On its 80th birthday, a strong United Nations is more vital than ever

President Donald Trump at the general debate of the 80th session of the United Nations General Assembly on September 23, 2025 (dpa picture alliance / Alamy)

As David Lammy highlighted in his speech there on Thursday, the UN this year marks the 80th anniversary of its founding. It was in London, in the ashes of the Second World War, that it met for the first time. King George VI told delegates: “In the long course of our history, no more important meeting has ever taken place within its boundaries.”

But the tone this week in New York was very different. “What is the purpose of the United Nations?” Trump challenged the delegates. “It’s not even coming close to living up to [its] potential.” And he listed a string of conflicts – from Kosovo to the Congo – where he said it was him that paved the path to peace, the UN redundant. 

Trump’s question has some merit. 80 years ago, when the purpose and principles of the UN Charter were agreed, the US Secretary of State James F. Byrnes set out his commitment and his expectation of the delegates by saying: “We must now preserve the peace by working together”. Today, we live in a world of threats to this peace, whether it’s the 59 active conflicts around the world, increasingly frequent heatwaves, droughts and floods, or the deployment of tariffs amid rising economic protectionism.

But Trump’s question is also one that we as progressives can and must answer. 

We recently spent a few days in New York as part of a parliamentary programme run by the Munich Security Conference. While the programme’s participants come from very different locations – whether India, Estonia or Guatemala – there are many similarities in our political contexts. The most significant is the rise of populist politics, which plays on people’s legitimate fears and frustrations, but responds destructively not constructively. Whether it’s a local council or the United Nations, the institutions of governance, and the laws and norms that sit behind them, are for the populists not a bringer of – but a barrier to – progress.

We have both worked with the UN and many of its bodies before we were elected. From this experience and our engagements in New York, including a meeting with the new President of the UN General Assembly, Annalena Baerbock, the following is clear.

First, while the UN institutions are far from perfect, many continue to play a crucial role. It is clear that the UN Security Council is no longer serving its intended purpose. It hasn’t passed a single resolution on Ukraine. The US has blocked resolutions for a ceasefire in Gaza. But other UN bodies are being used more effectively by member states. Just look at recent UN General Assembly resolutions on a ceasefire in Gaza, on countries’ obligations to tackle climate change, or on achieving gender equality.

Reform of the UN is clearly once again on the table, through the three tracks of the UN80 process, including proposals to restrict the use of the veto at the Security Council. We spoke to senior diplomats who said the chances of this agenda progressing are higher now than they have been in a long time. 

Second, while it’s easy to point to appalling violations of the international laws and norms that underpin the UN, many parts of the UN system, and the vast majority of its member states, have held firm in their commitment. Take, for example, the continuing moral authority and compliance from many UN member states with treaties like the Ottawa Convention on landmines. Or the 11 UN peacekeeping missions that are currently operational around the world. 

What’s more, the institutions and norms of the UN continue to provide a framework to address new challenges of this era, for example the Global Dialogue on AI Governance, which is ongoing and moving towards the negotiation stage. 

Reinforcing and reforming the UN with renewed zeal is vital

Third, while again it is imperfect, in our insecure world there remains no better vehicle for supporting and often directly delivering for millions being failed by politics; people whose frustrations the populists feed off. Whether that’s the victims and survivors of sexual violence in Sudan, for whom the UN Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict has secured their first conviction of a perpetrator. The millions of Palestinians, entirely reliant on UNRWA for basic services from education to rubbish collection. Or the one in six young people unemployed across Africa, at risk of political marginalisation and radicalisation, benefiting from UN education and skills programmes.

At a time of rising populism globally, geopolitical tension and destabilisation, reinforcing and reforming the UN with renewed zeal is vital. We know that undermining shared institutions is a well-worn chapter in the populist playbook.  Allowing them to succeed would lead us down a very dangerous path. 

The UK – as a Security Council member, the ‘penholder’ on key crises from Libya to Sudan, and an important albeit smaller donor to many UN institutions – has a leading role to play. This must be a key part of our progressive project in government, not just getting the government delivering for people here in the UK again, but working with and through the UN and other international institutions to deliver for the global peace and security on which our own peace and security depends.

Clement Attlee opened the first meeting of the UN with the words: “I hope and believe that every delegate… must come not only in a spirit of determination, but a spirit of hope.” That spirit lives on and must drive us more now than ever.

Laura Kyrke-Smith is Labour MP for Aylesbury, and Melanie Ward is Labour MP for Cowdenbeath and Kirkaldy

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