MULTILATERALISM IS NOT A LUXURY
Human rights at the centre. Democracy and transparency in the process.
The feminist networks and organizations of Latin America and the Caribbean, committed to the defense of human rights, write to you to express our deep concern regarding the proposed reform of the United Nations system, promoted through the UN80 initiative: Shifting Paradigms: United to Deliver.
We do so in a global context marked by wars and genocides, climate crisis, extreme inequalities, unprecedented demographic transformations, patriarchal violence, organized anti-rights offensives, and a severe weakening of democracy. In this scenario, multilateralism is not a luxury: it is an indispensable condition for the protection of peoples and the planet.
Precisely for this reason, it is deeply troubling that, within the framework of this initiative, the possible elimination of UNAIDS, the weakening of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, and the proposed merger of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) with UN Women are being considered.
For a renewed—not weakened—multilateralism.
We do not defend the status quo. As feminists from a region that has driven historic advances in gender equality, bodily autonomy, and sexual and reproductive rights, we know that the multilateral system requires profound transformations to meet today’s challenges.
However, these transformations cannot strip the United Nations’ core mandate of its political and normative substance: the protection of human rights and the dignity of all people, as established in the UN Charter and the international human rights system that flows from it.
We are deeply concerned that UN80 documents focus almost exclusively on efficiency, “administrative coherence,” the reduction of duplication, and institutional mergers, while troublingly overlooking States’ legal obligations, the role of treaty bodies—including CEDAW, CESCR, CRC, and CRPD—and their foundational importance for gender equality, sexual and reproductive rights, and the urgent challenges posed by global demographic dynamics.
A multilateralism fit for our time cannot be reduced to an organizational redesign exercise. It must, above all, be a political and ethical renewal of the commitment to human rights, social justice, gender equality, and the sustainability of life.
Human rights must be at the center.
The report Shifting Paradigms: United to Deliver structures reforms to reduce “fragmentation,” consolidate entities, and create new coordination mechanisms. However, it does not explain how these changes will avoid backsliding in the realization of human rights, nor how coherence with States’ existing international obligations will be ensured.
Nor does it acknowledge the fundamental role played by treaty body recommendations in shaping public policy, or their relevance to gender equality and sexual and reproductive rights.
The process must be democratic and transparent.
Although it is stated that States will be informed and consulted, the process is moving forward with a concerning concentration of decision-making power in a small circle of senior officials and external consultants. More troubling still, there are no clear, accessible, or binding mechanisms for civil society participation, let alone for feminist and women’s movements that have been central to the creation and defense of the Beijing Platform for Action and the Cairo Programme of Action. This limits democratic debate and generates opacity.
Any UN-led reform process must:
- Place human rights as the guiding principle and non-negotiable limit, in their universal, indivisible, and inalienable nature, and not reduce them to a transversal or instrumental approach.
- Strengthen the international architecture for gender equality and sexual and reproductive rights, including the global response to HIV/AIDS.
- Guarantee non-regression of existing mandates, avoiding their dilution or merger—particularly those protecting historically marginalized populations—in a context of escalating global anti-rights attacks.
- Preserve and strengthen the specialized and complementary mandates of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, UN Women, UNFPA, and UNAIDS, ensuring adequate resources, effective coordination, and full capacity for political advocacy.
- Ensure transparent, informed, and accountable processes, including mandatory human rights and gender impact assessments for all proposed reforms.
- Guarantee the meaningful participation of civil society, particularly feminist and women’s movements, as an indispensable condition for democratic legitimacy.
There can be no genuine reform of the United Nations if the pillars that sustain gender equality and women’s human rights—including bodily autonomy and sexual and reproductive rights—are weakened.
The United Nations belongs to its peoples. And it is we, the peoples, who demand and defend its existence.
Sincerely,
We, the feminists of the peoples of Latin America and the Caribbean
For the list of signatories, please click here