Is the United Nations still relevant?

Is the UN still relevant? I'll gather current evidence on its role and challenges to assess its standing.

The United Nations is still relevant - but its relevance is uneven, contested, and increasingly questioned as it turns 80 in 2025-2026.

The debate is not whether the UN does anything, but whether it can do what it was created to do: maintain international peace and security and provide legitimate global governance.

Arguments That It Is Still Relevant

1. Humanitarian and development system - irreplaceable at scale

According to the United Nations 2025 Annual Report, over 70% of global humanitarian aid and peacekeeping efforts are coordinated through UN agencies .

In 2024 alone the UN:

Its agencies remain central:

Peacekeeping: The first UN peacekeeping operation was established in 1948 and today more than 68,000 civilian, military, and police personnel are posted at 11 missions. Despite withdrawals like Mali, operations continue to protect hundreds of thousands of civilians daily, including in South Sudan, Lebanon, Syria and Abyei.

2. Normative and diplomatic relevance

The UN's true power lies in norm entrepreneurship — institutionalizing principles of human rights (UDHR, 1948), gender equality, and climate justice (Paris Agreement, 2015). It remains a forum of moral legitimacy and symbol of multilateral hope.

If turning up is what matters, the sheer popularity of the forum with world leaders is a clear indicator that the United Nations is widely viewed to be politically relevant. Its more than 190 member states are sending representatives to New York for the 80th session of the General Assembly, the vast majority sending heads of state.

3. Global public opinion still favorable

A median of 61% of adults across the surveyed countries have a favorable view of the UN, and 32% have an unfavorable view, according to Pew Research Center's 2025 Global Attitudes Survey of 25 countries. Earlier data showed 58% favorability worldwide entering the Trump administration, rising to 61% in 2025 - the biggest year-over-year increase in over two decades.

Arguments That It Is Becoming Irrelevant

1. Security Council paralysis

The most cited reason for declining relevance is the veto. The repeated use of the veto has sparked criticism among member nations over the relevance of the international organisation. The veto has allowed the P5 members to wield disproportionate powers, thereby creating an unrepresentative structure.

The UNSC still reflects the power distribution of 1945, dominated by the P5 (U.S., U.K., France, Russia, China) while emerging powers like India, Brazil, Germany, and South Africa remain excluded.

Commentators argue this has real consequences:

> The United Nations is now 80, and its long slide toward irrelevance appears unstoppable. The design of the Security Council has become a recipe for paralysis

> The UN's slide into near-irrelevance continues unabated

The repeated failures of the United Nations in preventing conflicts such as Ukraine, Gaza, and Sudan along with veto paralysis have raised doubts about its effectiveness in the 21st century.

UN mediation is in crisis: in Gaza and Ukraine, the option to appoint a UN Special Envoy isn't even on the table.

When measured by its ability to deliver impactful, material solutions to the most critical global problems, the United Nations’ relevance looks far worse.

2. Legitimacy and hypocrisy deficit

> The most fundamental challenge to the relevance of the United Nations is intimately linked to perceptions of its legitimacy. For many, this has been irretrievably compromised

Critics point to Russia violating Ukraine's sovereignty, China refusing to condemn it, and the United States providing seemingly unconditional support for Israel’s actions in Gaza. This erodes the institution's most central role, which is to ascribe or deny legitimacy to the use of force.

The UN has also been criticized for putting human rights abusers on bodies meant to protect them, failing to stand up to China over COVID-19 origins, and running on a global spoils system rather than merit.

3. Financial and bureaucratic crisis

The UN stumbles under financial arrears of more than USD 5 billion, paralysis in its Security Council and growing reliance on mini-lateral groupings. The United Nations’ ability to tackle climate change, global health risks, humanitarian disasters, technological change, and longer-term development goals is shrinking, and it is shrinking rapidly, particularly after the U.S. - the driving force behind the UN's creation and its biggest funder - has distanced itself, withdrawing from the Paris Agreement and the WHO and putting caps on peacekeeping contributions.

Former CFR President Richard Haass argues the annual leaders' gathering is less important for what the UN does (which is little in preventing or ending wars) than for what it provides, namely a venue for bilateral meetings - "Davos for diplomats".

Is Reform Possible?

Almost everyone agrees reform is needed, but structural change is blocked because any change would be opposed by at least one of the five current permanent members, which is why no meaningful change is ever likely to materialize.

Attempts are underway:

Proposals include expanding permanent and non-permanent membership to include the Global South, introducing assessed contributions for new domains, and building real-time crisis response units leveraging AI.

Conclusion: Relevant but Constrained

As Kofi Annan wrote, “The UN is humanity’s imperfect instrument of hope”.

Most experts quoted by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs in 2025 conclude: The case for multilateralism is stronger than ever. But, for better or worse, it will have to take place largely outside the UN unless the UN is reformed.