The UN Needs a Competent Chief Administrator not a Global Moral Leader in its Secretary-General

by Dr. Susan Yoshihara

On Monday, June 15, María Fernanda Espinosa will appear before the United Nations General Assembly as part of the public hearings for candidates seeking to become the next Secretary-General. Her appearance comes at a pivotal moment. While some emphasize the sex and geographical home of UN’s next SG, what matters most is what kind of manager the UN staff need.

Much of the public discussion surrounding the 2026 selection has focused on two themes: the expectation that the next Secretary-General should be a woman and the longstanding argument that it is Latin America’s turn to hold the office. Both are politically significant. No woman has ever served as Secretary-General, and many governments and advocacy groups view this as an overdue correction.

Before Espinoza or any other contender takes the stage, national representatives must answer the question: is the Secretary-General primarily a global moral voice, charged with advancing international norms and speaking on behalf of the world’s conscience? Or is the Secretary-General first and foremost the chief administrative officer of a vast international organization that is facing one of the most severe fiscal and institutional crises in its history?

Get that right and it will help restore fiscal responsibility and confidence in the institution. That in turn will advance women’s equality and concerns specific to geographical regions.

The UN’s Fiscal Reality

The next Secretary-General will inherit an organization facing significant financial pressures. Years of budget disputes, delayed payments by member states, expanding mandates, and rising expectations have produced growing concerns about the sustainability of the UN system.

Member states increasingly question whether the UN is focused on delivering measurable results. Critics argue that mandates have proliferated faster than the organization’s capacity to implement them. Supporters worry that fiscal pressures threaten essential humanitarian, peacekeeping, refugee, and development operations.

Whoever becomes Secretary-General will therefore face a task that is at its heart managerial.

Leading the Pack

Among the principal candidates, three stand out for their emphasis on organizational effectiveness.

Rafael Grossi of Argentina, the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency, has built his reputation on technical competence, crisis management, and institutional performance. Unlike many international figures, Grossi tends to speak less about moral authority and more about results, accountability, and execution.

Rebeca Grynspan of Costa Rica, currently Secretary-General of UNCTAD, has explicitly presented herself as a reformer. Her campaign emphasizes institutional effectiveness, financial sustainability, and rebuilding confidence in multilateral institutions through better performance.

María Fernanda Espinosa of Ecuador occupies an interesting middle ground. A former President of the General Assembly and former foreign and defense minister, she has emphasized the need for mandate reviews, efficiency improvements, and fiscal discipline. She has also spoken about restoring the UN’s “moral authority” and strengthening its role in conflict prevention and diplomacy.

For observers trying to understand the future direction of the organization, Espinosa’s candidacy is notable because she attempts to bridge two competing visions of the office. Nations have an opportunity to find out what takes precedence and what that will mean for fiscal and managerial discipline.

Chief Administrative Officer, Not Global Advocate

Article 97 of the UN Charter describes the Secretary-General as the organization’s “chief administrative officer.” Framers of the United Nations Charter sought to ensure that the office would remain accountable to member states rather than evolve into a form of supranational political authority.

Over the decades, Secretaries-General have interpreted the office as something more. Beginning with Dag Hammarskjöld, many holders of the position have argued that the Secretary-General has an independent responsibility to defend the purposes and principles of the Charter. The office evolved into a hybrid role—part administrator, part diplomat, part public advocate.

Most notably, Kofi Annan argued that the Secretary-General exercises “the moral authority entrusted to him by the Charter” and portrayed the United Nations as a community of shared values, human rights, and international legitimacy rather than merely an administrative organization.

Most current candidates accept some version of this evolution. Few argue that the Secretary- General should be merely a manager. The difference lies in emphasis, but what the organization needs now is clarity and focus on the administrative task at hand.

Michelle Bachelet, former President of Chile and former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, is closely associated with the view that the UN serves as an important normative institution and that the Secretary-General should be an active voice on global issues.

Grossi, by contrast, tends to ground the legitimacy of international institutions in competence and effectiveness. His public statements suggest a more managerial understanding of leadership, even while recognizing the broader political responsibilities of the office.

Grynspan and Espinosa seem to fall somewhere between these poles, though both have devoted considerable attention to the practical challenges of institutional reform.

The Best Man for the Job May Be a Woman

Advocacy groups, civil society organizations, and several governments have argued that after eighty years, the United Nations should finally break what remains one of the most visible glass ceilings in international politics.

Few governments including the United States openly oppose this goal. Yet many diplomats quietly frame the issue differently.

Rather than asking whether the next Secretary-General should be a woman, they ask whether the next Secretary-General should be the candidate best equipped to lead the organization through a period of fiscal stress, geopolitical fragmentation, and declining public confidence.

Espinoza has expressed the view of many: the best man for the job may indeed be a woman. Several highly qualified women are in the race. What nations cannot afford is a symbolic rather than substantive choice based on sex or geography. This for the sake of women and men anywhere in the world who still count on UN programs.

Peace and Security Lead to Equality and Justice

As the cases and findings in my latest book emphasized, prioritizing peace and security can lead to the UN agencies’ stated goals of “gender equality and the empowerment of women” rather than the other way around.

Millions of women and girls around the world depend on the successful functioning of UN institutions. Refugee protection, humanitarian relief, anti-trafficking efforts, conflict mediation, peacekeeping operations, food assistance, and educational programs all require competent administration and sustainable financing. If those systems fail, the consequences are felt most acutely by dependent populations.

Hence the most important qualification for the next Secretary-General isn’t gender, geography, or ideology. What matters is past proven performance that demonstrates the ability to restore organizational effectiveness and member-state confidence.

That is why today’s interview with María Fernanda Espinosa is worth watching closely.

In a race increasingly framed around history-making possibilities, the gravity of the situation demands sobriety and unity in saving the organization. No doubt UN staff, who come from around the world, are hoping for a chief executive to turn things around rather than a symbol, statesman, or moral voice. To improve the status of women and salvage institutional credibility and effectiveness to the UN organization, member states must chose a chief administrator rather than a history-making global moral advocate.