” He distinguishes between high politics, war, peace, security, where the UN struggles, and low politics, where it continues to matter on a technical and humanitarian level. “Multilateralism and international law are not disappearing,” Larik insists. “They’re evolving.”
States are finding new ways to cooperate outside traditional Western structures. The European Union, he notes, plays a surprisingly cohesive role in this reshaped global order. “The EU still champions multilateralism, but with newfound caution,” Larik says. “It’s building unilateral instruments, such as anti-coercion tools, to defend its interests. It’s a message to the world: we prefer cooperation, but we won’t be carved up.”
For Ryngaert, this shift reflects a broader legal reality. “States no longer view international law as a constraint, but as a tool. Trade, data, health, everything is now geopolitical.”
Still, Larik concludes, “The EU remains one of the few actors trying to restore order and decency in the chaos.”
Attempts at renewal
“The UN suffers from an image problem,” Ryngaert admits. “We remember the failures, not the daily successes.” Through agencies such as WHO, WFP and UNHCR, lives are saved quietly, victories overshadowed by the media’s preference for crises.
“That’s the paradox of international law,” he says. “Stability doesn’t sell, crisis does. Yet it’s precisely that quiet stability, the conflicts that never erupt, that may be the UN’s greatest achievement.”
Larik agrees but argues for pragmatic reform to preserve credibility. “If we want a genuine rules-based order, states must comply, or at least offer credible justification when they don’t. International law isn’t a buffet where one picks only what pleases.”
He remains cautiously optimistic. “Yes, there’s reason for pessimism, from Moscow to Washington we see disdain for norms. But law endures as our collective conscience. Institutions like the International Court of Justice, the International Criminal Court, and humanitarian organisations such as the Red Cross, preserve that moral anchor. That may well be the UN’s most underestimated strength.”
The morality of impotence
“Since 1945, the world has transformed,” notes Nollkaemper. “The UN began with fifty members; today it has nearly two hundred. Calls to reform the Security Council date back to the 1960s, yet any change requires the consent of those same five permanent members. They have effectively vetoed reform itself.”
He adds, “It’s hard to imagine a scenario in which the permanent members surrender that veto, unless compelled by another world war and new victors.”
Ryngaert sees in this the UN’s central paradox: it oscillates between legitimacy and efficiency, often failing on both counts. Larik, more hopeful, insists the UN must endure precisely because global forums are vanishing elsewhere.
“Small, realistic reforms matter,” he says. “Empowering the General Assembly, relying more on international courts, linking UN programmes with regional and local organisations, these can restore relevance without illusions of perfection.”
Ryngaert is succinct: “If you abolished the UN today, you’d have to recreate it tomorrow.”
Horizon 2030
Some analysts envision a future of regionalised United Nations, networks of cooperating councils connected by digital coordination and algorithmic decision-making. In Africa, an African Security Council is emerging; in Asia, there’s talk of a regional peace architecture.
Larik doubts the prospect of a radical transformation. “The UN will remain what the world is: an imperfect mix of interests, egos, hope and solidarity,” he says. “It survives not by power, but by necessity. As long as war and injustice persist, there must be a forum, however flawed, where nations still face one another.”
“The organisation remains, for all its limitations, an essential anchor in an otherwise far more chaotic world”
“The organisation remains, for all its limitations, an essential anchor in an otherwise far more chaotic world,” concludes Nollkaemper.
Perhaps that is the true lesson of eighty years beneath the blue flag: progress depends less on perfection than on perseverance.
This article was published in the 8th edition of Forbes Luxembourg.
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