Defining the World’s Toughest Job

A global survey on the next UN Secretary-General

By Cherisse Bovell, Lewis Broadway, Harshani Dharmadasa, and Ishaan Shah

The selection of the next UN Secretary-General is typically a process shaped by UN Member States, power politics, and backroom deals.

But the race for the 10th Secretary-General is unfolding at a time when the pressures shaping global cooperation are being felt sharply everywhere — especially in countries whose populations are the youngest, are growing the fastest, and will live the longest with the consequences of today’s decisions. For these so-called young countries, the questions are not abstract but immediate and practical: Can the UN system function as the platform where the world comes together to tackle shared challenges and advance stability, opportunity, and cooperation in ways that make a real difference in people’s lives? And what should young people expect from the Secretary-General, who has outsized influence on the answer to that question?

Through the UN Foundation’s Our Future Agenda program, we launched a global survey to bridge the expectations gap between the race for the Secretary-General’s role and the people who will be most affected by how it is filled. The aim is to bring a clearer line of sight between one of the most consequential leadership decisions in the multilateral system and the lived realities of people everywhere.

Within weeks, more than 2,000 young people have participated from around the world. Early responses provide a clear signal, including:

• Respondents in Africa and Asia have strong interests in the outcome, reflecting where demographic weight, economic transition, and political expectation are concentrated and where the stakes of global cooperation — on jobs, political stability, the climate crisis, and access to opportunity — are defining conditions of daily life.

• Leaders will be judged more by their ability to navigate trade-offs, build trust across divisions, and deliver concrete outcomes that people can see in their daily lives than by their background and experience.

• The role needs to extend beyond managing immediate crises to shaping a stable and predictable future.

• How a leader operates under pressure and how the leader manages competing demands, sustains trust, and maintains direction in a system under strain will matter more than the leader’s personality, regional balance, or political feasibility.

If you are interested in sharing the survey across your networks or integrating it into your work, we welcome your engagement. Please reach out to the authors at info@ourfutureagenda.org to explore collaboration.

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About the Survey

The survey was launched in February and runs through August, with a global reach across all five UN regions. It is designed as an interactive digital consultation combining polling with open-ended questions. Findings will be shared at key events (such as the ECOSOC Youth Forum, organized by the UN Economic and Social Council), reflected in a youth-led open letter, and incorporated into a final report that will be shared with the 10th Secretary-General, setting out a clear baseline of youth expectations at the start of the Secretary-General’s tenure.

About Our Future Agenda

Our Future Agenda is a United Nations Foundation program dedicated to putting young people — especially from young countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America — at the heart of global decision-making and solving the world’s biggest challenges.

Learn more: www.ourfutureagenda.org