1 for 8 Billion says the race for the UN’s top job remains vulnerable to opaque political bargaining.
A new report published by the advocacy group 1 for 8 Billion sheds light on how some past candidates for UN Secretary-General have likely engaged in backroom deals with powerful member states to secure the global body’s top job, potentially undermining the credibility and independence of the office.
It is a phenomenon that, according to Ben Donaldson, an advisor to 1 for 8 Billion and co-author of the report, is “widely assumed and suspected.” However, Donaldson said the general public and some “incredibly frustrated” diplomats interviewed in the report have little idea of how it all works.
Through “more than 40 interviews with former diplomats, candidates from previous races and former senior officials,” the report presents “credible allegations” that suggest “all five permanent (P5) members of the Security Council have unduly compromised the independence of candidates over the course of the UN’s history.”
As the race for the next secretary-general heats up, it is likely that history, of trading influence and power for votes for a spot at the top, is “highly likely” given “past practices,” Donaldson said in a phone interview. He spoke with Envoy over the phone. While some candidates have committed to break away from past practices and maintain the independence of the office, not all of them have.
According to the report, many of these murky tradeoffs surface around the appointment of senior UN officials, creating “de facto monopolies on top UN jobs for nationals of certain countries” to safeguard a member state’s status within the system, especially among the P5, which includes the United Kingdom, China, Russia, the United States and France.
Over the years, several of the UN’s most powerful senior posts have come to be associated with nationals of P5 countries: French nationals have led UN peacekeeping continuously since 1997; British nationals have held the top humanitarian affairs job since 2007, apart from interim arrangements; and US nationals have led political affairs since 2007.
According to Donaldson, former candidates who spoke with him off the record said the discussions around these requests “won’t be vulgar” as in “you give me this, I give you that type thing, but it will be a clear sort of indication of where the red lines are” from the member state.
This practice, also known as “ring-fencing,” dates back decades. In 1971, the Austrian Kurt Waldheim, the UN’s fourth secretary-general, presumably to secure China’s favor, created the post of under-secretary-general for political affairs, trusteeship, and decolonization and filled it with a Chinese national. Likewise, in 1996, Kofi Annan, a Ghanaian diplomat and the seventh secretary-general, accepted a request from France that a French national be appointed head of peacekeeping in return for support for Annan’s candidacy.
According to the report, in 2006, the UN’s eighth top diplomat, South Korean Ban Ki-moon, honored a US request to appoint an American national to a senior political role in exchange for US support. The report also alleges that the Portuguese incumbent Secretary-General António Guterres appointed a Spaniard as his senior policy advisor at Spain’s behest during his candidacy. At that time, Spain was one of the Council’s 10 non-permanent members. Guterres is set to leave office at the end of this year.
Still, not all candidates have succumbed to the asymmetric pressures that can build during the selection process. In 1961, the Burmese diplomat U Thant rejected a request to appoint a French national as his chef de cabinet or chief of staff. According to the report, Thant asserted that he would not be dictated to regarding appointments. France eventually dropped its demand, and Thant went on to serve as the UN’s third secretary-general for two terms.
When asked during the daily press briefing in New York about Guterres’ alleged deal with Spain, UN spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric said, “We don’t have any comment on these reports, all tied to the incoming election, which we are not involved in.”
Notably, it is widely accepted that decades of alleged quid pro quos between candidates and member states, especially among the P5, have established a status quo that affords these nations a comfortable monopoly on certain senior-level UN positions. According to the report, a US national has held the post of under-secretary-general for political and peacebuilding affairs continuously since 2007, five consecutive French nationals have served as the under-secretary-general of peace operations, four Chinese have headed the UN department of economic and social affairs, the last six UN emergency relief coordinators have been British, and since 1993 a Russian has led the UN’s offices in Geneva or Vienna.
In a podcast interview, before stepping down as the UN’s emergency relief coordinator, Martin Griffiths described these quid pro quos as being part of “a very strange system.” The role of emergency coordinator “is too crucial a job to be left to favoritism,” he added.
Relatedly, in a separate interview, Griffiths’ successor, Tom Fletcher, spoke of the “hyper-transactional” relationships he has with some of his “most principled donors”— beyond the secretary-general elections— who promise more money for the office for the coordination of humanitarian affairs but on certain conditions. He added that one donor said, “We’d like to do more, but can we have a one-to-one after the meeting? We want these three jobs, and we’re not happy that we’re not getting enough jobs in your organisation,” Fletcher added.
These practices also undermine UN reform efforts, at a time when the organization faces a raging financial and credibility crisis. “If a candidate enters office owing favors, having to make accommodations to P5 countries with respect to top jobs, that kind of freezes the bureaucracy in place,” Donaldson said. It is how the powerful maintain the status quo.
Renewed Pressure, or a Break with the Status Quo?
Meanwhile, given the tight-lipped nature of these negotiations, it is unclear how the six candidates running to be the next secretary-general are navigating these political pressures and expectations behind the scenes. Through public dialogues, only four of the current crop of hopefuls, including Michelle Bachelet, María Fernanda Espinosa, Rebeca Grynspan, and Carolyn Rodrigues Birkett, have pledged to uphold 1 for 8 Billion’s Principles for Integrity in UN secretary-general Campaigns, which, among other commitments to promote transparency in the selection process, calls for candidates to be independent “from member states, including with respect to appointments to senior posts.”
The remaining two candidates, Rafael Grossi and Macky Sall, have not made the same public commitment; however, Grossi, during his three-hour interactive dialogue at UN headquarters in New York in April, described the principles as “common sense.”
The pressure that comes with the selection process – ultimately decided by the P5 – can be difficult for the candidates, added Donaldson. “This is why the emphasis of the report is on scrutinizing the practice of powerful countries,” he said. “The power asymmetry is so extreme that candidates have an incredibly difficult tightrope to walk in order to try and get their candidacy over the finish line it’s also why we’re calling for states and civil society to support candidate independence by mobilizing against backroom dealmaking.”
However, according to Rita French, the director of policy and diplomatic engagement at Article 109, an international nonprofit coalition working with member states to update the UN Charter, some candidates have recently “faced not-so “backroom” pressure.” She noted how Michelle Bachelet “received a very public, and very hostile reaction from US officials over her stance on reproductive rights.”
Although not formally announced, there is reason to believe that the informal meetings between the Security Council and the candidates will take place later this summer. Then, at some point in July, the straw polling process – an informal voting procedure that determines the Security Council’s candidate – is expected.
The lack of clarity around the nomination process is “emblematic of the way the Security Council works,” said Donaldson. “This is my frustration,” he added. “Nobody knows what’s going on, which is how these types of shady deals are allowed to go unchecked.”
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