UN at 80

Posted on September 26, 2025 by Alan Alexandroff

This week it was all about the multilateral institutions – namely the UN – but it was also about the key multilateral proponent, or at least it was – the United States. Both seem hopelessly at odds with multilateral progress at the time of UN80. It’s a very busy week in New York as both the 80th Session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA80) High-level Week and Climate Week NYC have been launched.

As Elliot Waldman, now the editor-in-chief of World Politics Review, WPR, gloomily expressed:

“Somewhere in a parallel universe, the United Nations’ 80th birthday is a tempered but joyous occasion: A time to toast accomplishments and take stock of the long road ahead. To celebrate milestones reached and learn from opportunities missed. Above all, to recommit to a collective push to overcome global challenges.”

“Instead, on planet Earth in the year 2025, the mood is bleak—uniformly so.”

“If the U.N. isn’t “in free fall,” it’s suffering “a crisis of irrelevance.” Perhaps it’s “no longer fit for purpose.” The organization’s top humanitarian aid official, Tom Fletcher, [Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator at the UN] summed it up best: The U.N.-led international system is facing a “perfect storm: underfunded, overstretched, and under attack.””

The near despair was underlined at the UN NYU Newsletter:

“This year, at the start of the 80th UNGA, the pendulum has swung all the way to deep despair. In addition to the ongoing conflicts noted above, 2025 witnessed conflagrations between India and Pakistan; Iran, Israel and the United States; and, more recently, Cambodia and Thailand. Worse, the discernible rise in the use of the veto means that the UN Security Council (UNSC) is being rendered ineffective in dealing with critical peace and security matters. Indeed, in the past year while Moscow exercised its veto six times, Washington used it five times — the latest on 18 September — on the question of Palestine. This takes the total number of vetoes cast by the permanent members in 80 years to 318.”

And in terms of US actions. Well, Waldman targets the current Trump administration actions:

“A decade later, the world has instead learned just how much it can no longer count on the United States. Not only has President Donald Trump dismantled the U.S. Agency for International Development and pulled funding from the United Nations, his administration has also denounced the [Sustainable Development Goals] SDGs as a “globalist endeavor,” beset by “‘gender’ and climate ideology” and “inconsistent with U.S. sovereignty.” Indeed, much of the current handwringing over the state of the U.N. has to do with whether it can survive Trump’s second term. … the cracks in the foundational assumptions of the SDGs—not to mention the Western-led international order that backed them—go far beyond Trump, even if he was the wrecking ball that brought it all crashing down.”

The dreary perspective for the UN, the Sustainable Development Goals and even more from the Trump administration did not commence with the UN High Level Week but Trump’s pointed distaste for the UN and multilateralism was on dramatic display on Day 2 of the UN gathering with Trump’s speech before the General Assembly.

As Colum Lynch at Devex, quoted and described the Trump speech which was placed on Day 2 as the convening country:

“U.S. President Donald Trump delivered an often disparaging, grievance-filled address to the 80th United Nations General Assembly, blaming the U.N. for facilitating uncontrolled migration, denouncing the Europeans’ energy policies, calling climate change a hoax, and outlining a long list of the greatest things in history he claims he has achieved for America and the world.”

““Everyone says I should get the Nobel Peace Prize,” he said in a nearly one-hour speech to the 193-member U.N. General Assembly yesterday, claiming to have personally ended seven wars in his first seven months in office, a claim questioned by many.”

“Trump provided few details on his specific plans for the U.N.’s role in the world, and offered little clarity on whether the U.S. intends to press ahead with further draconian budget cuts. But he underscored the need for other countries to follow his lead and crack down on migration.”

“Uncontrolled migration, he warned in his first address to the U.N. since his reelection, is “the number one political issue of our time,” he said. “Your countries, they’re being destroyed.””

““It’s time to end the failed experiment of open borders. You have to end it now,” he said. “Your countries are going to hell.” The President also made it clear earlier in his term that the US would cut funding to the World Health Organization, the U.N. Population Fund, UNESCO, and withdraw American participation in the U.N. Human Rights Council.”

This upfront attack on the UN by President Trump is the ‘icing on the cake’ to a now unleashed financial crisis at the UN impart, of course, created by the United States. As described by J. Alex Tarquinio, who reports on the UN, at the FP:

“Many thorny issues could be discussed when Trump sits down for a bilateral meeting with U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres on Tuesday. The United States is the largest financial contributor to the United Nations, but Trump has withheld even mandatory contributions to the U.N. budget—a decision that has plunged the organization into a fiscal crisis with existential implications.”

“The one thing that might please the U.S. delegation is talk of deep reductions in the U.N. budget. The last-minute preparations for this high-level week took place amid a frantic belt-tightening process. The United States usually pays 22 percent of the regular U.N. budget and around 26 percent of the peacekeeping budget, thus Trump’s decision not to provide even obligatory contributions this year has left a big hole.”

“Ahead of the high-level week, Guterres sent a revised U.N. budget to member states and an advisory committee. Preliminary figures released last week reveal that more than 18 percent of the U.N.’s staff positions are slated for elimination. Years of hiring restrictions mean that some of those posts are vacant. Furthermore, another 262 positions are being proposed for relocation. A senior U.N. official said that they were no longer talking about doing more with less but rather “doing less with less.””

“As the plan for downsizing, euphemistically dubbed UN80, drags on, many diplomats in New York seem to be experiencing a loss of purpose. “I think a lot of diplomats are frustrated that the current UN80 process has not involved much discussion of what the U.N.’s main goals should be, rather than how many jobs to cut,” said Richard Gowan, the U.N. director at the International Crisis Group.”

As for Climate Week, even the Europeans, and many others, found it possible to disappoint. As Anna Gawel at Devex described:

“Usually, NDCs [National Determined Commitments] are submitted long before UNGA, but this year, only 36 out of 197 countries have published their NDCs, writes my colleague Jesse Chase-Lubitz, who will be at Climate Week. Still missing from the list are some of the world’s biggest emitters, including India, Saudi Arabia, the European Union, and Indonesia.”

Now the rationalization for yet to be announced NDCs and described by Marcos Neto from the UN Development Programme, as quoted Anna Gawel was to accept that it would be better to be late but significant:

““This is an important moment,” Marcos Neto, assistant administrator at the U.N. Development Programme, tells Jesse.”

“He’s not especially worried about the number of NDCs still to be submitted — pointing out that there has been a consensus throughout the U.N. that “quality and ambition is more important than doing it in a hurry” and that so far the NDCs submitted are “fundamentally a better set of NDCs.””

Yes, maybe, but national politics remains a big worry. As Suzanne Nossel urged in her piece, “It’s Not Too Late to Fix the U.N.”at FP, she expressed what many were hoping for that might yet turn the current UN crisis around:

“Rather than muddling through the current crisis in its present form, the U.N. must use this momentum to remake itself as a body fit for purpose in the second quarter of the 21st century.”

But as she herself argued in an earlier piece in FP that was titled, “The Great Dismantling”:

“Even as ongoing court challenges could salvage some vestiges of the internationalist system, foreign-policy idealists must begin to envision new futures. It is time to collectively reckon with Trump’s great dismantling of the liberal internationalist project and the internal weaknesses that made it possible. Only then can the liberal beliefs that underwrote the old order find new life.”

“The United States has not ratified a human rights treaty since 2002. Russia and China have grown increasingly opportunistic, seeking to remake international institutions by installing their personnel and agendas across United Nations bodies. The U.N. Security Council’s outdated composition and deadlock over sensitive issues have made it an afterthought in major conflicts such as those in Ukraine and Gaza.”

“Such tensions have made it nearly impossible to confront new challenges, including climate change and COVID-19. The U.N.’s 2024 Summit of the Future, heralded as a “once-in-a-generation opportunity to reimagine the multilateral system,” ended with a whimper as stalemated negotiations culminated in a watered-down pact that garnered scant global attention.”

There is no hiding from it, multilateralism and its key institutions are in deep crisis. Multilateralism can be renewed but not with the current national leaders, especially Donald Trump.

Are there people of good will determined to reform the UN system? Of course there are. Does Trump speak for the majority of Americans, I don’t think so. But without concerted collective national efforts to reform and enhance the multilateral institutions we remain “whistling in the dark”. There are reform minded folk. As Ravi Agrawal of the FP noted in his time in New York:

“The less obvious take—the bit that has made my U.N. week polarized in a personal sense—is that I came across a surprising number of hopeful doers and thinkers.”

Hopeful, yes, but much more is required for success.

Image Credit: CFR

Glancing Back; But Also Looking Forward

Posted on September 19, 2025 by Alan Alexandroff

So, we are rolling into an important time for multilateral and regionally strategic action, though realistically it always is an important time. On the multilateral front, notably there is the annual high-level week of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA). Here a sort description as expressed by John Haltiwanger and Rishi Iyengar at FP:

“World leaders and diplomats will flood into New York City in the coming days for the annual high-level week of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), which kicks off on Monday. This year marks the 80th session of UNGA—and it comes at a challenging moment for the world and the U.N. itself.”

I suspect it will give us a ‘temperature reading’ on the UN as it enters UN80.

On the regional front there was the meeting this week between Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum and Canada’s Prime Minister Mark Carney. Closer trade and economic relations were the agenda as both advance to renegotiate USMCA – the United States-Mexico-Canada free trade arrangement – and yes with Donald Trump. Past bilateral agreements make stronger Canada-Mexico ties slightly fraught.

But in setting this discussion up, let me take the temperature on the effectiveness of the Informals – that is the G7, the BRICS and most importantly, the G20. This year’s G20 gathering is hosted by South Africa in November and there has been more than enough friction between Trump and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa. It currently appears as though President Trump will not attend the summit, but the US will be represented by his Vice President J.D. Vance. There is real tension, especially as the United States is scheduled to take hosting of the G20 for 2026.

Thinking about the role and impact of the Informals, most notably the G20, I turned to good colleagues, Colin Bradford and Johannes Linn both from Brookings and elsewhere. Both have long been observers of the Informals but especially the G20. Indeed both were early advocates, along with Canada’s former Finance Minister and then Prime Minister of Canada Paul Martin for a G20 and then a G20 leaders-led multilateral institution. To reflect on the Informals and particularly the G20, I reviewed several pieces from Bradford and Linn but most particularly the piece these colleagues wrote after the first of several summits ending with the Cannes Summit in 2011 – “A History of G20 Summits: The Evolving: Dynamic of Global Leadership”. Journal of Globalization and Development (2):2. The piece enabled my colleagues to reflect on what had been accomplished with the early G20 summits and what the challenges ahead were.

The two, Bradford and Linn were, as the piece reveals, keen observers and strong advocates for a leaders-led multilateral collaborative institution. As they initiated this piece they wrote:

“The G20 summit of key world leaders emerged as a significant institutional component of the global governance architecture from its first surprise gathering in Washington, D.C. in November 2008 to the most recent summit meeting in Cannes in November 2011.”

And the purpose as they saw it of the creation of the Informals starting with the G7:

“Over nearly 40 years the annual G6/7/8 summits dealt with a wide array of issues, ranging from short term financial, economic and political crises, to longer term economic, social, environmental and security issues.”

But the challenges were evident from the commencement of the Informals:

“However, less progress was made in the area of macroeconomic management and coordination, including effective surveillance, resolution of balance of payments and exchange rate imbalances among major economies, and progress on trade liberalization.”

Though the US expressed little interest in moving the G20 to the leader level, the 2008 global financial crisis (GFC), and the threat it posed to global finance, changed minds:

“Just prior to the US election ending the presidential term of George W. Bush, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, as president of the European Union, and Jose Manuel Barroso, President of the European Commission, visited Camp David, a presidential retreat in Maryland, at the invitation of US President George W. Bush. On Saturday afternoon, October 18th, they announced their intention to call a summit involving nations from around the world to reflect the world-wide nature of the financial crisis but they did not indicate which configuration they would choose.” …

“The first G20 Summit was held in Washington, DC, on November 15, 2008, at the National Building Museum, with ministers of finance joining the leaders for each G20 nation, plus the Netherlands and Spain, which President Sarkozy had pushed to include, in addition to the heads of various international institutions. This made for a huge summit table, exacerbating the problem of size of an enlarged summit grouping. But the purpose and the outcome of the summit was to discuss “principles of reform” – coordinated stimulus to prevent a deep recession and reform of the global financial system to prevent a recurrence of the crisis –, rather than to reach specific agreements, and to set in motion processes among G20 ministers of finance, which would develop a more specific and ambitious agenda.”

And something like a conclusion went like this:

“The good news is that the G20 embraces a much broader group of countries, cultures and economies than the G8. The G20, for all its flaws, is a realistic and broadly representative meeting of the world as it is and will increasingly be, not the world that was. In addition, the G20 has a strong foundation in the ten-year history of the G20 ministerial meetings, developing a strong network among officials of communication, consultation and concertation. The strength of this network of senior officials is the foundation of G20 Summits and provides the means of moving the global agenda forward continuously from one presidency to the next.”

“The bad news is that the G20 summits appear to the public around the world to be more conflictive than cooperative, and hence less effective. But if the idea of G20 Summits is also to connect leaders to their publics in providing global leadership on issues that are simultaneously domestic and international, then the embodiment of the domestic political conflicts in the global treatment of those issues makes summits more real and less rarified.”

“The G8 Summits were exercises in diplomacy and international cooperation. The G20 Summits thus far into their history are more complex exercises embodying contradictory forces arising from domestic political struggles to deal with the new inter-connectedness of challenges and the new nexus of the global and domestic dimensions of economic problems affecting the ordinary citizen.”

The challenges were, and are, real. In a sneak peak over the impact and influence of the Informals, let me identify a small snippet of a very large edited volume by by Andreas Freytag and Peter Draper, as editors for, The Elgar Companion to the G7, being published by Edward Elgar Publishing, in the near future. I was fortunate enough to participate with a chapter entitled, “The rise and decline of the First Informal: the changing character of the G7 summit”. Notwithstanding the lead the chapter examines all the key Informals. From my perspective the Informals are close to unique for the fact that they are leader-led:

“Much has been made by observers and experts of the informal nature of these bodies in contrast to conventional formal institutions. And indeed this was a quite different institutional construction, as early observers like Nicholas Bayne and other diplomats were quick to point out. But even these early observers of the Informals did not make enough of the fact that these Informals were annual summits, yes, but also, and pointedly, that these particular forums, the G7, G8 and G20 were, and are, leader-led.”

“Beyond the question of representation, however, there is the continuing, crucial question about the effectiveness of all these Informals. What impact have these Informals had in fashioning policy and, most critically, in advancing collaboration and global governance policymaking?” …

“Without giving the “story” away at this point in the narrative and analysis of the Informals, it is evident in reviewing the life of the Informals that international relations forces have had a dramatic impact on all the Informals and their capacity to advance collaborative global governance policymaking. And examination of their structures and processes shows that they have not led to the desired policy leadership that was hoped for by early political leaders. This, then, is not just a story of the rise of the Informals, but equally, it would seem, their “fall”.”

Multilateral collective action remains a promise unfulfilled in the global order. Global leadership continues to fall short in the maelstrom of geopolitical tensions of the leading states.

And it is then not surprising that I turn to bilateral and regional actions in the midst of all this geopolitical rivalry, especially in the context of Trump 2.0. I was, therefore, attracted to the consequences of the meeting of the leaders of Mexico and Canada. As described in the Daily Review of WPR:

“Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum hosted Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney this week for a summit in Mexico City that likely would not have happened if not for the ongoing challenge posed by Donald Trump’s return to the White House.”

“Trump has imposed tariffs of 35 percent on Canada and 25 percent on Mexico, ostensibly as punishment for failing to address cross-border drug trafficking and illegal migration, though many goods are exempt due to the U.S.-Mexico-Canda Agreement, the free trade deal that the three countries signed during Trump’s first term as a replacement for NAFTA.”

But the future of USMCA is unclear. Again from WPR a view of the future:

“With the USMCA coming up for a mandatory review next year, Trump is expected to use that occasion to seek further concessions from Canada and Mexico—perhaps not only on trade but also on other issues like migration and security cooperation. Sheinbaum and Carney know that they will have more leverage in those negotiations if they forge a united front, but first they have some repair work to do in their own bilateral relationship.”

In the first negotiation severe tensions were created by a bilateral dael between Mexico and the US:

“Canadian officials were taken aback when, during negotiations over the USMCA in 2018, Mexico struck a preliminary bilateral trade deal with the U.S. that threatened to leave Canada out in the cold.”

So, this brings us to now: “As part of their bid to mend ties, Carney and Sheinbaum signed a new “comprehensive strategic partnership,” which they said would “complement” the USMCA. They also agreed to strengthen direct commercial links between the two countries, including through maritime trade that doesn’t rely on crossing U.S. territory.”

“At next year’s review, the three countries will need to agree on whether to renew it—potentially with updated provisions. Failing to do so will trigger a series of annual reviews beginning in 2027 for ten years, before its scheduled expiration in 2036.”

“Given Trump’s penchant for unpredictability and chaos, nothing can be ruled out. For Canada and Mexico, steering the talks to a mutually beneficial outcome will mean first overcoming the mistrust between them.”

So there we are: ‘glancing back; but looking slightly askew at the immediate future.

Image Credit: Observer Research Foundation

The Fate of the SDGs and indeed Global Development

Posted on September 12, 2025 by Alan Alexandroff

So as you will read a slightly truncated Alan’s Newsletter Substack Post, but there is a good reason.

So this week’s Post will be a wee bit truncated. Why you ask? Well, I am with many other political science and international relations colleagues in Vancouver for the APSA (American Political Science Association) Annual gathering. How many, I am not yet sure but I suspect fewer than had originally been planned for by the Convention. I had organized a Roundtable on Middle Powers and several of my colleagues were unable to actually join us because their institutions had cut all travel grants for faculty and colleagues. Rather sad.

But I couldn’t sign off for this week before commenting on a very good piece published by Adam Tooze from Columbia University and Director of the European Institute and nonresident scholar at Carnegie Europe. Tooze does a Substack named Chartbook. He is quite prolific and insightful. And because he was commenting on the SDGs I couldn’t resist examining his analysis. The fact is we have the UN80th gathering and the High-Level week for the UNGA is just about upon us from September 22-30th. And the SDGs are an important feature. As described by the UN:

“The 80th session of the United Nations General Assembly – under the theme Better together: 80 years and more for peace, development and human rights – comes at a pivotal moment to renew global commitment to multilateralism, solidarity and shared action for people and planet. This year’s high-level week highlights the urgency of delivering on the promise of the Sustainable Development Goals and reinvigorating global cooperation. Two key platforms will spotlight action and solutions: the flagship SDG Media Zone produced by the UN Department of Global Communications with dynamic interviews and panel discussions on SDG solutions held from 22–26 September; and the Goals Lounge, convened by the UN Deputy Secretary-General and hosted by the UN Office for Partnerships from 20-26 September, featuring unscripted dialogues, deep dives into vital issues and interactive experiences. All events are live streamed on UN WebTV.”

And while there is determination by many associated with the UN, or committed to UN multilateral reform to spur renewal the UN finds itself at its 80th anniversary deep in crisis as I noted in previous Posts.

And here is where Adam Tooze comes in with his recent FP article, “The End of Development”. Not surprisingly Tooze focuses on the Trump administration and its reaction to the SDGs. As described by Tooze:

“In the letter, the U.S. government categorically rejected the entirety of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals, or SDGs. This wasn’t simply a withdrawal, as from the climate commitments of the Paris Agreement; it was an unambiguous denunciation of the collective ambition to improve the material condition of humanity. American voters, the letter claimed, had delivered a clear mandate in the last election: Their government must put America first, caring first and foremost for its own.”

“Yet the justification did not stop at nationalism. It expanded into a broader geopolitical critique.The letter argued that the resolution’s language—specifically, its reference to “peaceful coexistence”—could be read as an endorsement of China’s Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence.Similarly, the United States objected to the resolution’s phrase “dialogue among civilizations,”interpreting it as a nod to Chinese President Xi Jinping’s Global Civilization Initiative.”

“While the rest of the world proceeded with the vote, the Trump administration’s intervention laid bare the fact that the apparent consensus around the SDGs—touted since 2015 as a universal blueprint for development—had collapsed.”

While Tooze focuses on this depressing, though not surprising, Trump administration take on the SDGs and more broadly on development, he identifies a goal that was always a very far reach. As Tooze notes:

“The broader vision of the SDGs was always a gamble at long odds, and in practice, it has delivered so little that it raises the question of whether it was ever anything more than a self-serving exercise on the part of global elites. For the sake of their own collective vanity, they needed to convince themselves and the world that they had a comprehensive and bold vision. But it’s something else to mobilize and sustain an effort to realize the SDGs.”

“And this, in turn, reflects a refusal to admit what development actually means or to anticipate how the status quo powers will react once it happens. With hindsight, the SDGs, for all their capaciousness and generosity of spirit, seem like an effort to craft a world organized around a spreadsheet of universal values rather than politics and around a happy blend of public and private economic interests.”

And as Tooze then suggests:

“In retrospect, the SDGs now look less like a new dawn than the final gasp of a unipolar, end-of-history fantasy. Rather than billions leveraging trillions, the track record of blended finance is dismal. It is rare to see more than cents on the dollar mobilized in private money. In key areas of innovation such as green energy and artificial intelligence, the developing world, far from catching up, is left even further behind.”

“Whatever happens to the individual components of the SDGs—worthy objectives such as reducing child mortality and digital inclusion—one thing is for sure: The age of a politically neutral, universally endorsed development agenda is over.”

“The passing of the SDGs should be a cause for real regret. Theirs was an extraordinary and comprehensive vision. Along with the Paris Agreement, they marked a high-water mark of a certain kind of universalism.”

Tooze turns approvingly to what he sees as the successful national effort of China:

“China is the world’s greatest development success. On that basis, it has emerged as a lender and as a development power. At its high point in 2016-17, lending under the Belt and Road Initiative for a while matched that by the World Bank. Though Belt and Road subsequently slowed, China’s strategic direction remains clear. The CCP believes that material transformation is the key to legitimacy and peace. The phrase often repeated by the Chinese leadership, quoting from Xi, is that development is the “master key.””

“Xi’s Global Development Initiative was China’s answer to the SDGs. It was not an overall rejection, let alone a point-blank denunciation, but a rewriting so as to focus on just eight key areas, including poverty alleviation, food security, pandemic response and vaccines, development financing, climate change and green development, industrialization, the digital economy, and connectivity in the digital age, all under the sign of “results-oriented actions.””

And Tooze then concludes that there is a way forward but far distinct from this universal approach of the SDGs as set out by the UN and with lessons learned from the success of China development:

“The bland box-ticking vision of 2015 is no longer our world. But in its rejection of the shared U.N. agenda in the name of strident sovereignty, the United States is indulging in a politics of denunciation more becoming of a downtrodden developing country than a former unipolar hegemon. By contrast, China’s blend of realpolitik with ideology and national interest cannot help but seem rational and balanced as well as being backed up by an unparalleled national record of development and huge resources.”

The outstanding question is where does the UN effort go and in turn at some point the US likely post Trump.

Image Credit: APSA

This Post originally appeared as a Substack Post at Alan’s Newsletter – https://substack.com/home/post/p-173380329

The Confusing New Global Order

Posted on September 5, 2025 by Alan Alexandroff

It was a confusing past couple of weeks if you were trying to understand the ‘emerging’ global order. Maybe the confusion was best captured by colleague Daniel W Drezner at Tufts University and he is also responsible for the very good Substack, Drezner’s World. Dan just recently wrote in WPR about what is, or isn’t, today’s shape and leadership behavior of the international order. Such an understanding is important as much has been written in the past week about China’s apparent emergent global role in the face of its leadership at Tianjin of the SCO, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, and then President Xi’s determined display of power at the 80th celebration in Beijing of the victory over Japan in World War Two.

I will get to the China leadership assertion in just a moment but let’s get a grip on the current shape of the order. Now, Dan suggested:

“The death of the post-Cold War era has been proclaimed many times now, only for those reports to have been greatly exaggerated. After the 2008 global financial crisis, many observers declared the end of neoliberalism, which had underpinned the post-Cold War global order—but it persisted. Similar predictions were made after the populist shocks of 2016, and yet the global order remained largely unchanged. Even the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic failed to change things all that much.”

“What makes 2025 interesting is that for the first time, both critics and supporters of the liberal international order seem ready to deliver its eulogy. For example, it’s no surprise that Jamieson Greer, the current U.S. trade representative under President Donald Trump, would characterize the neoliberal order as “untenable and unsustainable.” Lauding what he dubbed the “Turnberry system”—after Trump’s golf resort in Turnberry, Scotland—based on high tariffs and macroeconomic rebalancing, Greer bragged, “What was long dismissed as heresy by the free-trade fundamentalists in Brussels, Geneva and Washington is now becoming conventional wisdom.””

And there is no question that the behavior of this second Trump administration is in contrast, stark contrast in some cases to administrations of the past promoting or at least declaring support for a liberal international order led, not surprisingly, by the United States.

But as Dan declares:

“Undeniably, U.S. policy preferences have shifted dramatically. That is reflected in a variety of Trump administration policies that have torched the norms that defined the liberal international order. On trade, Greer valorized a system “that is fair, balanced and oriented toward serving concrete national interests rather than vague aspirations of multilateral institutions,” while taking a gratuitous swipe at the World Trade Organization and its “old guard of trade bureaucrats.””

But as Dan suggests:

“There is a difference, however, between declaring one global order dead and declaring that a new global order has arisen to take its place. In international relations, it is a truism that destruction is far easier than creation.”

Some analysts have announced that multipolarity and the support for realpolitik, realist foreign policy, is now what drives leading and great power action. But as Dan points out:

“A more realpolitik-based grand strategy cares less about norms, values, alliances and partnerships, and more about strictly advancing the national interest. One could argue that the shift in U.S. policy preferences merely reflects the conclusion that in a multipolar world, the U.S. should behave as other states do. In other words, if Russia and China are pursuing their interests in an amoral, astringent manner, why shouldn’t the United States?”

“Concluding that the new international order is now a realist one, however, would be inaccurate and incomplete. And it is worth explaining why, to make sense of the world to come.”

So then where are we according to Dan when it comes to understanding the dynamic of the current global order. His conclusion:

“But while Carr [E.H. Carr, a British historian of the interwar years] did warn against an excessively utopian worldview, he also cautioned against a strictly realpolitik-based approach as well. As he noted, most actors in world politics need power, but they need social purpose as well.”

“Perhaps the new social purpose of today’s emergent world order will be a revised definition of sovereignty or a belief that nationalism trumps all other global values. But the point is that this remains an area of contestation. And until the great powers can either agree—or at least agree to disagree—on what comes next, the new world order will remain radically incomplete.”

And the notion of a global order where at least the leading and “great powers can agree or at least agree to disagree”, using Dan’s language, is clearly not upon us yet.

Meanwhile, China has taken the recent moment to display its leadership and proclaiming a world order distinct from that expressed by Washington. Now Xi took the opportunity of the SCO Summit to advance a different order from that expressed by Washington. As described by Sergey Radchenko at FP – Radchenko is Wilson E. Schmidt distinguished professor at the Henry A. Kissinger Center for Global Affairs at SAIS:

“Splendidly dressed dancers moved about the stage swiftly in a colorful performance as nearly 30 world leaders looked gravely on. Gathered in Tianjin for the summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), these assembled dignitaries were also taking part in Beijing’s carefully choreographed pageantry. Their presence was meant to proclaim China’s glory as the center of the non-Western world.”

Especially highlighted was the presence of India’s Narendra Modi with much attention paid by observers to the souring of relations between Trump and Modi after years of work by US leaders to draw India more closely to the West. Though much was made of this sparkling gathering, the SCO remained as it largely is a performance setting. And what was less well noted by observers was that Prime Minister Modi did not remain to share the dias at the 80th anniversary with Xi, Putin and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, the so-called ‘axis of autocracy’. As for the strategic value of the SCO gathering, Radchenko suggests there was less to conclude from this gathering than urged by some:

“The reality is more complex than the optics might suggest. The SCO has always been less than the sum of its parts. It formerly served a very specific function: helping China and Russia manage their differences in Central Asia. The addition of India; Pakistan; Iran; and, most recently, Belarus has diluted the SCO’s mission. Now, it provides little more than a glamorous opportunity for multilateral banquets.”

And as for the 80th anniversary of the end of the war, according to Radchenko:

“Unlike Xi’s vision for a happy world of win-win cooperation, the military parade suggests the possibility that someone might well lose and that it won’t be China.”

“In place of the banalities and broader vision of the SCO meeting, Beijing offered a more provocative message endorsed by a smaller core of countries. Putin, along with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and even North Korean leader Kim Jong Un were on hand for the roaring spectacle.”

“Planes flew overhead. Tanks, armored personnel carriers, laser guns, and nuclear missiles—carefully labelled in English for ease of reference—rolled across the square to the sounds of a military orchestra.”

If the intent was to underline a growing close axis of friendship opposed to the US it did, according to Radchenko, catch Trump’s attention:

“May President Xi and the wonderful people of China have a great and lasting day of celebration,” Trump tweeted. “Please give my warmest regards to Vladimir Putin, and Kim Jong Un, as you conspire against The United States of America.”

At its most strategically opportune, it would seem that Trump’s strategy of splitting Russia from China, hence the Alaska Summit, has seemingly failed. Now let’s see if Trump works in the other direction and tries to split China from Russia with recently suggested discussions over a pending grand bargain between Xi and Trump and a possible Summit.

Meanwhile, though, one cannot ignore the US lawlessness exhibited by this current Administration. The US has in many respects become the locus of disruption. Take for instance the US attack on a Venezuelan vessel in the Caribbean. As described by Rishi Iyengar and John Haltiwanger at FP:

“U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Wednesday that destroying the boat rather than intercepting and seizing it was intended to deter other “narcoterrorists.” “What will stop them is when you blow them up,” Rubio told reporters during a visit to Mexico. “And it will happen again.””

“Tuesday’s strike is the first operationalization of Trump’s secret order to the U.S. military last month to begin directly going after drug cartels, which was reported by the New York Times but still has not been made public.”

It was startling to see, especially for those concerned over adherence to international law. The United States blew it up – what the Administration breezily declared was a boat loaded with drugs and a further declaration that the vessel was filled with terrorists as opposed to seizing the vessel and its occupants. Such lawlessness is shaking and the fact that it comes from the United States with dramatic silence from US domestic voices -in Congress especially, is just dismaying.

It underlines the current disorder but little else.

This Post first appeared at my Substack, Alan’s Newsletter

https://globalsummitryproject.substack.com/p/the-confusing-new-global-order

Image Credit YouTube

Discussion about this post

Faltering Multilateralism Continues

Posted on August 29, 2025 by Alan Alexandroff

Well, it is kinda the end of the summer – now that we have the Labor Day weekend upon us. Wow!

It seemed reasonable to try to assess where we are on a number of issues that we have been following recently. These examinations all target the state of health of multilateralism. First the state of the Plastics Treaty, or not. I have looked at this before in a Post. The negotiation and the failure to move toward a Treaty underscores the diplomatic difficulty in achieving multilateral success in the current global relations context.

Then, there is the state of the UN – the central multilateral institution. Here too, I have looked at it previously in an earlier Post. What is at the heart of the failure of the UN; and is it fixable. We are examining the UN of course in the toxic context of Trump policymaking but the problems are real, with or without Trump. Now I was going to extend today’s Post to view the impact of Trump diplomacy on the international environment but I think I’ll save that for a later Post.

The Plastics Treaty

Well bluntly the Treaty, for the moment, is nowhere. As described by Joshua Lincoln at WPR:

“Negotiations on a treaty to limit global plastic waste ended last week not with a bang, but with a whimper. In the early hours of Aug. 15, after two compromise draft texts were rejected by various groupings within the 183 negotiating countries, the chair of the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee simply adjourned the talks.”

“Beyond these substantive problems, there were thorny implementation and design issues: the voting threshold, scientific input, and other features needed to make the treaty’s implementation mechanisms effective, and the financing mechanism.” …

“But when China—the world’s largest producer of plastics—as well as India and Brazil put their thumbs on the scale in favor of a text with no global obligations and subject to a rigid consensus requirement at every future step, any remaining room for agreement evaporated.”

So, is it dead! Maybe not but new diplomatic paths need to be taken. This will take some daring by states but its time to consider different diplomatic strategies. As Lincoln suggests:

“When it comes to a plastics treaty, the divisions among states are now likely too wide to bridge via consensus, but other pathways may be available. A majority of states could seek a new negotiating mandate through a vote at the U.N. General Assembly, as was done for the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in 2016-2017. Or the same group could go outside the U.N. entirely, which has precedent in the 1997 Ottawa Convention on land mines. In both of those cases, a coalition of states forged ahead on their own, trusting that more countries would sign on over time, as they eventually did.”

Like-minded states need to suck it up and attack these global problems starting with ‘coalitions of the willing’.

UN at 80

At the upcoming 80th General Assembly session which will be held from September 22-30th, the UN will, according to the UN, devote itself to:

“The 80th session of the United Nations General Assembly – under the theme ‘Better together: 80 years and more for peace, development and human rights’ – comes at a pivotal moment to renew global commitment to multilateralism, solidarity and shared action for people and planet. This year’s high-level week highlights the urgency of delivering on the promise of the Sustainable Development Goals and reinvigorating global cooperation.”

But reality is about to intrude, I hope. The UN needs to ‘face the music’ when it comes to its future. As Helen Murphy describes at Devex, here is the world the UN faces:

“Under pressure from U.S. funding cuts, Secretary-General António Guterres is rolling out sweeping reforms through the UN80 Initiative. China, now the organization’s second-largest financial contributor, is pressing for more jobs and influence as Washington retreats.”

“The United Nations is bracing for sweeping change. Facing massive U.S. funding cuts, it has floated slashing 20% of its secretariat’s 33,000-strong workforce. And China — now the U.N.’s second-largest contributor — isn’t shy about seizing the opening. Chinese diplomats have pressed for more jobs for their nationals and even argued American staff should bear the brunt of any layoffs.”

Well the Chinese actions may be annoying but that is hardly the heart of the UN problem. Murphy goes on to describe the real future facing the UN:

“Launched in March by Guterres and led by U.N. Undersecretary-General for Policy Guy Ryder, UN80 boils down to three main prongs: belt-tightening in the secretariat, reviewing the 40,000 mandates handed down since 1945, and possible mergers across U.N. agencies with overlapping roles.”

“Behind it all is a brutal money crunch, writes Colum. Washington owes the U.N. more than $1.7 billion, mostly in unpaid peacekeeping dues. But “this is not simply a cost-cutting, downsizing effort,” Ryder insists. “The objective is to make the U.N. better.”

“Critics aren’t buying it. “Basically, [the current funding crisis is] because the U.S. stopped paying,” says Ian Richards, head of the U.N. staff union in Geneva. Meanwhile, Stewart Patrick of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace calls it “a slash-and-burn approach,” adding, “they are basically unwittingly replicating a DOGE experiment at the United Nations.””

Yes, the fiscal crisis is real and needs to be addressed but it may require reducing the size of the UN as noted above. But that isn’t the end of it. As pointed out by Suzanne Nossel in a recent article in FP:

“The emergence of alternative multilateral bodies, great-power deadlocks, and global reductions in development assistance all threaten the U.N. in its current incarnation.”

But also there is more to it than just US ‘financial pressure’ and its determination to undermine multilateral organizations as well as all the problems identified by Nossel above. The UN has to face up to its dramatic inefficiency:

“This wavering support comes as the U.N. faces considerable organizational challenges. In recent decades, the U.N. has taken on a dizzying array of tasks and projects, many of which are out-of-date, overlap, or fail to achieve much.”

“Although the U.N. does irreplaceable and lifesaving work, it is saddled with ever-proliferating mandates that distract and detract from those essential endeavors. As part of a strategic review for the institution’s 80th birthday, Guterres commissioned an analysis of U.N. mandates, which was released in August. The study lays bare the organization’s inefficiency and mission creep, making the case for radical streamlining.”

“The new Report of the Mandate Implementation Review revealed an organization run amok. The U.N. has 22 distinct intergovernmental bodies; just the General Assembly, Security Council, Economic and Social Council, and Human Rights Council alone issue a total of more than 600 mandates.” per year, adding to a groaning total of more than 40,000 still-active mandates.”

“Mandates—which refer to U.N. bodies’ decisions, requests, and directives for action, such as creating a committee, conducting a study, or preparing a report—define the organization’s work. They can do everything from authorizing the deployment of thousands of peacekeepers, to requiring the preparation of a report on discrimination, to directing the work of a four-person accounting office, to adding to the existing list of more than 200 U.N. commemorative days (such as the International Day of Yoga). Regardless of its scope, each mandate demands effort from the U.N. Secretariat staff, who must carry out the mandate and report back to the entity that authorized it.”

“While the report did not appraise the value of individual mandates, it pulled no punches in exposing inefficiencies and waste. In fulfillment of these mandates, in 2024 alone, the U.N. held 27,000 meetings, incurring more than $360 million in direct costs associated with conference services and reports. Because there is no central registry of mandates, new ones are created without awareness of what is already being done. Since 1990, around 20 subjects have appeared every year in both General Assembly resolutions and ones adopted by either the Human Rights Council or the Economic and Social Council.”

So all these problems have accumulated over many years and it would appear that it is time, past time probably where the organization and its members have to tackle these critical problems. As Nossel concludes:

“The organization must seize the current cash crunch as a historic opportunity. Indeed, there are already sweeping proposals to remake the global body—including a leaked internal document that lays out an array of ideas to merge, eliminate, and relocate major U.N. functions.””

Really tough problems for multilateralism and its institutions with no guarantee that the organizations and its national members and staff and leadership have the will to tackle these very difficult problems.

This Post first appeared as a Substack Post at Alan’s Newsletter https://substack.com/home/post/p-172213259

Turning Back to Middle Powers – The Contrasting Character of Middle Powers?

Posted on August 21, 2025 by Alan Alexandroff

I ended a recent Post – “Can we foresee Middle Power Action in a World of Geopolitical Tensions?” indicating I wanted to examine further Middle Powers (MP) and Middle Power Diplomacy (MPD.) My hope: explore further what experts have suggested identifies MPs and characterizes MPD. I wanted to further look into views and insights from former Australian foreign minister Gareth Evans. We were fortunate enough to have him as one of the discussants in the webinar gathering on Australia and New Zealand as MPs. He subsequently kindly so we could quote him and then later provided us with remarks he delivered to a course at the Australian War College in Canberra last June.Let me therefore reel things back to MPs and MPD after examining the disempowering of multilateralism with the currently failed Plastics Treaty.

As it turns out I thought it might prove useful to expand the lens I had on Gareth Evans and to include insights as well from another discussant from a CWD session, Dr, Dino Patti Djalal. We were very fortunate to have such a wide set of discussants examining MPs and their behavior during our previous sessions on MPs and MPD. Dr. Djalal is the founder and chairman of the Foreign Policy Community of Indonesia (FPCI) and chair of Middle Power Studies Network (MPSN). In government Djalal served as Indonesia’s ambassador to the United States and Vice Foreign Minister of Indonesia. Recently he produced the first edition of “Middle Power Insights”.

Dr. Djalal has offered an extensive definition built on objective features as the foundation for understanding MPs:

“In this article, I refer to middle powers as countries that, by virtue of their considerable size (population and geography), weight (economic, diplomatic, and military strength), and ambition, are placed between the small power and great power categories. (Think of the middleweight division in boxing.) The combination of these three “SWA” metrics – size, weight, ambition – narrows down to a handful of middle powers, and covers those in the North and the Global South.”

Based on the extended definition above, the following list appears to be the MPs identified and mentioned by Dr. Djalal:

Mexico
Canada
Australia
Indonesia
Saudi Arabia
UAE (possibly)
South Korea

former ‘major powers’ of the 20^thcentury now ‘pivotal middle powers’ including: possibly Germany,France, UK and Russia
Iran
Egypt
Turkiye
Brazil
India
South Africa
Vietnam

We probably should likely add at least some of the Scandinavian countries – traditional MPs, along with Canada and Australia, including:

Norway
Sweden
The Netherlands

And I would suspect that these additional states would also likely be recognized as MPs by most:

Singapore
New Zealand

“Of the 193 countries in the world today”, according to Djalal, “around two dozen qualify as middle powers – some are in the Global North but the majority”, as the list above shows, “are in the Global South.”

While Djalal does not provide a definitive list, the above constructed one identifies those MP countries at least mentioned by Djalal in his Report. As you see there are about two dozen as suggested by Dr. Djalal.

We were fortunate enough, as noted above, to include as one of our CWD discussants in our Australia session, the former foreign minister of Australia Gareth Evans. It is probably not all that surprising that Evans has a strong interest in MPs and MPD given he was foreign minister of Australia and a well known traditional MP . In his remarks later provided to us for our use he expressed an extended definition of MPs:

“There is no standard definition, or agreed international list, of ‘middle powers’, and no lack of continuing argument about not only the coverage of the concept, but its operational utility, and in some cases its acceptability to those so labelled.”

“For me, there are three things that matter in characterizing middle powers: what we are not, what we are, and the mindset we bring to our international role. ‘Middle powers’ are those states which are not economically or militarily big or strong enough to really impose their policy preferences on anyone else, either globally or (for the most part) regionally. We are nonetheless states which are sufficiently capable in terms of our diplomatic resources, sufficiently credible in terms of our record of principled behaviour, and sufficiently motivated to be able to make, individually, a significant impact on international relations in a way that is beyond the reach of small states.”

Unlike Dr. Djalal, Gareth Evans suggested some skepticism on relying on the objective measures that Dr. Djalal promotes. As he suggested in remarks he delivered at the War College last June he expressed this view:

“Focusing on objective measures of physical size – of population, GDP, landmass, defence expenditure or the like – doesn’t take the definitional argument very far.”

According to Evans MPD as practiced by these states provides:

“cooperation and coalition-building with like-minded countries in individual or niche issues that no single power can solve by acting alone.”

Evans then expands on this:

“I would describe ‘middle power diplomacy’, in turn, as having both a characteristic motivation and a characteristic method:

• “The characteristic motivation is belief in the utility, and necessity, of acting cooperatively with others in addressing international challenges, particularly those global public goods problems which by their nature cannot be solved by any country acting alone, however big and powerful; and

• The characteristic diplomatic method is coalition building with ‘like- minded’ – those who, whatever their prevailing value systems, share specific interests and are prepared to work together to do something about them.”

And as he describes it in his early remarks to CWD, this is how Evans sees MPD operating:

“For middle power diplomacy, as I have described it, to be effective, requires a number of factors coming together: practical opportunity, often limited given the realities of great and major-power dominance; available diplomatic resources, energy and stamina; intellectual creativity, seeing opportunities which others have missed; and credibility, practising what you preach and being seen as genuinely independent, nobody’s deputy sheriff…”

For Djalal with his focus on the active Global South MPs and their growing plurilateral coalitions:

“The world’s middle powers are changing the playbook in the international system.”

“The growing cooperation involving the middle powers – within the Global South, between the Global South and the North, between the Global South and the United States and China – is reshaping the international order.” …

“More and more, middle powers are positioning themselves to be a driving force in shaping regional architecture, thus compelling them to step up their response to the challenges inherent in their neighborhood. They are also spearheading various minilateral initiatives that can potentially supplement the provision of global public goods and also enhance the space for meaningful dialogue.”

So while these two experts do not exactly see ‘eye to eye’ they both see the influence of MPs and their diplomatic action on global relations. They do point to regional action and collaboration on the provision of public goods.

All this discussion of MPs leaves a couple of intriguing questions. Can we identify current action that we can subscribe to MP action? Can we describe the coalitional aspects of such MPD and is the behavior one way only, that is efforts to build coalitional effort to achieve effective global governance in a world of growing disorder?

As a start, the characterization we’ve just seen for MPs by both previous experts does contrast with a far more ‘realist perspective’ on MPs and MPD proposed by a set of scholars at the Institute for Peace and Diplomacy. In their 2022 article, “Middle Powers in the Multipolar World” by Moeini, Mott, Paikin and Polansky they target first the emergence of what they see as as a declining unipolarity and an emerging structure of multipolarity:

“With the international system shifting away from Pax Americana and toward a more multipolar world, a class of state actors usually called ‘middle powers’ is the subject of increased attention in policy and academic debates. Despite their rising prevalence, however, references to middle powers are often imprecise, inconsistent, surface level, and ad hoc—reflecting a general bias toward great powers and/or universalism that privileges systemic (global) analysis in mainstream international relations.”

For these experts the core understanding comes from the fact that these MP are regionally embedded:

“We show that middle powers are better defined by their 1) enduring regional presence and geographic rootedness, 2) considerable economic and military capacity relative to neighbors, 3) historical and cultural pedigree as civilizational states, and 4) the regionally-focused, limited extent of their ambitions — they seek not world domination but a sphere of influence in their near-abroad matching their historical range and scope.”

“Given the decline of unipolarity, growing disruptions and backlashes to globalization, and the fracturing and realignment of the global financial and political-economic system, region-based economic and political dynamics are likely to become ever more central to international politics. Understanding future geopolitical trends will depend on recognizing the reality and centrifugal force of multiplicity at the regional or sub-system level to which middle powers are anchored in a cohesive unity—with each civilizational node, the fulcrum of a regional security complex (RSC).”

“One could not speak of ‘middle powers’ without taking into account their symbiotic relationship with the geographical regions wherein they are located and recognizing that “security interdependence is normally patterned into regionally based clusters: security complexes.””

For these scholars, MPs are:

“In our scheme, middle powers emerge as anchors to these regional complexes, and the regional security complex forms around them. But the question remains: what distinguishes a middle power from other nation-states in a particular regional security complex, and what differentiates it from a great power?”

So what are the differences identified? According to these folks this is it:

Great powers are, practically speaking, global players—nations with the ability, or at least the potential, for global force projection and international action.”

“Middle powers, in contrast, are confined—both in intent and their activities—to their designated regional security environments due, for the most part, to their relative resource constraints.”

MPs then, according to the authors are:

“A major reason for this necessary paradigm shift is that middle powers are civilizational states, firmly rooted to a particular land, tradition, and culture and possessing a powerful historical memory.”

“In sum, a middle power is best defined by its relative power and superiority within the regional security complex it anchors, a well-developed cultural tradition and sense of identity that are the wellspring of relative solidarity, aspiration and capacity for regional—though not global—dominance, and ability to chart a course of import vis-à-vis great global powers while retaining its autonomy.”

“The regional requirement is thus a sine qua non for the category of middle powers, but the domestic health of a state matters too. Internal socio-political considerations, including regime stability, social cohesion, self-confidence, a common purpose, and effective leadership are the basic building blocks for all power: middle powers are no exception.”

Who then do these authors identify as today’s MPs:

“Therefore, based on our established criteria, we propose that Japan, Turkey, Iran, Brazil, Indonesia, India, Germany, France, the Anglosphere (the UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand when & where they work in tandem), Nigeria, and South Africa are all better understood as middle powers in the current global landscape.”

Certainly an identifiable subset of the MPs identified both by Djalal and Evans. But in contrast to both these MPs a regionally anchored set of states:

“In short, the multipolar world will greatly increase the geopolitical relevance of regions and enhance the ability of middle powers to lead them, with great powers less inclined to intervene from ‘above’.”

Now I am not doing ‘true justice’ to the very developed perspective presented by these experts but hopefully it does enough to present a strong contrast between the several visions presented. So then the question left is: Are we bound to focus on the collaborative efforts of MPs to press forward in advancing global governance initiatives; or are MPs embedded in conflict structures of the geopolitical world of great powers?

To that question I will return in the near future

Image Credit: MPSN (Middle Power Studies Network)

This Post was first published at my Substack Alan’s Newsletter:

https://substack.com/home/post/p-171565248

Looking Again at Middle Powers – but first ‘Plastics Forever’

Posted on August 15, 2025 by Alan Alexandroff

I ended my last Post – “Can we foresee Middle Power Action in a World of Geopolitical Tensions?” indicating I wanted to examine further Middle Powers (MP) and Middle Power Diplomacy (MPD.) I think it is very important, in the current global disorder with Trump 2.0, to explore further, MP and MPD. It is valuable to dig further into the remarks expressed by Gareth Evans, Australia’s former foreign minister at a CWD session. We were fortunate enough to have him join CWD as a discussant in that webinar gathering on Australia and New Zealand as MPs. He subsequently provided us with a written set of his remarks from the session and then later on he was good enough to provide remarks he delivered to a course at the Australian War College in Canberra last June.

But before tackling MPs again, I had to turn my focus on the ‘impending’ Plastics Treaty and to take the measure of the state of multilateralism by focusing on this negotiation. The several delegate gatherings reflect the current difficulties of multilateral negotiation and more importantly reaching multilateral agreement – moving the yardsticks on critical global governance issues.

As pointed out by Madeleine Speed at FT:

“Delegates from more than 170 countries have gathered in Switzerland over the past two weeks in a final attempt to reach a globally binding treaty. The fifth round of talks collapsed in South Korea last year after oil-producing nations blocked the inclusion of measures that would regulate plastic production.”

“The Geneva talks scheduled to conclude on Thursday [August14th] were extended into another day for the presentation of a second draft of the treaty. But a heated final plenary meeting on Friday morning appeared set to end without agreement.”

This is of course a failure after a previous failure in Busan South Korea to conclude a Plastics Treaty. Negotiations to conclude a Plastics Treaty has been ongoing since 2022.

In fact just a few hours later Hiroko Tabuchi, who covers pollution and the environment for the NYTimes wrote:

“Negotiations over a global plastic pollution treaty collapsed on Friday [August 15th] as countries failed to bridge wide gaps on whether the world should limit plastic manufacturing and restrict the use of harmful plastic chemicals.”

“Environmental groups accused a small number of petroleum-producing nations, which make the building blocks of plastic, of derailing an ambitious effort to tackle plastic waste. “We are leaving frustrated,” Edwin Josué Castellanos López, chief negotiator for Guatemala, told the delegates. “We have not come up with a treaty that the planet so urgently needs.””

And Madeleine Speed at the FT appeared to confirm the immediate Treaty failure:

While the majority of more than 170 countries were prepared to compromise to secure a treaty in Geneva on Friday, the US refused to agree to anything beyond voluntary measures, national delegates told the Financial Times. This followed the long-running opposition of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and a number of other petrostates which would not budge from their refusal to agree measures that address the production of plastic, rather than only waste management.

So where to from here, and why are we seeing yet again multilateral negotiating failure. On what’s next Tabuchi wrote:

“It was unclear what next steps might follow the latest round of negotiations in Geneva which were supposed to be the last. Inger Andersen, executive director of the United Nations Environment Program, which is hosting the talks, said countries needed time to regroup after failing to reach consensus over draft treaty texts.”

And why the difficulty. The problem is the goal set by those seeking a binding treaty in the face of oil producers. Looking forward the continued production and use of plastics leads here according to the OECD:

“The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development estimates that, without global action to curb plastic pollution, plastic production will grow by 70 percent between 2020 and 2040, totaling 736 million tons a year by the end of that period. Overall as of 2020, less than 10 percent of global plastic waste was estimated to have been recycled, with the rest disposed of in landfills, incinerated or released into the environment.”

There is dramatic tension between those focused only on recycling, notwithstanding the poor track record for recycling and those determined to place a cap on plastic production and dealing with plastic toxicity:

“A coalition of nations had aimed not only to improve recycling and clean up the world’s plastic waste, but also to curb plastics production. That would put measures like a ban on single-use plastics, a major driver of waste, on the table, some said at the time.”

“A group of nations also pushed for the treaty to include controls on toxic chemicals in plastic products.”

In addition to those determined to tackle the toxic chemicals in plastics there are those slow walking efforts to place a cap on production especially Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the UAE and other oil producing states. Now that group has been augmented by a number of others:

“The United States, which supported the idea of a broad treaty under the Biden administration, has now turned against production caps, proposing in the most recent round to strike a mention addressing “the full life cycle of plastics” from the treaty.”

Trump 2.0 now joins Russia and China in opposing limits on production.

Clearly, part of the dilemma faced by delegates seeking a binding treaty here is the determination of the negotiating group to use a rule of agreement that limits the group’s ability to move forward:

“The talks’ collapse “proved that there’s no way we can proceed with consensus,” said Bjorn Beeler, executive director at IPEN, an international network of nonprofits focused on addressing pollution. “The result was the chaos you saw.””

As pointed out by Tabuchi in an earlier NYTimes piece:

“On Thursday, delegates continued to demand a new draft, even as they contemplated various outcomes: a weak treaty, a continuation of talks or no treaty at all. Getting all of the world’s nations to agree using U.N.-sanctioned consensus-based negotiations seems increasingly out of reach.”

Rather than employing a majority decision rule the negotiation faces consensus agreement. And it appears the results are all too obvious. It is evident that majority of nations favor a production cap and dealing with toxic chemicals as well as recycling management:

“But the majority of nations at the talks have supported curbs on plastic production, saying the plastic waste problem needs to be addressed at the source.” …

“And at the treaty talks, more than 80 countries had signed onto a proposal led by Switzerland and Mexico to include controls on toxic chemicals in plastic products.”

As pointed out in Al Jazeera:

“Valdivieso’s [the chair, Luis Vayas Valdivieso, Ambassador of Ecuador to the United Kingdom and Chair of this negotiation] draft text does not limit plastic production or address chemicals used in plastic products, which have been contentious issues at the talks.”

“About 100 countries want to limit production as well as tackle cleanup and recycling. Many have said it’s essential to address toxic chemicals. Oil-producing countries only want to eliminate plastic waste.”

“More than 400 million tonnes of plastic are produced globally each year, half of which is for single-use items.”

“Nearly half, or 46 percent, ends up in landfills, while 17 percent is incinerated and 22 percent is mismanaged and becomes rubbish.”

What the next steps for the Plastics Treaty negotiation are, at the moment unclear, but it is evident that Middle Powers in Europe, Latin America and Indo-Pacific are not yet capable of forging collaboration in the face of a consensus rule.

Let us see where the negotiation goes from here, if at all. Meanwhile, let’s turn back to MPs and to situations where consensus does not govern.

Image Credit: AP

This Post first appeared as a Substack Post at Alan’s Newsletter -https://substack.com/home/post/p-171066675

Can we foresee Middle Power Action in a World of Geopolitical Tensions?

Posted on August 8, 2025 by Alan Alexandroff

So we’ve been struggling to understand the current roles, and possible future roles of Middle Powers (MP). Context is important especially in the context of today’s global disorder that sees: ‘undying’ wars in the Ukraine and Gaza; seeming rising geopolitical tensions between the US and China, the US and Russia and rising Global South demands. How might MPs act in the near term with respect to these current tensions whether in Europe, the Middle East or in the Indo-Pacific? Can MPs still exert and advance global governance leadership notwithstanding the disorder trends? In the next couple of Posts I hope to elaborate on MPs and MPD. As you will see MPs and their potential influence have represented an important stream of research inquiry.

The CWD – now the Changing World Dialogue, has maintained a strong interest in the role of Middle Powers and their Middle Power Diplomacy. We held various virtual CWD sessions through the pandemic and we have continued our inquiries as the pandemic abated. By the launch of the CWD sessions in September 2024, Colin Bradford, the lead Co-Chair of the CWD saw the ‘MP World’ this way:

“Global pluralism, developed in 2020-2023, posits the existence already of “autonomous” strategies and independence in foreign policies as a “global political dynamic” in global relations. Pluralism is a core concept for CWD, in that it leads to the “pluralization” of relations with China as an “alternative framework” to address the toxic tension in the bilateral China-US relationship in recent years. This has been the goal of CWD from its foundation.”

“In the last year of CWD exchanges, the importance of Middle Powers and Middle Power Diplomacy has arisen as the domestic driver of pluralism. This new CWD series seeks to elucidate the factors enabling countries to be Middle Powers and the features of their international behaviors which are effective in addressing global systemic challenges.”

“A better understanding of these factors and features could facilitate proactive national efforts to deliberately contribute to global pluralism by “punching above their weight” and to influence global governance outcomes that include China and the US but which “globalize” those outcomes, rather than narrow them by allowing great power dominance to prevail.”

“See quotations at the end of this note, one by Shiro Armstrong and one by Mari Pangestu, both of whom are participants in this series on the importance of Middle Power Diplomacy for Australia and for ASEAN.”

“The purpose of this new CWD series of Zoom Sessions in the next four months is to focus on the two-sided coin of global pluralism and middle power diplomacy in order to explore the degree to which they are capable of achieving the goals of CWD for humanity.”

Colin then turned to the goals of the CWD, as he saw it, from his ‘perch’ as a Co-Chair and identified the following:

“to preserve the world as a single international community;

to avoid another Cold War;

to strengthen global governance in the face of geopolitical tensions;

to prioritize the “good-of-the-whole” within and between nations; and

to mediate “difference” through dialogue by capitalizing on “diversity as an asset” rather than using it as a divide.”

And from there Colin sought to identify the dimensions of Middle Power Diplomacy (MPD) as he saw it:

“This segment of the note is a highly preliminary and more a conversation starter than the articulation of a framework for future work to be undertaken on MDP. Indeed, it is the purpose of this CWD series to iteratively develop that framework. We are just beginning.

The domestic side of global pluralism is the drive, or lack of it, within a nation to play a role in international affairs that advances the country’s interests and enhances its profile in the international community. It is certainly not always the case that countries that could have the power and influence to play an international role have chosen to do so. Neither is Middle Power status conferred upon countries once and for all but rather is a characteristic that waxes and wanes with the historical trajectory of the country.”

Having articulated these MPD dimensions, Colin then described, as he saw it, the key elements of being a MP:

“Some key elements that immediately come to mind as factors affecting the capacity of a country to play a role internationally as a Middle Power are:

national leadership willing to embrace the ambition of being an MP;

size, but not necessarily always the case;

a pivotal issue and a moment in time when opportune to weigh in;

a platform for playing out the role where germane issues are raised;

an appreciation of the value of reputational capital that can accrue:

supporting principles, norms and ideals regarded as high ground;

regions matter as geographic spheres where MPD is played out; and

regions matter as Middle Powers in their own right.”

Finally, Colin pointed to what he saw as the emergence of MPs and MPD in the current geopolitical setting:

“Geopolitics today dominate international relations and weaken global governance.”

“The choice is between *** a bipolar geopolitical order dominated by China-US relations, the war between NATO and Russia, and divisiveness between the G7 and the BRICS AND *** a pluralized inclusive global order in which Europe differentiates itself as a global actor and more than two dozen Middle Powers and regional players, like ASEAN and the African Union, have influential roles.”

“In the pluralized inclusive order scenario, European countries which alone are not great powers but who do exercise independent influence as Middle Powers, and even Major Powers, such as France, Germany, Italy, and the UK, are definitely global actors. Australia, Canada, Japan and South Korea are classic cases of Middle Powers in the literature. (8 MPs)”

“The rest of the G20 from the Global South fill out this scenario with Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Mexico from Latin America, India and Indonesia from Asia, and South Africa and Turkey create a diverse array of strong voices in global affairs. (+8 MPs)”

“Then there is an orbit of influentials consisting of Egypt, Iran, Nigeria, Pakistan, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia that certainly have region-wide roles in Africa and the Middle East, but given the global repercussions of events in these two areas, play roles in global relations more broadly. (+ 6 MPs = a total of 24 Middle Powers, counting ASEAN and the AU)”

As a result of his inquiry Colin sought to put “his hands” around what he sees as the MPs in today’s global order. Colin, in fact produced 24 MPs:

“Europe: France, Germany, Italy, the UK

Pacific Asia: Australia, Canada, Japan and South Korea

Global South: Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Mexico, India, Indonesia, South Africa and Turkey

Influentials: Egypt, Iran, Nigeria, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia

Regional Institutions: ASEAN, SAU (African Union)”

But the list was not complete and Colin adds the following from Central Asia mentioning: Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan suggesting:

“They are relatively small landlocked countries but are in a pivotal geographic situation between China, Russia, Europe and the Middle East. And they are largely out of the western view of the world, which I think is a mistake.”

“These five Central Asian countries are also five of the ten members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) in which China, India, Iran, Pakistan, and Russia are members; Egypt, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia (among others) are dialogue partners, and ASEAN, is a “guest attendee.”

“I would offer the thought for discussion that we give some attention to Central Asia as a region and to these five countries. Whereas I do not think we should focus on the SCO as a group, I do not think we should ignore it, which I must admit to having done for most of my career.”

“Pluralism exists today with leaders like India’s Modi, Brazil’s Lula, Turkey’s Erdogan, as well as Macron, Scholz, Meloni and EU leaders, taking independent positions, most notably in their relations with China. Instead of the China-US relationship dominating the global discourse, pluralism is manifested by assertive independence on the part of more than two dozen “middle powers” beyond the triad of great powers.”

As Colin concludes this examination, he ties the MP analysis to global summitry institutions in particular the G20 and the effort to maintain a single international community and blunt the negative impact of bipolarity:

“These two dozen entities have visible roles in a different drama. The G20 becomes a more significant platform that forces members of the G7 and the BRICS to talk, negotiate and even agree on concerted priorities and coordinated actions. The complexity of pluralism as a global political dynamic creates a mélange of perspectives and interests which is less ideological and a discourse which is more pragmatic, problem-centric, and professional. The G20 is the most prominent site where this new dynamic is played out, but not the only one.”

So that was where Colin saw the CWD focus on MP and MPD as we began our 2024 cycle of CWD zoom gatherings. It was a busy season of meetings including a series of MP gatherings including sessions on: Korea, Japan, Australia and New Zealand, Indonesia and Turkey.

In the follow on Post I want to reflect further on what we learned in our gatherings on MPs and MPD and focus in particular on the insights brought to us at the time, and then following on by Gareth Evans the former foreign minister of Australia. He had very valuable things to say.

Credit Image: MPSN (Middle Power Studies Network)

This Post first appeared as a Substack Post at Alan’s Newsletter https://globalsummitryproject.substack.com/p/can-we-foresee-middle-power-action

The Active, Indeed Very Active, World of the ‘B… in Chief’

Posted on August 1, 2025 by Alan Alexandroff

So President Trump and his minions were extremely active this past week. The President, as Bully in Chief, and his people are still going strong, especially when it comes to trade and tariffs. But there were other areas that this President and his administration pushed forward on and warrant a look. So much (re)gressive action is being taken that it is hard to keep up with it all. It is exhausting.

Starting at home you could not avoid the critical action being directed by the Head of the EPA, Lee Zeldin. As described by Maxine Joselow and Lisa Friedman at the NYTimes are Zeldin’s efforts to roll back the EPA underpinnings to fighting climate change – the ‘endangerment finding’. And do notice where Zeldin made his announcement:

“Lee Zeldin, the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, said on Tuesday the Trump administration would revoke the scientific determination that underpins the government’s legal authority to combat climate change.”

“Speaking at a truck dealership in Indianapolis, Mr. Zeldin said the E.P.A. planned to rescind the 2009 declaration, known as the endangerment finding, which concluded that planet-warming greenhouse gases pose a threat to public health. The Obama and Biden administrations used that determination to set strict limits on greenhouse gas emissions from cars, power plants and other industrial sources of pollution.”

“Without the endangerment finding, the E.P.A. would be left with no authority under the Clean Air Act to regulate the greenhouse gas emissions that are accumulating in the atmosphere from the burning of fossil fuels.”

It is a dramatic step. As described by the two reporters:

“The proposal is President Trump’s most consequential step yet to derail federal climate efforts. It marks a notable shift in the administration’s position from one that had downplayed the threat of global warming to one that essentially flatly denies the overwhelming scientific evidence of climate change.”

“It would not only reverse current regulations, but, if the move is upheld in court, it could make it significantly harder for future administrations to rein in climate pollution from the burning of coal, oil and gas.”

“Without the United States working to reduce emissions, it becomes far tougher for the world to collectively prevent average global temperatures from rising by more than 1.5 degrees Celsius, or 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit, above preindustrial levels.”

From current legal actions underway I think there is a reasonable chance that at the Appeal Court level Zeldin’s actions might well be declared illegal but at the ‘Supremes’, it is a hard call.

These actions are potentially devastating but Zeldin’s actions reveal a dramatic alteration in Zeldin’s actions:

“The plan to eliminate the endangerment finding showcases the political evolution of Mr. Zeldin, who for years took moderate positions on climate change and other environmental issues.”

“A former congressman from a coastal community on Long Island that is struggling with rising sea levels linked to global warming, Mr. Zeldin once joined a bipartisan caucus to address climate change. In 2019 he broke with fellow Republicans to vote against an amendment that would have prohibited the E.P.A. from reducing greenhouse gas emissions.”

“An ally of Mr. Trump who prominently defended him during House impeachment hearings, Mr. Zeldin moved to the right on energy and other issues during his unsuccessful bid for governor of New York in 2022.”

“Just weeks after his nomination to lead the E.P.A., Mr. Zeldin declared that he would be “driving a dagger through the heart of climate-change religion” by repealing regulations on greenhouse gas emissions.”

Loyalty has become the sine qua non for Trump folk.

Now on the Trump bullying front both the actions against elite universities and then trade policy actions can’t be outdone.

On the trade front first. There is an explosion of tariffs issued by Trump following an anemic number of successfully reached agreements with the Trump administration. First there was a major ‘agreement’ reached earlier in the week with the EU, its second largest trade partner. The EU agreed to a 15 percent tariff after Trump threatened 30 percent. And, the EU committed to buying more energy from America, and apparently agreeing to buy more AI chips, and to invest $600bn in the U.S. Back to this agreement in a moment.

The new tariff rates established a 10 percent baseline for all imports to the U.S., while setting higher levies on many countries including Syria (41 percent), Laos (40 percent), Switzerland (39 percent), Iraq (35 percent), South Africa (30 percent) and India (25 percent). In addition, Trump imposed various punitive tariffs including a sweeping 50 percent tariff on most goods from Brazil beginning in one week. The U.S. Treasury also announced sanctions on Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes over the trial of former President Jair Bolsonaro for plotting a coup after he lost the presidential election. Trump appears outraged at the actions to punish the former president for his attempted coup. I suspect it brings back memories of his own actions.

In announcing the tariffs, which had been set to take effect on Friday, Mr. Trump invoked Brazil’s prosecution of its former president, Jair Bolsonaro, a Trump ally charged with attempting a coup to remain in power. Mr. Trump has said Mr. Bolsonaro is the victim of a “witch hunt.””

And his animus seemingly is not confined to Brazil. Trump raised tariffs with Canada as pointed out by the Toronto Star’s Raisa Patel and Josh Rubin:

“U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order late Thursday hiking tariffs on certain Canadian goods to 35 per cent, with no deal materializing between Ottawa and Washington as the clock ticked towards an Aug. 1 deadline to reach a trade agreement.”

Such a tariff rate would be punishing for sure, but the agreed USMCA exemption allows most cross border exports to cross tariff-free. It is estimated that the exemption covers about 94 percent of the items Canada exports to the U.S.

Now, back to the agreement with the EU for a second look. This agreement – a 15 percent tariff, immediately raised a strong round of criticism. A notable example was Zaki Laidi, a former special adviser to the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, and a professor at Sciences Po. As Laidi wrote in Project Syndicate in a piece titled, “The Trumping of Europe”:

“One can reproach Viktor Orbán, a friend of US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, for many things. But the Hungarian prime minister is not wrong to point out that we have just witnessed Trump “eating [European Commission President] Ursula von der Leyen for breakfast.” After all, the draft trade agreement the European Union has now concluded with the United States sets a 15% tariff on most European exports to the US, against a 0% tariff on US exports to Europe. Clearly, the match goes to Trump, 15 to nil.”

“This glaring asymmetry is a far cry from what Europe was demanding – namely, near-zero tariffs on both sides. And making matters worse, the framework also envisions $750 billion in forced purchases of US energy, $600 billion of European investment in the US, and additional orders of US-made military hardware.”

Laidi suggested the following as the conclusion of this negotiation:

“Still, from his standpoint, this outcome is exceptional. Europe cannot possibly claim to have “won.” At best, it managed to limit the damage. Von der Leyen arrived in Scotland weak and anxious; she left even weaker, but relieved.”

Laidi’s counter to the agreement von der Leyen reached is:

“Europe had plenty of cards to play, and it could have strengthened its hand further by coordinating its position with the two other G7 countries facing US bullying: Japan and Canada. Nor did the EU’s options stop there. Another formidable card is the Anti-Coercion Instrument (ACI), which is designed for situations where “a third country would seek to exert pressure on the European Union or on one of its member states to take specific measures that would affect trade and investment.” That is precisely what has been happening.”

And while the result for the EU, as I see it was indeed middling at best Laidi does underscore that to be more effective what was required: a coalitional arrangement both within the 27 member countries of the EU, let alone coalitional agreement among at least some of the members of the G7. While the EU outcome may be a hard lesson, it does underscore that parties need to work much harder and more quickly to achieve coalitional arrangements whether within the EU or in a coalition of at least some of the members of the G7. Until then Trump bullying is not going away any too soon.

And then there is the ‘negotiation’ with Harvard University. Actually, in my youth, I was lucky enough to take a Harvard negotiation course. Given the ‘negotiation’ between Harvard and the Trump administration there is no small irony in the continuing Hravard programme as pointed out in a recent article in The Economist:

“At Harvard you can study negotiation. This being Harvard, there is in fact an entire academic programme dedicated to the craft. The principles are simple. Understand your alternatives—what happens if you fight rather than compromise—and your long-term interests. This being Donald Trump’s America, Harvard itself is now the case study.”

Trump has particularly targeted Harvard in his efforts to rein in rampant anti-semitism at universities most particularly seemingly the elite Ivy League campuses:

“Mr Trump has turned full guns on that supposed hotbed of antisemitism and left-wing indoctrination. America’s oldest and richest university would be his most satisfying trophy and its capitulation would become a template for coerced reforms across higher education. The government has sought to review some of Harvard’s coursework as Mr Trump has pressured it to hire fewer “Leftist dopes” and discipline pro-Palestine protesters. When the university refused, his administration froze federal research grants worth $3bn and tried to bar it from enrolling foreign students.”

The piece goes on to declare:

“Consider Harvard’s options. Litigation has succeeded initially: a judge paused the ban on foreign students. Harvard had a sympathetic hearing in its lawsuit to restore government funding. Yet the university knows that it cannot count on the Supreme Court, with its conservative majority. Meanwhile, the potential damage from Mr Trump’s campaign looks both acute and existential. Losing federal funds would transform Harvard from a world-class research university to a tuition-dependent one. They constitute 11% of the operating budget and represent almost all the discretionary money available for research. Making do without while maintaining current spending levels would see the university draw down its $53bn endowment by about 2% a year. That is possible for a while, though it would erode future income and much of the endowment is constrained by donor restrictions anyway.”

Notwithstanding Harvard’s litigation against the Trump bullying of the University, Harvard is probably eyeing the details of the Trump agreement with Columbia University as a template for a possible deal with the Trump administration.

It is an option for sure. I am sure such a deal will be difficult to swallow but otherwise the threat to Harvard remains all too real. Once again I am struck that the universities were apparently unable to gather together and act together – whether with collective legal action, or negotiation in a coalition. Of course the urge is to put it behind quickly and get back to ‘normal’ but dealing with the ‘Bully in Chief’ requires a more pointed collective strategy. I do hope such collective efforts emerge among the Trump targets to deal with the ‘Bully in Chief’.

Image Credit: Today News

This Post originally appeared as a Substack Post at Alan’s Newsletter

https://globalsummitryproject.substack.com/p/the-active-indeed-very-active-world

Crisis and Reform at the UN

Posted on July 25, 2025 by Alan Alexandroff

I’ll start by returning to a subject I broached in this earlier Substack Post, Finding Success for the BRICS+, where I raised questions over the impact at the conclusion of the Conference on Financing for Development:

“Just concluded in Seville Spain is the 4th International Conference on Financing for Development (FfD4). As noted by SDSN, The UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN) which operates under the auspices of the UN Secretary-General, and designed to mobilize a network to drive action on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Paris Agreement on Climate Change this summit gathering is designed to”:

Adequately finance the UN system;
Increase financing for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs);
Increase their financing of the global commons; and
Agree on reforms of the international financial markets to ensure that savings flow to the poorer countries in the world.

According to author, Minh-Thu Pham, a nonresident scholar in the Global Order and Institutions Program at CEIP, in an article titled: “The Compromiso de Sevilla Marks a New Path for Development Finance”:

“At the outset of FFD4, the four co-facilitators—Mexico, Nepal, Norway, and Zambia—agreed that the AAAA [Addis Ababa Action Agenda] and the September 2024 UN Pact for the Future, which contained language committing to reforming international financial architecture, must be the minimal level of agreement in Sevilla.”

“The ultimate document they produced underscores a collective obligation to advance development, rather than a mere bargain between the Global North and South. Indeed, the very name—Compromiso de Sevilla—signals this distinction: While English speakers might hear “compromise” in the Spanish “compromiso,” the word actually means “commitment,” a linguistic nuance that captures the document’s aspirational rather than merely transactional character.”

She goes on further to argue:

“Despite some disappointments, the Compromiso de Sevilla is a major win for the Global South, particularly developing countries most vulnerable to economic shocks. It marked the emergence of a new path for international cooperation, based on three principles: maximizing development impact, giving Global South countries greater voice and influence over financial and debt structures, and strengthening country leadership and country-led initiatives. The fact that an outcome was reached by consensus provides yet another signal that a new breed of multilateralism is emerging to meet the needs of the moment—albeit one without the United States.”

How does she see the outcome? Well, that seems pretty clear:

“Ultimately, the Compromiso de Sevilla is a substantive advance both for the Global South and the cause of multilateralism. Four key policy provisions stand out.”

“Lacking an effective global architecture for managing sovereign debt, the world’s poorest countries are paying more on servicing their debt than on health and education combined. Despite sharp North-South differences, negotiators reached agreement on important initiatives to lower debt burdens:

Creating a borrowers forum with a secretariat in the UN Conference on Trade and Development to provide borrowing states a platform to coordinate

Convening a new working group under the UN secretary-general, including the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, tasked with examining responsible borrowing and lending practices

Endorsing increased local-currency lending to reduce pressure in crises

Establishing a global debt registry housed at the World Bank

Calling for a strengthened G20 Common Framework

Agreeing on an intergovernmental dialogue at the UN on closing gaps in the debt architecture.”

Yet she is willing to see that in the end:

“As Zambia’s UN ambassador Chola Milambo declared, “at the end of the day, it’s going to be implementation that matters.” To build on the Compromiso de Sevilla, the Spanish hosts and the UN proposed a Sevilla Platform for Action to encourage partnerships between member states, civil society, and the private sector to announce initiatives to operationalize and execute specific elements of the agreement. The platform now includes over 130 initiatives, cutting across thematic areas, methods, and political coalitions. Collectively, they suggest increasing awareness that complex multilateral agreements need relentless follow-up efforts to become a reality. Some initiatives may fail, but through sheer volume of ideas and effort, others will have an impact. (Helpfully, the UN has created a digital registry of all initiatives under the Platform for Action.)”

As the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) reviews and ultimately comments on the results of Seville:

“UN Member States have approved the outcome document of the Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development (FfD4) and transmitted it to the Conference for adoption. The ‘Compromiso de Sevilla’ recognizes the annual financing for development (FfD) gap of USD 4 trillion and launches “an ambitious package of reforms and actions to close this financing gap with urgency,” while catalyzing sustainable development investments at scale.”

The reality is that it is not the number of initiatives – as striking as they may appear to be – and the result here is 130 initiatives, but it is as the Zambian UN ambassador is quoted as saying, how much implementation of these initiatives occurs.

There are a multitude of initiatives notwithstanding the UN faces a $USD 4 trillion gap. And there is growing recognition of a deep financing crisis at its many institutions. As a result of UN80 the Secretary General Antonio Guterres has been seeking a 20 percent reduction in its workforce and consolidations wherever possible.. As Colum Lynch of Devex made clear:

“The U.N.’s financial future just got worse.

For weeks, the world body’s leadership has been plotting out plans for slashing funding and downsizing its workforce by at least 20%.”

“But the recent passage of a law clawing back more than $1 billion in U.S. funding to the United Nations for everything from peacekeepers to human rights promotion and nutritional supplements for children in conflict zones has made it clear it will have to dig deeper. And it coincides with a State Department announcement on Tuesday that the U.S is withdrawing from UNESCO.”

“The White House “rescissions” — provisions to cancel congressionally appropriated funds — would cut more than $361 million in funding for U.N. peacekeeping missions in Lebanon and the Democratic Republic of Congo, ballooning Washington’s already whopping peacekeeping arrears to about $1.8 billion, according to Better World Campaign. The U.N. maintains that the U.S. is legally obligated to pay its full share of peacekeeping costs.”

“A proposed House budget for fiscal year 2026 that is making its way through the House appropriations committee envisions even deeper cuts, capping peacekeeping funding at about $560 million, a roughly 54% cut from 2025. The funding for international organizations would drop from about $1.54 billion to $310.2 million. It would also prohibit funding for several U.N. agencies that are unpopular among Republicans, including UN Human Rights and the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East.” …

“The package also targets another critical funding account, the international organizations and programs account, with over $450 million in voluntary U.S. funding for UNICEF ($142 million), the U.N. Development Programme ($81.5 million), UN Human Rights ($17.5 million) and the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs ($3.5 million).”

The Trump administration’s latest action, as just noted above, is to announce that it is leaving UNESCO. As described by Lynch:

“In announcing its decision to leave UNESCO, a State Department spokesperson said the Paris-based agency’s recognition of the “State of Palestine” ran “contrary to U.S. policy” and contributed to anti-Israel rhetoric. The spokesperson also accused UNESCO of advancing “divisive social and cultural causes” at odds with the “America First” foreign policy.””

And as Lynch further points out these cuts and terminations have occurred before:

“The cuts are being imposed before the U.S. has even concluded its own long-awaited 180-day review of U.S. contributions to international organizations, and before Mike Waltz, president Trump’s nominee to lead the U.S. delegation at the U.N., has been confirmed by Congress and begins his work.”

So where does that leave the UN when it comes to trying to achieve the critical SDGs, Agenda 2030, the UN’s global development strategy:

“The 10th Edition of the Sustainable Development Report published just this past June features the updated SDG Index and Dashboards, which assess and rank all UN Member States on their performance across the 17 Sustainable Development Goals. It also introduces a new SDGi Index, focused on 17 headline indicators to measure overall SDG progress since 2015.”

“Despite these important gains”, as described by António Guterres Secretary-General of the United Nations, “conflicts, climate chaos, geopolitical tensions and economic shocks continue to obstruct progress at the pace and scale needed to meet the 2030 target. This year’s Sustainable Development Goals Report finds that only 35 per cent of SDG targets are on track or making moderate progress. Nearly half are moving too slowly and, alarmingly, 18 per cent are in reverse. We face a global development emergency.”

“Over 800 million people are trapped in extreme poverty and hunger. Carbon dioxide levels are at the highest in over two million years, and 2024 was the hottest year on record, surpassing the 1.5°C threshold. Peace and security have worsened, with over 120 million people forced from their homes, more than double the number in 2015. Meanwhile, debt servicing costs in low- and middle-income countries reached a record $1.4 trillion, squeezing resources needed for sustainable development.”

Likely all the nations will soldier on for the next five years at the UN trying to achieve the 17 goals. But let me make a suggestion. If implementation is the measure of success, maybe the preferred strategy for completing Agenda 2030 is to identify a priority group of SDG goals – a little like a return to the MDGs – but in this case say five goals. Then having chosen the ‘priority five’ the UN and all the members then put their collective energies on reaching the targets for those five goals. I would further suggest that the UN members choose, and then focus on this subset of five priority goals based, it seems to me, on those critical five where the data is most available and complete across all the members. The ‘priority five’ could enable national actors to track and report on implementation. Success could possibly then breed success. And if the UN and the national actors could accept that there was overreach with the 17 targets and Agenda 2030 – and course correct, well maybe success is still possible.

Anyway it’s a thought.

Epilogue: ProJune 26, 2025, marks 80 years since the signing of the UN Charter. The UN Secretary-General launched the UN80 Initiative to modernize the organization and address emerging global challenges.

This Post first appeared as a Substack Post at Alan’s Newsletter. https://globalsummitryproject.substack.com/p/crisis-and-reform-at-the-un

Rising BRICSAM

'Breaking' Knowledge, Information and Commentary on Rising BRICSAM and Global Governance Summitry

UN at 80

Glancing Back; But Also Looking Forward

The Fate of the SDGs and indeed Global Development

The Confusing New Global Order

Faltering Multilateralism Continues

Turning Back to Middle Powers – The Contrasting Character of Middle Powers?

Looking Again at Middle Powers – but first ‘Plastics Forever’

Can we foresee Middle Power Action in a World of Geopolitical Tensions?

The Active, Indeed Very Active, World of the ‘B… in Chief’

Crisis and Reform at the UN