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Complex Global Shocks, Emergency Platforms, and United Nations Reform

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This Library includes publication entries by GGIN Partner institutions which are collected in the interest of promoting research and sharing knowledge. Library entries are subject to the academic integrity policies and review processes of the contributing institution. Unless otherwise noted, they are not publications of the Stimson Center, the Global Governance Information Network project, or any other partner institution.
Publication Type
Policy Brief
Contributing Institution
Global Challenges Foundation, Global Governance Innovation Network, Stimson Center, The New School: International Affairs
Availability
Full text. Item is original to GGIN (UPDATES ONLY)
Posted
6 September 2024
Authorship

Abstract

Too often when disasters strike, structural impediments as well as inadequate political will and resources deadlock and disable the United Nations (UN) from coherently and effectively responding. Recent worldwide shocks with extraordinary humanitarian impacts, notably the COVID-19 pandemic (2020-2022), the cost-of-living crisis (2022-), and Russia’s resurgent invasion of Ukraine (2022-) have prompted calls for the Organization to play a more pronounced role in coordinating aid at the same time as other demands for UN reform have looked to confront injustices in its structure and operations. In September 2021, Secretary-General (SG) António Guterres released Our Common Agenda, a package of recommendations to reinvigorate and contemporize the UN that would be realized in the September 2024 signing of the Pact for the Future and includes a proposal for “the Emergency Platform” (EP) to tackle responding to global shocks. The EP would be innovative as a vehicle directed by the Secretary-General that releases existing resources and coordinates a division of labor beyond Member States and UN agencies, incorporating a wider range of actors and capabilities. Since the SG initially sketched the EP, the idea has taken shape over the course of several rounds of negotiations and iterations of the Pact for the Future and is now known as “emergency platforms.”

This memo begins, first, by outlining the need for and mechanics of the EP tool. Second, it examines the contours of debates around the EP, enumerating criticisms that have often informed revisions in the Pact for the Future drafting process. Finally, it considers the politics and prospects for the establishment of emergency platforms. The Summit of the Future will produce an agreement, but three challenges that will determine the impact of emergency platforms will remain: trigger protocols and authority, resource commitments, and the multilateral environment. Furthermore, a review of emergency platforms processes will also be needed to track performance—not only in coherence and cooperation in responding to shocks but in determinations of what constitutes a designated “complex global shock.”

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