UN chief to stress multipolarity, UNSC reforms at BRICS Summit in India
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has been invited to address the Open Session of the 18th BRICS Summit in New Delhi on the theme "Resilience, Innovation, Cooperation and Sustainability: Shaping the Future for Inclusive Global Growth."
He is expected to underscore that a more multipolar world requires reform of multilateral institutions, including the UN Security Council and the Bretton Woods institutions, to better reflect contemporary economic and geopolitical realities.
The address comes as the process to select his successor as the tenth UN Secretary-General is already underway ahead of his term ending in December 2026.
Security Council reform has been a long-standing demand of India and several other countries, who argue the Council's composition does not reflect 21st-century realities.
UN Security Council Composition and the Amendment Procedure
The UN Security Council's composition is fixed by Article 23 of the UN Charter, which currently provides for 15 members: 5 permanent members (China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States) and 10 non-permanent members elected by the General Assembly for two-year terms. Changing this composition requires amending the Charter under Article 108, a deliberately high bar that has been cleared only once for the Council (the 1965 expansion from 11 to 15 members, of which the Article 23 amendment is a record).
Key Details
- Article 108: a Charter amendment requires adoption by two-thirds of UN General Assembly members and ratification by two-thirds of member states, including all five permanent Security Council members — giving each P5 state an effective veto over any reform.
- Article 27 governs Council voting: procedural matters need an affirmative vote of 9 of 15 members; all other ("substantive") matters need 9 votes including the concurring votes of all five permanent members — the source of the P5 veto.
- Article 109 separately allows a General Conference to review the Charter, convened by a two-thirds General Assembly vote plus any 9 Security Council votes — an alternative, rarely-used reform route.
- The only past amendment enlarging the Council took effect in 1965, raising membership from 11 to 15 (non-permanent seats from 6 to 10); permanent membership has never been expanded since the UN's founding in 1945.
When Guterres calls for Security Council reform "to reflect today's realities," the practical obstacle is Article 108 itself — any of the five permanent members can block a formal Charter amendment, which is why reform proposals have circulated for decades (via the Inter-Governmental Negotiations, or IGN, process) without resulting in a binding amendment.
India's G4 Coalition and the "15-Year Veto Deferral" Compromise
India anchors its UNSC reform campaign through the G4 — an informal grouping with Brazil, Germany and Japan formed in 2004, under which each supports the others' candidature for permanent seats in an expanded Council. The G4 proposal envisages a Council of around 25-26 members, adding six new permanent seats (two for Africa, two for Asia-Pacific, one for Latin America and the Caribbean, one for Western Europe and Others) and additional non-permanent seats.
Key Details
- India has opposed a "two-tier" system that would create new permanent members without veto power, while supporting the G4's compromise offer to voluntarily defer the exercise of veto rights by new permanent members for an initial 15 years.
- The main rival bloc, "Uniting for Consensus" (informally the "Coffee Club," including Italy, Pakistan, and others), opposes new permanent seats altogether and favours only expanding non-permanent membership.
- The African Union's "Ezulwini Consensus" seeks two permanent African seats with full veto rights from the outset — a gap with the G4's 15-year deferral offer that reform negotiators still need to bridge.
- Reform negotiations proceed through the UN General Assembly's Inter-Governmental Negotiations (IGN) framework, which has run without a text-based negotiation format for years, a procedural sticking point reform advocates (including India) have criticised.
Guterres's call to reform the Security Council lends UN Secretariat-level support to a reform India has pursued for decades primarily through the G4 platform, though the Secretary-General himself has no formal power to initiate a Charter amendment — that authority rests solely with member states under Article 108.
Bretton Woods Institutions and the Quota-Reform Deadlock
Guterres's reference to reforming institutions "including the Bretton Woods system" points to the IMF and World Bank, whose governance is based on financial "quotas" (for the IMF) and shareholding (for the World Bank) that determine both voting power and financial contributions — a structure largely unchanged in its power distribution since the institutions were created at the 1944 Bretton Woods Conference, even as the global economy has shifted markedly toward emerging economies.
Key Details
- The IMF's most recent (16th) General Review of Quotas did not rebalance voting shares in favour of emerging and developing economies in line with their current share of global GDP.
- The United States alone holds sufficient IMF voting share, combined with other advanced economies, to block major decisions requiring an 85% supermajority — an effective US veto over structural IMF reform.
- Dissatisfaction with the slow pace of Bretton Woods reform (a persistent complaint from BRICS members, especially China) was a stated motivation for creating alternative institutions such as the New Development Bank (2015) and the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (2016, headquartered in Beijing).
- India's IMF quota share and voting power lag its share of global GDP, a gap India has consistently raised at G20 and IMF governance forums.
By linking Security Council reform with Bretton Woods reform in the same statement, Guterres frames "multipolarity" as requiring parallel reform of both the UN's political architecture and the post-1944 international financial architecture — two separate reform tracks that BRICS, as a bloc, has consistently supported.
The UN Secretary-General's Institutional Role
The UN Secretary-General is appointed under Article 97 of the UN Charter by the General Assembly on the recommendation of the Security Council, for a term (by convention) of five years, renewable once. Guterres, in office since 2017 and re-elected for a second term in 2021, has his current term ending on 31 December 2026, with the selection of his successor already underway alongside this address.
Key Details
- Article 97 designates the Secretary-General as the UN's "chief administrative officer"; Article 99 additionally empowers the Secretary-General to bring to the Security Council's attention any matter threatening international peace and security — the basis for the Secretary-General's independent advocacy role, including on institutional reform.
- The Secretary-General has no vote or formal decision-making power over Charter amendments or Security Council composition; the office's influence on reform is limited to moral and diplomatic advocacy.
- The process to select the tenth Secretary-General (to take office January 2027) was underway in 2026, involving General Assembly interactive dialogues with multiple candidates.
- Comparable convention: like the Secretary-General, the President of the UN General Assembly also rotates (annually, among regional groups), but neither office holds a Security Council vote.
Guterres's BRICS address is being delivered in an advocacy capacity in the spirit of Article 99, near the very end of his own tenure, underscoring that institutional reform calls from the UN Secretariat carry symbolic and agenda-setting weight but no binding authority over member states.
- UNSC composition: 15 members — 5 permanent (China, France, Russia, UK, US) with veto power under Article 27; 10 non-permanent, elected for two-year terms.
- Only past Council enlargement: 1965, from 11 to 15 members (Article 23 amendment).
- Charter amendment threshold (Article 108): two-thirds of UN General Assembly members, ratified by two-thirds of member states including all five permanent Security Council members.
- G4 grouping (India, Brazil, Germany, Japan): formed 2004; proposes 6 new permanent seats in an expanded ~25-26 member Council.
- Guterres's second term as UN Secretary-General ends: 31 December 2026; selection of the tenth Secretary-General was underway in 2026.
- IMF's 16th General Review of Quotas produced only a modest (roughly 6%) quota increase for emerging and developing economies, short of rebalancing demands.
- BRICS Open Session theme (2026 summit): "Resilience, Innovation, Cooperation and Sustainability: Shaping the Future for Inclusive Global Growth."