Multilateral processes for a regenerative future

Today’s interlinked social and ecological crises can’t be tackled by any one government alone. Yet institutions like the UN can feel distant, slow and out of reach for the communities and movements most affected by their decisions.

On 16 October 2026, Calder Tsuyuki-Tomlinson hosted a conversation amongst a small group of practitioners from around the world to ask whether and how to engage with the multilateral system. Key topics covered in the conversation include: 

1. What are multilateral processes, and why do they matter?

Multilateral processes bring nation states together to work on shared challenges. They range from established processes such as the UN, WHO and WTO, to looser coalitions such as the G20 and BRICS, to “coalitions of the willing” that form around specific topics.

They matter for several reasons:

• They shape narratives. The UN Secretary-General’s open stance on moving beyond GDP, for example, attracts media attention and shapes public and political debate.
• They set shared standards and expectations, such as the SDGs and the Paris Agreement.
• They provide international rules and legal frameworks, some legally binding and some not.
• They remain the only place to address problems that need many countries to act together, from climate change to nuclear treaties to AI.

Compared with other multilateral institutions, such as the financial ones, the UN also offers something rare: near-universal representation. Every country has a say and a vote, which gives smaller and low-income countries, such as small island states, leverage over more powerful ones.

2. What challenges stand in the way of regenerative and distributive economic policies?

Participants discussed several obstacles:

• Fragmentation. For example, land degradation, climate and biodiversity share root causes, including how today’s economic systems are designed, yet they are negotiated in parallel by separate, sometimes competing bodies. This siloed approach leads to incoherent policies and fragmented implementation at country level.
• Decision-making bottlenecks. Consensus-based processes like the Climate COP tend to settle on the lowest common denominator, and the Security Council veto shows how power imbalances are built in. The UN General Assembly votes by majority, but its resolutions are non-binding recommendations.
• Managing outside influence. Civil society and powerful corporations both seek influence, and those with more power and resources can organise themselves better. The biodiversity COP has given Indigenous Peoples a stronger voice, reflecting their role in stewarding biodiversity, but this is the exception rather than the norm.
• A weak link to implementation. Many UN standards are recommendations that depend on willing states, and voluntary measures only go so far. Shifting business towards wellbeing economy goals, for example, requires states with real regulatory power and control over their own public finances, so they can shift corporate incentives and governance.
• Shifting geopolitics. Major countries that once supported international rules are now openly challenging them, and large economies like the US hold immense influence over UN decisions. The fraying of the current system opens a window for reform, but there is a real risk too: those who benefit from gridlock can exploit it to make cooperation on shared problems impossible.
• Hard-to-find leverage. With so many moving parts, it is hard for civil society to know where to focus its efforts. Deep structural reform remains slow and distant, as many agencies and processes fight for their own survival amid shrinking international funding.

3. How might we influence and reshape these processes?

Participants shared several tactics and insights:

• Build coalitions that speak with one voice. For example, to influence the UN Beyond GDP process, Calder and others convened civil society organisations through regular meetings to share information, pool resources and intelligence, spot opportunities and craft joint submissions.
• Build coalitions around common policies. Behind different economic framings and indicators lies a shared set of policy proposals that help people and the planet thrive. Many are already being put into practice around the world, as the case studies in the Doughnut Economics Policymakers’ guide and the Wellbeing Economy Policy Design Course show.
• Build wider coalitions from the bottom up to break down silos. Olivier De Schutter, the former UN Special Rapporteur on Extreme Poverty, and his team brought together organisations working on human rights, social justice, climate, nature conservation and economic system change to propose a joint Roadmap for Eradicating Poverty beyond GDP, with diverse policy options. Countries can also bridge siloed conventions and agencies, for example, by setting up a single office to engage with different UN processes and coordinate national efforts.
• Shift the public narrative. The UN and other multilateral processes will inevitably mirror the geopolitics outside them, so ultimately the public must elect and support politicians who push for economic system change, nationally and internationally. The challenge is communicating how people’s cost-of-living crisis, lost land, water and forests, and experience of climate impacts connect to institutions like central banks, credit rating agencies and the IMF, which shape the international economic order but often feel too technical for citizens to push their politicians on.
• Support alliances of the willing. Progressive governments and political leaders are emerging to challenge how the global economic system is designed. Spain, the OECD and several UN agencies, for example, launched the Beyond GDP Global Alliance of “countries and partners committed to advancing the integration of more comprehensive metrics of development in policy and financing practice”. Coalitions like this can move faster than the UN system, and show the public and other governments what is possible.

To host future peer-learning sessions 

The session is part of policy peer-learning series designed to connect those curious about how Doughnut Economics can shape government policies and governance systems. They draw inspirations from and help enrich our Doughnut Economics for Policymakers' guide and Wellbeing Economy Policy Design Course.  

If you have a topic or question related to governments and policies that you wish to discuss with the broader DEAL and WEALL community, please get in touch via this google form. 

Thank you for your interests and participation!