Sooner or later, it was bound to happen. Credibility would evaporate. Trust would be lost. And aid would be cut.
We all knew it couldn't go on forever. Except our leaders. Because, if they had known, they would have done something about it, or not?
For years, I have written about the absurdities, lack of results and declining professional standards that have crept into development policy and practice across the UN system [endnote 1]. The standard response was that I should not try to fix what is not broken. "The glass is still half full." Now, in 2026, the system is on the verge of collapse. Even the most traditional traditionalists agree that the UN Development System is a mess and needs a major overhaul. How come that none of our executives saw it coming?
The culture of leadership veneration
One might expect organizations engaged in something as complex as development to thrive on internal debate and a culture of open discussion. That was not what I experienced. Perhaps it is the climate in the UN, where everyone sits quietly behind their office door so that they can't be held responsible for anything later.
Perhaps it is an occupational hazard of organizations devoted to doing good. The development strategist cultivates a culture in which moral purpose is often confused with professional competence. Questioning a programme, a strategy, or a policy is proof that one does not care sufficiently about the vulnerable and underprivileged.
Several senior UNICEF colleagues have described the organization as outright anti-intellectual. The development strategist is delighted when the boss says exactly what everyone expects the boss to say. Yet it was not uncommon for a serious strategic discussion to be cut short by the most senior person in the room, delivering a sometimes pointless intervention at 95 decibels, roughly the noise level of a food blender. Nor have I seen a UN leader engage seriously with aid critics, let alone lose sleep over whether the established approach to aid is actually the best way to bring about development.
And the development strategist rarely challenges his superiors. “Managing up" is the ultimate survival skill. Dashboards are designed to always flash green [endnote 2]. Sycophantic reporting validates the preferences of the leadership and buries systemic failures.
Curiously, after hours, the standard appears to drop. Among development strategists, the lowest common denominator of leadership often seems to be that the leader has not yet caused a scandal.
Leaders
There is no polite way to put this. Despite having worked with some outstanding colleagues, I struggle to identify UN leaders whom I admire for setting a clear direction. Even though the world has changed dramatically and in spite of ongoing management reviews, I have not seen any significant change in policy for decades that has had a positive impact on the effectiveness of the UN Development Group. The ship has simply continued to drift along on its course.
I have always been wary of self-appointed and formally appointed leaders, particularly those who avoid making decisions. Choosing not to decide is itself a decision: a decision in favour of the status quo. But leaders are paid more exactly because they are expected to assume greater responsibility, withstand scrutiny, and make difficult choices. Leadership is not a shield from criticism. If anything, it should attract more of it. Accepting that bad decisions have consequences, as does failing to make decisions, is a fundamental aspect of any leadership position.
Purpose
UNICEF's leaders have strived to maintain the brand, cultivate donor relationships, and increase revenue. Most spent significantly more time raising money than considering how it should be spent. They may have fundamentally misunderstood the purpose of a development agency.
Contributed income is not earned income. The purpose of a development organization is not to maximize revenue, accumulate assets, or perpetuate itself. Success should be measured by whether partner countries move onto a sustainable path to prosperity and whether the agency can plausibly demonstrate its contribution. When UN leaders lose sight of the original purpose, their organizations become self-referential, seek confirmation in echo chambers, and optimize for donor visibility and institutional survival.
Management
Most of us would agree that the UN system has become insanely bureaucratic and convulated. Too many people are busy talking to themselves and disbursing funds in homeopathic quantities to projects of doubtful significance, while maintaining a parallel universe of aid-dependent services.
What should one conclude from an organization where country offices invest enormous effort in preparing programme documents, yet rarely report expenditure and results in a coherent manner? Where every new so-called strategic plan is a cut-and-paste job of those written fifteen years ago and hardly qualifies as strategy? Where lessons-learned exercises become a clown show? Or where headquarters continues to expand, only to discover overnight that New York is an expensive place to work and live?
Coda
The UN is no longer a dynamic organization where the brightest minds and best managers come together with open minds - to reflect, evaluate, and develop strategies that create the right international conditions for development to happen. Without a vibrant culture of discussion, a focus on the original intention, and a willingness to adapt, our leadership is unlikely to get this right.
Thanks for this Detlef. I afraid after wiping out 3000 positions last year as part of our budget cuts, and fiddling with HQ vs hubs vs regional offices - we have not taken a great step forward in this debate but rather sidestepped difficult conversations that are overdue. And do we honestly think that after sacking 3000 staff - that ANYONE would stand up and challenge the senior staff that are still standing at the top - after they absorbed the shock off moving from NY to Valancia or from NY to some hub in Bangkok. How will they ever recover the shock of changing their dentist from Manhattan to Bangkok? Staff who are left standing will be silent as the cuts in the past year were done in.a way that did not make any meaningful effort to listen and the fangs did come out when any staff tried to speak up.
ReplyDeleteDetlef Palm’s critique is less an attack on individuals than an indictment of a culture that has drifted far from its stated purpose. His description of “leadership veneration,” where questioning strategy is equated with a lack of moral commitment, highlights a dangerous conflation of intent with competence. In such an environment, dashboards glow green, dissent is muted, and managing up becomes a survival skill. If debate is stifled and critics are dismissed rather than engaged, it is hardly surprising that warning signs go unheeded until credibility erodes and funding is threatened.
ReplyDeleteEqually striking is the argument that the system has confused revenue generation with mission fulfilment. Palm suggests that leaders have devoted disproportionate energy to protecting the brand, cultivating donors, and expanding headquarters functions, while paying insufficient attention to whether programmes demonstrably move countries toward sustainable prosperity. When income becomes the proxy for impact, organisations risk becoming self-referential—optimising visibility and institutional survival rather than measurable developmental change. His critique of bureaucratic proliferation, repetitive “strategic” plans, and incoherent reporting reinforces the sense of a system busy with activity but uncertain of results.
Yet the article also implies a path forward. A vibrant culture of open discussion, intellectual rigor, and genuine accountability would challenge complacency and restore clarity of purpose. Leadership, as Palm argues, is not insulation from criticism but an obligation to invite it—accepting that both bad decisions and indecision carry consequences. If the UN Development System is indeed at a crossroads in 2026, reform will require more than structural reshuffling or staff cuts; it will demand a reassertion of first principles, measurable impact, and the courage to confront uncomfortable truths.
An institution's culture is the sum of the thoughts, attitudes, and actions of its individuals. In other words, the critique of culture and individuals cannot be separated.
DeleteI am not sure who Detlef refers to as UNICEF leaders; ED? DEDs? RDs? D-2s in HQs and around the world? Reps? Having been Chief of Staff and RD and, basically, growing up in UNICEF, I, now and before, mostly, tend to agree with Detlef, but I believe, in this piece, he overestimates the decision-power and room for action of ``UNICEF leaders``. There is a governance structure of UNICEF beyond ``UNICEF leaders``. There is a SG, there is a Board, there are doners paying ``UNICEF leaders`` and other staff`s salaries (for many years, also Detlef`s). My point is simply that this article seems to ignore that there is a governance structure of UN agencies that goes way beyond it`s ``leaders``. I have experienced an ED being told by the White House and a SG what to decide. I have experienced a ED having to
ReplyDeleteaccept ridiculous decisions by the Board. I have experienced suggestions from DEDs and RDs being being well received by ED, but shut done by the governance structure above or beyond UNICEF. I really wish it was as easy as Detlef suggests, that the ``UNICEF leaders`` decide what happens in UNICEF.
@Bernt: We know that the Executive Board is dysfunctional. It tends to approve almost everything that is put before it, and political influence is an inevitable part of its role. But that is not the point here.
DeleteThe main issue is the failure of the organization's own leadership to exercise self-critique, foster honest reflection, encourage rigorous analysis, and report candidly. Over time, this has led to something more damaging than poor governance: a gradual loss of institutional purpose.
Most of us joined UNICEF to carry out specific assignments and responsibilities. Leaders, however, have a different obligation. As people rise through the organization, one would expect them to step back from the immediate daily humdrum and ask the larger questions: How do the different parts fit together? Does the organization still function as intended? Does what we do today still make sense in light of today's realities? When leadership ceases to ask these questions, directors cease to provide direction. Instead, they simply manage the status quo.
Having joined the organization from the private sector in the aughts as a consultant, who ultimately struggled over years and tens of contracts and promises to hire me, that one of the most debilitating challenges is a structural one. The four-year plans and resulting "organogrammes" are stultifying vestiges of a manufactured accountability system that cannot function flexibly to address changing landscapes, priorities and goals or support meritocracy. The "strategic plans" are the mortar that holds up those walls. Of course leaders can't be effective, nor can we assess them fairly.
Delete@Jim: at the minimum, our leaders could concoct strategic plans that make sense.
DeleteI have an example of a UNICEF leader engaging seriously with a critic - sometime in 1989 Graham Hancock published Lords of Poverty. Yes, he of “there was a sophisticated civilization before a comet screwed up global climate circa 11,000 BCE fame - check out his recent interview on the YouTube channel Diary of a CEO. I knew Hancock from my days of regular cross country desert traveling to Djibouti from a refugee camp in Somalia to buy supplies in ‘81/82. So Richard Jolly roped me in to help him write a considered response to Hancock’s points - we read the book line by line with highlighters and worked on this response for around ten days on and off. In the end it was around three pages. I’d only been with UNICEF about 6 months at that point and I found Richard took it all very seriously. He acknowledged a lot of what Hancock said and his main point was - what is the alternative to “development”. Social Democratic-led capitalist expansion needs to be tempered with something and Hancock did not address that point.
ReplyDelete@Roger: Very good. If my math is correct, Lords of Poverty and your critique of it are now 37 years old. I also volunteered hauling supplies from Djibouti to Somalia refugee camps during the early eighties - I never met Hancock, and I did not agree with everything he wrote. But that is no longer the point.
DeleteThe development landscape, and many of the assumptions underpinning international aid, have changed dramatically since then. That makes it even more important for those who are closest to the work to step back periodically, test their assumptions against reality, and ask whether the traditional approach to development aid still makes sense.
Engaging seriously with criticism is not about endorsing every critic. It is about maintaining the capacity for honest reflection and continuous learning. Ultimately, this is not a question of having a few brilliant thinkers. It is about fostering a culture of discussion, critical reflection, and maintaining a clear sense of purpose.
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ReplyDeleteYour comments on the UN Development System resonate regarding the lack for leadership that fosters dialogue, accountability, and critical reflection. This culture turns development agencies into institutions that prioritize donor engagement and internal survival over meaningful, measurable impact. Without debate and intellectual rigor organizations drift.
ReplyDeleteI was at a UNCT retreat and they flew in several people as we had several UN agencies in different countries under one UN Framework. There was no agenda. There was no notes from the UNCT retreat that had taken place 10 months before that. About an hour into it the floor opened for questions _ I asked where was the report and action points from last retreat? The entire room fell silent. The facilitator put this issue up on the Flipchart - and NO ONE answered it. Why? As it was acrimonious - there was no agreement on our priorities and in the way we grouped results. It was all put on ice as in that fallout no one could lead us to consensus - none of the important issues were answered and rather than addressing them we kicked the can down the line. Now were were 10 months down the line - we still did not want to take up the stuff that was not resolved the previous retreat. The hope was that with many heads of agencies new and some of the old "difficult" people out - we could forget about that and move forward and - repeat the same mistakes of the past due to an inability to admit failure and to reflect on what went wrong. Everyone looked at me like I was the biggest trouble maker I the room - and I was - but only because I asked for the summary of the last retreat so we could review the difficult things and learn. I was take aside and asked to be more diplomatic - so I called a taxi and left - no reason to be there. 20 adults - all at P-5 to D-2 level could not bring themselves to review what went wrong and use this to chart the way forward. That is the problem in a nutshell.
DeleteThis column has raised an alarm for urgent action to save the UN and thereby for it to once again be a exemplarary leader in promoting development, peace and security. The challenges are many even including that staff competencies need to be assured. The ideas in this column must find their way to those who can initiate and sustain the the urgent change process and sustain it until planned results are achieved. Time has come to make development move away from aid dependance. Difficult but urgent and absolutely necessary.
ReplyDeletelook who is in charge of the new vision of UNICEF - staff that are over age 60 and who won't retire. where are the young voices and new ideas - oh yeah - they all lost their jobs so D1s and D2s could be rescued.
ReplyDeleteThere is a tendency to remember the UN’s development role as more successful than it was. Those with long experience know the system was never effective in delivering development. When budgets were smaller and scrutiny less intense, failures were easier to deal with.
ReplyDeleteDear Detlef, you brought up interesting points for review and change but for me, the structure at the top has to be changed first. Take the UN Security Council as a formidable sample. The set-up of 5 nations was made after the second world war by the winners and was never really changed to include countries with more populations like India and Brazil nor economic powers like Japan and Germany. Why were those adjustments not made, keeping an outdated structure alive forever? The fish starts to stink from the head, isn`t it?
ReplyDeleteWhat really stinks is the process to change the. UNSC structure: The 2-Step Amendment ProcessGeneral
DeleteAssembly Vote: The UNGA must adopt the amendment by a two-thirds majority vote (at least 128 of the 193 member states).
Global Ratification: The amendment must then be ratified by two-thirds of all UN member states, including all five permanent Security Council members (the P5).
So all that and still any of the P5 can derail it! Arrrrgh!
Thank you Rob for your clarification of the un-realistic process which is, in my view, a flaw from the founders.
DeleteIt reminds me to the situation in the EU with Mr. Orban, ex-president of Hungary, who could take the whole EU countries hostage. What a flaw in the structure, very difficult, if not impossible, to change lateron! We should be aware and reminded, that human beings can act in many ways!
@Detlef and all commenters. What a joy to read you all.
ReplyDeleteAs I prepare for pre-retirement, this is my first read on this blog. It resonates most of the reasons why I decide not to continue with UN after 22years.
While I feel energized by our national colleagues in Darfur and by a very a few international one, I take this difficult decision because of too much focus in our organizations: on self preservation; on the lack of comprehensive solution driven observations during field missions that can shape our programs; and on the fait-accompli of continued increased burden of processes limiting initiatives and risk appetite.
And above all, the misunderstanding that strategies and programmes can contribute to "development" ONLY if the targeted population have the same conceptual framework of development than us ... or vice versa...
Thank you
i had an M&E officer worked for me. He did some programmatic visits to field office locations as this was his job - and even the slightest bit of critical observations often made the programme staff - whom PME aims to support and serve to measure results - would raise the most emotional battle. Like we had personally violated their PhD thesis. All we said was: let us take a second look at this activity and see if we can do better to achieve the intended result? Or maybe - god forbid - we suggest that MAYBE education and health could work together with same partner and location of a joint result - impossible in most cases.
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