Over 130 United Nations member states convened in New York City Sunday and Monday for a long-anticipated Summit of the Future  that aimed to press the “reset button” on stalled global development goals and polarized geopolitical debate.

The event, held  just ahead of the annual debate in the U.N. General Assembly, kicked off with the adoption of the “Pact for the Future,” alongside two key annexes: a “Global Digital Compact” and the “Declaration of Future Generations.”

The non-binding declarations cover the world’s most critical global issues, including: peace and security, sustainable development, climate change, digital cooperation, human rights, gender equality, and empowering youth and future generations.

The pact outlines 56 specific “actions” that member states need to take, underscoring the growing complexity of threats to global peace, highlighting the dangers of nuclear conflict, and confirming the core principles of the United Nations.

A central promise of the pact is accelerating progress on the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which aspire to universal healthcare access, the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger, the promotion of gender equality, climate and environmental sustainability and the expansion of education worldwide.

“With so much dividing us and with so many wars going on, I think we can salute yesterday’s agreement and that we came together and be able to agree on ambitious targets,” said Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre, speaking at Monday’s session.

“The pact for the future provides a vision for this across all the UN’s three main pillars that should be solutions… First, we have reaffirmed our commitment to international law, including human rights… Those who deliberately breach it must be held accountable.”

Address climate change and transform energy systems

“Second, we urgently need to address climate change, cut emissions, transform our energy systems and protect the environment,” he said, noting that addressing climate also requires increasing climate finance and investments and providing provide sufficient and timely debt relief to deeply indebted low- and middle-income countries.

The pact also calls for the global community to work towards an inclusive, open and secure digital future for all, he noted, pointing out that “some 2.6 billion people remain excluded from the digital world. For too many people also they lack access to electricity.”

Finally, he called for “preventive diplomacy and peace building” to be at the center of global efforts on sustainable development, including “a more transparent, inclusive and effective Security Council with great limitations to the use of veto,” as well as a greater presence of under-represented groups in global governance.

Is this pact a genuine path forward, or is it another lofty rhetoric exercise?

Despite the bright notes, many critics question the real-world impact the pact will have, in light of the world’s geopolitical polarization and stalled progress already seen on most SDGs.

“It was great to see people clapping for the new Pact, but the lagging SDGs problem is not one of planning but rather execution.  Let’s clap louder for results,” Peter Singer, a former top advisor to Director General Tedos Adhanom Ghebreyesus, told Health Policy Watch. “That means complementing SDGs with GSD (Getting Sh*t Done): better governance, scaling innovation, and translating data into delivery.”

Only 17% of the 2015 SDG targets are on track to reach the 2030 Goals, Singer pointed out in a blog published just ahead of the Summit.

“Rather than critically examine why the SDGs are off track and support countries to overcome these obstacles, the U.N. comes up with a new list of things it wants to accomplish,” Singer continued. “But if you failed to accomplish the last thing you promised and now do not critically examine the underlying reasons for that failure, why would anyone believe you could accomplish the next big thing?

“This is the same for health as it is for every SDG.  SDGs are fought and won in countries, but the UN can start by ‘cleaning its house from the inside out.’”

Guterres hails the pact as ‘step-change’

Defying the doubters, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres hailed the adoption of the Pact for the Future, at the start of the two-day summit as a “step-change towards more effective, inclusive, networked multilateralism.

“Excellencies, throughout my life, whether as an activist or at the United Nations, I have learned that people never agree on the past. To rebuild trust, we must start from the present and look toward the future,” Guterres said.

The pact, negotiated over the past nine months, represents the fruits of a dialogue launched in 2020 as the United Nations marked its 75th anniversary with a “global conversation” on people’s hopes and fears for the future. That dialogue set the stage for what would eventually become the Summit of the Future four years later.

Guterres had long championed the need for both the summit and the pact, emphasising that global crises have exposed the urgent necessity for U.N. reform and the transformation of international financial systems. These crises include ongoing conflicts in Russia/Ukraine, Israel/Gaza, and Sudan, insufficient progress on climate change, mounting national debt, and the unregulated rise of new technologies.

“I called for this Summit because 21st-century challenges require 21st-century solutions: frameworks that are networked and inclusive, drawing on the expertise of all humanity,” Guterres said in his opening speech on Sunday “Our world is heading off the rails, and we need tough decisions to get back on track.”

Specifically, he has called for major reforms to global institutions, including changes in the structure and rules governing the 15-member U.N. Security Council, where constant vetos by Russia, China and the United States of initiatives backed by rivals have progressively weakened the clout of the global body.  Guterres has also stressed the importance of redesigning multilateral finance and developing a system of global governance over the use of artificial intelligence.

Cameroon’s Philemon Yang, President of the 79th U.N. General Assembly, echoed these sentiments as he opened the event, saying, “We stand at a crossroads of global transformation, facing unprecedented challenges that demand urgent, collective action.” He continued, “The commitments embodied in the pact and its annexes reflect the collective will of member states. They must guide our actions to promote international peace and security, accelerate the sustainable development goals, foster just and inclusive societies, and ensure technologies serve the common good of humankind. We must move forward together in a spirit of solidarity and multilateral cooperation.”

Throughout the summit’s two days of speeches and presentations, delegates discussed the pressing need for a transformed United Nations capable of addressing today’s intertwined political, social, economic, and ecological crises. Key issues raised included failing to meet sustainable development and climate change goals, rising global military expenditures, and the need for debt relief to low-income nations that cannot afford to provide basic services.

Nearly half of the world’s population live in countries spending more on debt than health or education

“Our delivery and commitments made on sustainable development and climate change have been so much less than what was committed,” said Michael D. Higgins, President of Ireland. “The failure to achieve peace, eliminate acute global poverty, hunger or the consequences of climate change and biodiversity loss have been accompanied by a return to an arms race. Last year, global military expenditure increased by 6.8% to $2.44 billion, the highest ever recorded.”

Some 3.2 billion people live in nations that spend more on debt interest payments than on essential services like education and healthcare, Higgins added. Along with gaps in basic social services, the debt burden also leaves them with insufficient resources for making capital investments in the energy transition and sustainable development.

“We need to make our international financial architecture more effective and more inclusive,” agreed Charles Michel, President of the  European Council, the European Union’s governing body.

“Developing Countries need more private and public money now. We must also tackle that problem because we cannot accept that low- and middle-income countries must choose between fighting poverty and fighting climate change. They must do both, and we must support them to do both.”

Reforms in the UN Security Council

Kuwait, meanwhile, stressed the need for reforms to the U.N. Security Council, including fairer geographic distribution of Security Council membership.

“We agree with the Secretary General when he said that it is impossible to put the future for our children and grandchildren through an order or a system that was built by our forefathers without taking into account the future of young people,” said the Crown Prince of the State of Kuwait, Sabah Al-Khalid Al-Sabah.

“We are required today to work on introducing serious and practical changes to the global economic governance system, to networks of financial security, to international tax cooperation. We must reform multilateral development banks and address the problem of sovereign debts.”

Harnessing Technology

The challenges and opportunities presented by new technologies, particularly artificial intelligence, was another topic at the center of discussion.  Member states also stressed the importance of ensuring more equitable access to digital tools essential to education, healthcare, poverty alleviation and sustainable development.

“We believe that science and technology are foundations of a sustainable environment. Therefore, we are working on the digital transformation of our economy and providing an integrated and comprehensive database to support decision-making,” said Mohammed Shia’ Al Sudani, the Prime Minister of Iraq. This requires equitable access to AI tools and the capacity to benefit from AI and other digital technologies in a “responsible and moral way” he emphasized.

Jamaica’s Prime Minister, Andrew Holness, expressed similar sentiments, adding that “admittedly, new technologies, such as artificial intelligence and robotics, create new challenges to security and some livelihoods. However, they also create important opportunities, especially for young people, and hold great potential to empower generations, transform economies, and solve complex challenges. So great is the potential, in fact, that we must emphasise the importance of international cooperation to address the challenges and harness the opportunities, especially for the benefit of people in developing countries.”

War and peace: Addressing ‘double standards’

The ongoing destruction of war in regional hotspots, particularly Ukraine and Gaza served as a grim backdrop to discussions.

Kuwait’s Al-Sabah called for ‘universal adherence’ to international law and conventions, and the elimination of double standards. He pointed to the situation in Gaza as an example of the U.N. Security Council’s failure to prevent aggression and highlighted the damaging consequences of inconsistent enforcement of international law.

He further urged the international community to prioritise reforming global governance, and to establish a more inclusive, effective, transparent, and accountable Security Council.

Qatar, a key player in the Israel-Hamas negotiations over a ceasefire in exchange for a release of Israeli hostages still held by Hamas, also referred to the Gaza conflict, stressing that development cannot be achieved without solid peace, security, and stability foundations.

“Qatar maintains its efforts in mediation to prevent and resolve conflicts in a peaceful manner,” said Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani.

“We reiterate our call to reach a ceasefire agreement and to release all hostages,” Al Thani said. “We call on the international community to take a clear and decisive stance against violations of international humanitarian law and human rights law.”

Japan, meanwhile, addressed the “increasingly dire situation” around nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation, nearly 80 years after American nuclear bombing raids on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

“No matter how difficult the path to a world without nuclear weapons may be, we cannot stop our progress,” said Japan’s Prime Minister, Fumio Kishida.

Call to action on adolescent health

Another aspect of Summit emphasis was the future of the world’s youths. And related to that, WHO issued a call on the summit margins for greater attention to the mental, sexual and reproductive health of adolescents.

“Promoting and protecting the health and rights of young people is essential to building a better future for our world,” said Tedros in one of Monday’s breakout sessions, that saw the launch of a WHO report on adolescent health.

The WHO report found that least one in seven adolescents globally now suffer from a mental disorder; close to one in 10 teenagers is obese; and sexually transmitted infections are on the rise.

“Failing to address the health threats that adolescents face – some long-standing, some emerging – will not only have serious and life-threatening consequences for young people themselves but will create spiralling economic costs,” Tedros pointed out.

He condemned efforts to restrict young people’s access to sexual and reproductive healthcare, and sex education, which he said were a result of the recent pushback against gender equality and human rights in some countries and societies.

He emphasised that policies imposing strict age limits on young people’s access to vital reproductive health services, will only boomerang, leading to more HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted infections, as well as other spiraling health impacts on societies.

There are around 1.3 billion adolescents globally today – more than ever before.

As world leaders gather at the @UN #SummitOfTheFuture, NEW research highlights critical health risks facing adolescents today https://t.co/Fswsy8Eqhc#OurCommonFuture pic.twitter.com/du05e5iTfD

— World Health Organization (WHO) (@WHO) September 23, 2024

“Adolescents are powerful and incredibly creative forces for good when they are able to shape the agenda for their wellbeing and their future,” said Rajat Khosla, executive director of the Partnership for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health, which co-hosted the launch of the WHO report. “Leaders must listen to what young people want and ensure they are active partners and decision-makers.”

Image Credits: Screenshot, UNRWA , Reproductive Health Supplies Coalition/ Unsplash.