The multilateral system is currently experiencing a profound crisis that is both financial and political: a simultaneous contraction of resources, political commitment, and strategic consensus.
Erosion of commitment to the principles enshrined in the United Nations (UN) Charter by some key member states has accelerated dramatically over the last year. This has ominous implications in terms of threats to peace and security, and the civilian impact if and when those threats become real. The international aid effort has similarly suffered major setbacks. Official Development Assistance (ODA) levels in 2025 are expected to be 9-17 percent lower than in 2024, and further reductions are anticipated in 2026. Many aid actors and governments are reeling from the impact of these dramatic cuts, including the UN System.
While “UN reform” has been a perennial topic almost since 1945, the issue has taken on an added sense of urgency given the climate. Accordingly, the UN Secretary-General launched a new round of reforms in early 2025. The “UN80” Initiative (and its 3rd Workstream on “Changing Structures and Realigning Programmes” in particular) addresses questions of organization, roles, and responsibilities across the full gamut of UN actors. The proposals contained in the UN80 package follow almost a decade of active reform efforts.
This paper focuses primarily on the UN development system—an area where this Secretary-General has arguably had the greatest success in introducing profound system-wide changes at the UN. These reforms constitute one of the most consequential institutional reconfigurations of the UN development pillar in decades and now represent a core asset on which future reforms can build. UN80 is a critical opportunity to consolidate the advances of recent years, identify where and why progress on some aspects has been slow, and rethink the approach to these components.
