Save the UN

A call to protect and reform the United Nations before its credibility disappears — and with it, the fragile structure of international order.

1. The UN’s Purpose Was Never Utopia

The United Nations was not built to deliver heaven on earth. It was created from the ashes of the Second World War to stop the slide back into chaos. It is not a perfect mechanism — it is a necessary one. It exists to keep nations talking when everything else is falling apart.

“The United Nations was not created to take mankind to heaven, but to save humanity from hell.”
— Dag Hammarskjöld

Those words are not decorative. They are the reason the UN exists. It is a firewall against disaster — not a stairway to paradise.

2. A Flawed Institution With Real Impact

For decades, the UN has been criticized — sometimes rightly — for its bureaucracy, its compromises, its failures to act decisively. But critics often overlook what the UN prevents rather than what it announces. Its greatest victories are the headlines that never had to be written:

• Diplomatic standoffs quietly defused before they became wars.
• Humanitarian aid delivered in the middle of complex conflicts.
• Vaccination campaigns, refugee protections, and disaster coordination that saved millions of lives.

The UN is not a symbol — it is a network of treaties, mechanisms, peacekeeping forces, agencies, and dialogue platforms. If it collapses, there is no replacement waiting in the wings.

3. Why the Current System No Longer Works

The world of 1945 is gone. Yet the UN’s power structure, especially in the Security Council, reflects the geopolitical landscape of a bygone era. Five permanent members — with veto power — dominate decision-making even as global power has shifted dramatically.

Regions with enormous populations, resources, and strategic weight — particularly Africa and much of Asia — remain sidelined. The result is an institution increasingly out of step with the realities it is meant to govern.

4. Three Urgent Reforms to Protect the UN

4.1 Expand the Security Council to Reflect Today’s World

The Security Council must be rebalanced. At minimum:

• Add two permanent seats for Africa, recognizing a continent of over 1.4 billion people and rising strategic weight.
• Add three permanent seats for Asia, reflecting the demographic and economic center of gravity of the 21st century.

This is not charity. It is about aligning the institution with geopolitical reality. An unrepresentative Security Council is a weakened Security Council.

4.2 Enforce the UN Charter in the Security Council

A state that violates the UN Charter — through aggression, occupation, or systematic obstruction of UN resolutions — must not be allowed to shape the very decisions intended to uphold the Charter.

You cannot be both arsonist and firefighter at the same time.

4.3 Remove the Veto

The veto is a relic of a world dominated by five powers. It has become less a safeguard than a weapon — used to paralyze the Council at the very moments it is needed most.

Removing or strictly limiting the veto is essential to restore the credibility and functionality of the UN system. No single nation should have the ability to block collective action to stop war crimes, aggression, or threats to peace.

5. The Cost of Doing Nothing

If the UN continues to drift toward irrelevance, the vacuum will be filled not by cooperation — but by raw power. Great powers will act without restraint. Smaller states will seek protection in exclusive blocs or arms races. International law will become a matter of convenience rather than a shared framework.

History tells us what happens when diplomacy collapses: the strong dominate, the weak suffer, and the world burns.

“The United Nations was not created to take mankind to heaven — but to protect it from going to hell.” — Dag Hammarskjöld

6. Save It — Or Lose the Last Guardrail

To save the UN is not to romanticize it. It is to recognize its role as the last fragile guardrail against a return to a brutal world of unrestrained conflict. Reform is not optional — it is existential.

The choice is not between a perfect UN and no UN at all. The choice is between an imperfect forum for peace — and no forum at all.