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Mark Magnier

It is financially strapped, structurally flawed, infamously bureaucratic, reputationally damaged and riven with infighting.
So why would anyone want to take on the role of the next secretary general of the United Nations?
“I really think there should be some sort of psychiatric test for wanting this position,” said Richard Gowan, global issues and institutions director at the International Crisis Group (ICG). “The stakes are exceptionally high, and there is a strong sense around the UN that the next secretary general may make or break the organisation.”
The official start of the race to become the 10th UN chief in the organisation’s eight-decade history is under way, at an existential time for an organisation framed by noble ideals but dragged down by bickering and human failings.
While in theory the choice is made by its 193 member states, the real power is with the five permanent members of the UN Security Council (P5). The archaic several-month process that officially kicked off late last month includes secret ballots on coloured paper, with the largest voices going to major donors Beijing and Washington.


Once the P5 reaches a consensus, the others generally go along with it, and the new secretary general is usually in place for the five-year term by year’s end.
As member states assess which candidate will best protect their interests, the gossip-infused UN obsesses over every twist, which candidate is ahead, whether late entries will emerge, and what clues can be gleaned from the vague Chinese utterances and blunt American declarations.
“It’s everyone’s favourite parlour game around the UN,” said Elizabeth Cousens, president and chief executive of the UN Foundation, a civic group. “Every secretary general election is unpredictable, but this one comes at a particularly unpredictable time geopolitically.”
Shaping the selection is a concerning dilemma. Even as the Iran war rages, artificial intelligence upends societies and humanitarian crises intensify, UN peacekeeping has faltered and aid funding is drying up.
That ideally demands a strong, visionary leader capable of guiding the unwieldy global community through painful restructuring. But getting Washington and Beijing, along with Moscow, Paris and London, to agree – each with its red lines, parochial interests and rivalries – suggests a minimally objectionable candidate will prevail. Hardly the recipe for success.
“They’re all grey mouses of the system,” said one UN insider. “A lot of secretary generals have come in, made promises, moved a few deckchairs and lost their political capital.”
The hope, analysts say, is that a non-offensive winner finds their backbone once in office, as happened with past heads Dag Hammarskjold and U Thant.
Current Secretary General Antonio Guterres, who promised a “surge in diplomacy for peace” during his selection, has emerged as a cautious leader largely focused on humanitarian relief.
Critics also say he failed to seriously tackle cost-cutting, including expensive private school stipends and business-class travel.
While he is credited with forging a Russia-Ukraine Black Sea grain initiative in 2022, it was more in response to conflict than resolving the conflict itself, admittedly not an easy task.
One indication of the daunting challenges is the number of candidates, just seven compared to 13 at this stage in 2016, including some not supported by their home country. One withdrew after just two weeks; another just joined.
By UN convention, it “should” be a woman and the “turn” of someone from Latin America and the Caribbean, although these are not rules.
China has held its cards close, other than signalling support for women and Global South candidates.
“To sum up, commitment to the UN Charter, outstanding competency, integrity, impartiality, and the initiative to take responsibility,” Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said in New York in May, outlining the characteristics needed for China’s preference.

What does Beijing seek?
Analysts say Beijing wants a candidate who will support more Chinese in top UN jobs, including China’s growing UN peacekeeping role, and back further integration of its Belt and Road Initiative, as well as its global security, development and civilisation initiatives into the UN architecture.
“The Chinese don’t want the UN interfering in their business, but the UN has been really meek on most things in the Asia-Pacific for quite a while,” Gowan said.
“They certainly don’t want anyone who presses them on their human rights record. That’s a given.”
The administration of US President Donald Trump, meanwhile, is looking for someone who is compliant with its unilateral approach to foreign policy, can improve the UN’s poor record on conflict resolution and can champion its aggressive financial reform agenda.
Washington’s US$4 billion arrears for core and peacekeeping operations, nearly half that budget, have sparked the UN’s crisis.
“Similar to China, the US has very entrenched interests on the world stage and doesn’t want the next secretary general to present themselves as someone who’s standing in the way,” said Daniel Forti, ICG’s UN affairs director.
“The Trump administration sees it as a ‘my way or the highway’ approach.”


US partiality is further fuelled by China hawks, Maga lawmakers and US social interest groups.
“The secretary general sets a tone,” Stefano Gennarini, vice-president with the conservative Centre for Family and Human Rights advocacy group, testified in Congress. “It’s fundamentally important that UN officials do not interfere in internal political debates about abortion or other controversial social policies.”
US-China interests overlap, however, in favouring serious structural transformation, even if Beijing talks in upbeat generalities and lets the US espouse brutal reform. Given the US’ responsibility for 22 per cent of the general budget and China’s for 20 per cent, every candidate has at least nodded to restructuring in their platforms.
“Many countries, including China, were thinking along the same lines anyway – that these reforms are way, way, way overdue,” said Dan Negrea, US ambassador to the UN Economic and Social Council.
Another change from past leadership transitions is that the Trump administration cares less than its predecessors did, giving China more opportunities in soft power.
“The US burned so many bridges, and China has taken over so completely and cleverly,” said Marc Limon, executive director, Universal Rights Group. “They’re not at loggerheads, but I don’t think they’re working together partly because the US is just useless. They think they can shout and everyone will do what they want.”
But both seem keen to avoid the selection process dragging on, given the Iran war, the energy crisis, economic problems and other pressing issues.
This contrasts with 1996, when the US vetoed the re-election of Egypt’s Boutros Boutros-Ghali against China’s wishes, ultimately resulting in Ghana’s Kofi Annan. And in 1981, after the Washington-supported Nazi-tainted Kurt Waldheim stood for an unprecedented third term, Beijing balked. That led to 16 contentious rounds of voting before Peru’s Javier Perez de Cuellar was picked as a compromise candidate.
Seven candidates in running
This year’s seven declared candidates include Michelle Bachelet, Chile’s former president and a former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights; Costa Rica’s Rebeca Grynspan, secretary general of the UN Conference on Trade and Development; and Rafael Mariano Grossi, a long-time Argentinian diplomat who heads the International Atomic Energy Agency.
The others are Macky Sall, Senegal’s former president; Maria Fernanda Espinosa Garces, Ecuador’s former defence and foreign minister and the UN’s former General Assembly head; Carolyn Rodrigues Birkett, Guyana’s former foreign minister; and late entrant Olara Otunnu, Uganda’s former UN undersecretary general.

Five are from the Latin American and Caribbean region; four are women, and each has varied expertise, whether in human rights, global development, security and financial reform or small-state diplomacy.
Washington is generally seen as favouring Grossi given his ties to far-right Argentina. Some expect China to oppose Bachelet; others argue that Beijing appreciated her handling of Xinjiang as human rights head.
Betting app Kalshi gives Grynspan a 49 per cent chance of winning, compared to 42 per cent for Grossi and 8 per cent for Bachelet.
Trump’s long record as a showman has also spurred speculation that he could try and force through a preferred candidate using US funding leverage or pre-empt the process by announcing a winner at the G20 summit in Miami in mid-December to grab the credit and limelight.
Trump already floated Swiss football administrator Gianni Infantino for the job after he gave the attention-grabbing president a “Fifa peace prize”.
Expect stereotypes and sniping as race heats up
Amid the manoeuvring has come catty UN backbiting. That female candidates will not be respected handling security portfolios. That “woke” candidates will not survive Trump’s onslaught. That certain ages or religions are not ideal. That candidates who remain in their UN jobs while campaigning should be excluded.
The next leader will confront huge challenges. The UN has some 40,000 active tasks, reports, panels and working groups, many involving crises long since over, across 400 intergovernmental bodies, requiring some 27,000 meetings a year. UN initiatives are easy to launch but difficult to kill.
They also must grapple with two of the P5 – the United States and Russia – violating the UN Charter prohibiting use of force against another state, as Washington embraces “America first” policies.
And they will also face a World War II-era P5 that is badly out of step with the current geopolitical landscape, as India, Japan, Brazil, Nigeria and others clamour to join.
Under the selection process, candidates for the US$227,000 annual position are nominated to the Security Council and General Assembly, followed by interviews, town halls, visits to major capitals and several informal “straw polls” to gauge the preferences of Security Council members.
The first of these was held on July 30 and showed Grynspan as the early front-runner, followed by Rodrigue Birkett – with Grossi in third place.

“It’s supposed to be confidential, but they never are,” Gowan said. “It’s often out before the diplomats get back to their mission to write them up.”
These continue until one candidate gets nine of the 15 Security Council votes without a P5 veto, at which point the General Assembly can, in theory, reject them, although it never has.
The next winner of this poisoned chalice faces daunting odds and will need huge amounts of tact, wisdom, muscle and luck, analysts say.
“If they don’t use this crisis to make changes, then the UN will collapse,” Limon said.
“Like the League of Nations, people want to do good. But a lot of people earn ridiculous wages, golden handcuffs, and they don’t want to change.”
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Illustration: Henry Wong

Foreign Minister Wang Yi has said China expects “competency, integrity and impartiality” from the next UN secretary general. Photo: Reuters 

Candidates for the position of UN secretary general (from left) Michelle Bachelet, Maria Fernanda Espinosa Garces, Rafael Mariano Grossi, Rebeca Grynspan, Carolyn Rodrigues Birkett and Macky Sall take part in an event at the UN headquarters in New York last month. Photo: dpa

Rafael Mariano Grossi, a long-time Argentinian diplomat, is said to have Washington’s support for the UN’s top job. Photo: Reuters

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US Ambassador to the UN Mike Waltz told the House Foreign Affairs Committee in Washington on Wednesday that China’s UN missions also “serve a dual purpose as eyes and ears on the ground”. Photo: Reuters

US President Donald Trump was called “a peace president” by Waltz during a Congressional hearing in Washington on Wednesday that descended into a heated partisan battle over the Iran war. Photo: EPA

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Former national security adviser Mike Waltz testifying during his confirmation hearing before the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee to be ambassador to the United Nations on Tuesday. Photo: EPA

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Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres after chairing a Security Council high-level meeting in New York on Tuesday. Photo: Xinhua

Wang Yi chairing the UN Security Council’s high-level meeting on “practising multilateralism, reforming and improving global governance” on Tuesday. Photo: Xinhua

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A strong, visionary leader is needed as next secretary general as Iran war rages during one of most ‘unpredictable times geopolitically’


A strong, visionary leader is needed as next secretary general as Iran war rages during one of most ‘unpredictable times geopolitically’.


.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}A strong, visionary leader is needed as next secretary general as Iran war rages during one of most ‘unpredictable times geopolitically’

A strong, visionary leader is needed as next secretary general as Iran war rages during one of most ‘unpredictable times geopolitically’