Reclaiming Relevance: International Geneva can only survive with new ideas and leadership
Ever since the United Nations replaced the failed League of Nations in Geneva in 1946, the Lake Geneva region has emerged as a critical global hub for humanitarian, development, health, human rights, law, refugee, conflict and other related concerns. As one observer put it: “Geneva is basically where UN organizations seek to respond to the field, while New York deals with political decision-making and peacekeeping.”
All this has now changed. Earlier this year, the Trump administration unilaterally removed the United States from the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council and World Health Organization, while placing UNESCO in Paris under review as the next UN organization to possibly lose American support.
Washington has also severely cut back on funding for key UN agencies such as the World Food Programme, UNICEF, and International Organization for Migration (IOM), inhibiting their ability to provide food relief to crisis zones or to support refugees and migrants fleeing war, human rights repression, and economic despair. Ironically, these same cuts are affecting America’s own farmers, who have traditionally relied on such programming to purchase their wheat.
Major western donors, too, have reduced their humanitarian and development budgets by shifting funds to defence, a response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. As a result, the "International Geneva" community is already losing global relevance, with the humanitarian system entering panic mode amid a worsening funding crisis. Among many UN and other aid agencies this has often prompted more concern for the saving of jobs rather than focusing on genuine reform or addressing pressing needs in the field. Numerous crisis zones, such as Sudan and Gaza, teeter on the brink of starvation.
The Palais des Nations, headquarters for the United Nations in Geneva. Will 'International Geneva' survive as a global knowledge and humanitarian action hub?
UN Photo
International Geneva: An urgent need for effective leadership - and genuine reform
At a specially convened meeting earlier this week on "International Geneva at a Turning Point: Reclaiming Purpose in a World of Rising Threats,” an expert panel explored the urgent need for new ideas, approaches, and, above all, leadership, particularly from Switzerland itself.
If this global hub of knowledge and humanitarian action is to survive in a fast-moving era, the panellists noted, it must mobilize quickly with decisions based on harsh realities. It must also streamline itself in a manner that makes itself more efficient and responsive.
Responding to the demand for more imaginative yet pragmatic solutions, Global Geneva Group, a non-profit media initiative, organized the meeting in collaboration with Swiss members of of The Explorers Club and the Geneva-based International Institute for Law, Science and Policy (IILSP).
Over 80 experienced aid specialists and concerned members of the public, including youth, attended the gathering, held at the the International Museum of the Reformation in Geneva’s Old Town, a historically important location. Situated in the recently renovated 18th-century Maison Mallet, this inspiring museum (See Global Geneva article) stands only a few hundred meters from where, in 1863, Henri Dunant helped create the International Red Cross, initiating Geneva’s role as the world’s humanitarian capital.
Greater and more imaginative flexibility is crucial
Several panellists called on both Switzerland and Geneva to provide more proactive leadership on pressing issues such as climate change and war, as well as addressing the severe financial cuts imposed by Washington and the redirection of European humanitarian funds toward military spending.
“The problem is that there is no real leadership either in Geneva or Switzerland to effect the reforms needed. There are a lot of words but little action. Unless this happens, International Geneva is going to drift into mediocrity,” maintained one humanitarian advocate at the meeting.
The Trump Administration: A threat to democracy – and international support
Charles Adams, an international lawyer and former US ambassador, opened the session by bluntly stating: “We’re dealing with a completely different world. The Trump administration has become a fascist dictatorship that is undermining everything that democracy stands for while withdrawing from traditional American responsibilities vis-à-vis the rest of the world…that’s the reality.”
Sophie Tholstrup, Director of Policy & Climate at the Vienna-based NGO Ground Truth Solutions, warned that for International Geneva to survive, “it must be prepared to listen to and act on the views of people on the frontlines of crisis.” This means addressing an increasingly multipolar world where overlapping crises dominate. Aid agencies must be “genuinely driven by demand and not the imperatives of organizational survival,” said Tholstrup, who is based in Nairobi.
“We need to value and respect local communities affected by situations such as conflict or climate change by operating with context-specific knowledge rather than a cookie-cutter package of imposed solutions,” Tholstrup emphasized. .
Tarak Bach Baouab, Head of Advocacy at Médecins sans Frontières International (MSF) in Geneva, emphasized the need to recognize shifting global dynamics, such as the rise of alternative platforms like G-20 and BRICS. “International Geneva needs to embrace change rather than rest on the ‘Old Europe’ laurels of the past 80 years,” Baouab said.
He also stressed that International Geneva must “de-westernize” its approaches and adopt a more modern form of Swiss neutrality. “This is where Switzerland’s ‘Capital of Peace’ can excel, but it needs to respond and incorporate other viewpoints and ideas,” he said.
Lithuanian volunteer cameraman Motiejus Vyšniauskas shows youth workshop participants at Geneva gathering how to manipulate a professional video camera.
Photo HelpSaveTheMed
Youth is key
A further key element is youth engagement, which seems to be attracting growing support amongst those concerned by the need to involve the public at large, particularly newer generations. Christine Lutringen, Executive Director of the Geneva Graduate Institute’s Albert Hirschman Centre on Democracy, underlined the importance of this approach. “It is the future of young people which is at stake and this is why we need to bring them on board,” she said.
As part of the June 16 2025 International Geneva event, Global Geneva Group (GGG) held an afternoon communications workshop to help young people better understand the role of trusted storytelling and journalism in the face of misinformation/disinformation at a time when it is becoming increasingly difficult to discern what is credible, and what is not, in social media.
This is a growing concern among both parents and teachers and one which the HelpSaveTheMed/WIKI’s Centennial Expedition initiative, which is part of GGG, a Swiss-registered non-profit, is seeking to respond to. This multimedia educational initiative seeks to work with other organizations by helping them to reach out to both young and old as a means of highlighting threats, such as environmental pollution, the erosion of cultural heritage sites and wildfires, but also solutions of the Greater Mediterranean and the world's oceans.
“We’re trying to help young people improve their writing, video, photographic, cartooning or art skills regardless which profession they eventually chose,” said four-time Emmy Award Winning director-cameraman, Tom Woods. “Young people, too, are in desperate need of finding internships and volunteer work to give them experience and to become more engaged with the world. All this needs to be done on a collaborative basis and involve International Geneva."
Aid cuts: an opportunity for change
In many ways, however, several panellists argued, the current crisis represents an opportunity. Despite years of calls for reform, many of the same problems persist. While UN Secretary-General António Guterres has sought to promote – often not effectively - reform and greater meritocracy within the UN system, political appointments continue to dominate. Powerful member states from China and Russia to the US, UK, and Japan still push their nationals into roles regardless of qualifications. Such politicization only hampers the organization with mediocrity.
The UN, too, needs to open more to the public rather than become even more cut off from the outside world. Citing security concerns, the Palais des Nations where the UN is situated in Geneva, is making it increasingly difficult for the ordinary people to have access. Many have no idea what an “SDG” (Sustainable Development Goal) is or what UNHCR (the UN Refugee agency) stand for making the UN even more irrelevant in the public eye.
Information-wise, the UN is needs to overhaul its archaic approaches to media. For some journalists, it is simply not worth applying for accreditation given that the organization insists on reporters citing the UN rather than focusing on inter-related global themes such as environment and humanitarian response as part of the overall International Geneva community.
This includes the need to enable both ‘legacy’ journalists and ‘J-influencers’ (social media reporters operating with TikTok and other forms of outreach to young people) with world-wide ID cards not only to cover UN agencies in in Geneva but also other UN campuses, such as Vienna, Bangkok and NY.
Each institution or conference event, such as the recent UN Conference on the Oceans in Nice, has its own laborious accreditation procedures which only UN hampers flexibility. According to data engineers, a secure world-wide press accreditation system would take less than a few hours to set up.
The International Committee of the Red Cross is key player within the International Geneva community with its origins dating back to the founding of the Red Cross in 1863.
Photo: ICRC
Observers note that while many UN professionals run impressive programmes, others operate inefficient or outdated initiatives with often high, separate administrative costs. The One UN approach introduced by former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan appears to have been more or less thrown out the window. UNAIDS, created in 1996, is one example that could be integrated into WHO to save costs, according to select health specialists.
Further challenges include unproductive personnel and across-the-board staff reductions, like those recently announced by IOM and UNICEF (which faces 25 percent budget cuts). As one meeting participant noted, “We need to get rid of the deadwood, and keep the best staffers and consultants if you really want to have an efficient team.”
The solutions are staring us in the face
Nicholas Niggli, a former Swiss diplomat and faculty member at the Geneva Graduate Institute, called for radical innovation in International Geneva, including embracing Artificial Intelligence and post-industrial solutions. “We cannot continue as before,” he said. The expertise is already available in Switzerland, but also around the world, he added. “It is a matter of embracing the new now.”
Arthur Wood explaining how efficient funding for international aid and development is available, but needs to be part of an integrated, non-siloed approach.
Photo: HSTM
Arthur Wood, Founding Partner of Total Impact Capital and Equity4Humanity, argued that $5 trillion spent on the Sustainable Development Goals, climate, and inequality since 2015 has yielded limited results.
“What has all this achieved? Not that much. If anything, we are going back,” he said. “The challenge now is how to scale solutions with the elimination of traditional aid silos.”
Pointing out that enormous funding possibilities exist, Wood noted that “there is no reason why large-scale systemic and equitable collaboration cannot produce funding for projects married to the supply of capital, given that all social issues are interrelated.” This includes worldwide pension funds in search of appropriate investment, but also foundations of which over 7,000 exist in Switzerland alone.
The Rhone glacier in the Swiss Alps: Source of the Rhone River that flows into the Mediterranean.
Photo: Valais Tourism
International Geneva: From the Alps to the Mediterranean
While many organizations based in the Lake Geneva region tend to operate globally, there is also a physical justification for Switzerland to remain engaged with adjacent regions, such as the Mediterranean, which, as an inland sea, is affected by most of the key issues represented by International Geneva. These include climate change, wetlands conservation, sustainable tourism, water, drought and plastics pollution.
With its glaciers and rivers, for example, the Alps serve as one of the main ‘water towers’ for the Mediterranean with rivers such as the Rhone and Po playing a crucial part in agriculture, the survival of wildlife and the environment.” (See Global Geneva article on mountain ‘water towers’)
Will Geneva replace UN Headquarters in New York?
While UN and other organizations seek to slash programmes, transfer staff to cheaper locations, and apply across-the-board cuts rather than identifying and retaining what works, there is another emerging issue that could affect International Geneva in a massive manner.
As pointed out by panel moderator, James J. Busutill, an international lawyer and senior advisor to the IILSP, conservative political efforts in the U.S.. such as the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025. stand to further threaten UN functionality, particularly in New York.
With many of its recommendations already embraced by the Trump administration, right-wing conservatives are pushing to remove the United States from the UN Charter as a "waste of money."
“The Trump administration has already embraced more than a few of Project 2025’s recommendations and this will basically eliminate the UN’s ability to operate in New York by no longer assuring diplomatic immunities and protections for UN Headquarters,” Busutill said.
Such political and financial threats could significantly reduce Washington’s soft power even more, opening the door for countries like China and Russia to expand their influence.
As highlighted at the June 2025 UN Oceans Conference in Nice, France, diminished Western oversight is already enabling unregulated exploitation of global resources, while the gutting of scientific research grants hampers efforts to track climate change in key regions like the Arctic and Mediterranean as pointed out by the Geneva Centre for Security Policy (GCSP) at a recent Arctic event.
Traditional organizations such as the Red Cross and World YWCA have long been part of the Geneva landscape. Various UN agencies, NGOs, and policy groups - from UNHCR and IOM to Handicapped International, IUCN, GCSP, and MSF International, which unlike most other NGOs relies 100 percent on individual public donations rather than donor support - chose Switzerland for its neutrality and rich history of global cooperation. Their work will without doubt continue.
At risk, however, is International Geneva's ability to function as an influential global hub. As pointed out by many at the GGG meeting, it is up to Switzerland to take the initiative to firmly re-emphasize this crucial role.
This will mean stepping up more effectively with both reform ideas and support, including funding, or at least a mechanism to help raise the financial backing that is needed.
It also means includes bringing Bern, Zurich and Basel into the fold, given that these major cities to the north tend to look down on Geneva as a quaint appendage to the Swiss Confederation focusing on global humanitarian, human rights and development issues, but not really that important.
Global Geneva Group, which is based in Geneva, is prepared - with other organizations - to initiate a process to explore next steps on how the International Geneva community, together with Switzerland, could tackle such challenges. For further information. please contact: Edward Girardet, editor, Global Geneva magazine on LinkedIn or personal email: edgirardet@gmail.com
International Geneva: The main UN Headquarters?
Far-fetched as it may seem, if the Trump administration does decide to eviscerate the UN in New York, the potential new global headquarters role may fall to the UN Office in Geneva (UNOG), the UN’s second largest representation worldwide.
However, the question remains: will the International Geneva community - and Switzerland - have the vision and capability to rise to the occasion? If not, as Busutill emphasises, there is only one other country that could assume this role, notably China, which has been steadily infiltrating the UN in recent years while leveraging its influence across Africa, Asia and, increasingly, Latin America, in recent years.
Edward Girardet is an author, foreign correspondent and editor of Global Geneva who has reported conflicts, humanitarian situations and environmental issues worldwide for more than 40 years. He is also a co-founder of HelpSaveTheMed, a multimedia educational initiative of the Geneva non-profit association, Global Geneva Group.