The U.S. Withdrawal from Multilateral Commitments: Implications for Global Governance, Europe, and France

One year into Donald Trump’s return to the presidency, the United States has undertaken a sequence of withdrawals from multilateral institutions, culminating on 7 January 2026 with the decision to exit 66 international agencies, bodies, conventions, and treaties. Affecting 31 United Nations bodies and 35 non-UN institutions, this move-together with earlier withdrawals initiated since early 2025-constitutes the most extensive U.S. disengagement from multilateral governance since 1945.

Beyond their immediate legal and institutional consequences, these decisions carry far-reaching systemic implications for global governance, the European Union, and France. Taken together, they signal not merely a series of policy adjustments, but a redefinition of how the U.S. conceives sovereignty, cooperation, and the role of international institutions.

Grouped thematically, the withdrawals disproportionately affect climate governance, humanitarian coordination, and peacebuilding, while U.S. engagement is largely preserved in hard security and global economic management. As a result, they directly weaken the operational capacity of peacekeeping, humanitarian response, and climate action.

Earlier U.S. Multilateral Disengagement Decisions in 2025

On 3 February 2025, the Trump administration issued a presidential order mandating a comprehensive review of U.S. membership and funding in international organisations, with particular emphasis on selected UN bodies. The order also terminated participation in, and funding for, entities deemed contrary to U.S. interests, including withdrawal from the UN Human Rights Council and the suspension of funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).

In July 2025, the United States announced its withdrawal from UNESCO, citing concerns over politicisation, alleged bias against Israel, and objections to the organisation’s norm-setting role in education, culture, and science, which the administration argued no longer aligned with U.S. policy priorities. The sanctioning of UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese, linked to her reporting on human rights in Gaza, further illustrated growing tensions between the U.S. political establishment and independent multilateral monitoring mechanisms.

Taken together, these steps reflected U.S. positions on the Israel-Palestine conflict and long-standing concerns that parts of the UN system exhibit political bias, weak accountability, and obligations seen as incompatible with the U.S. foreign policy. They established the political and institutional foundation for a more systematic withdrawal from multilateral governance in January 2026.

Humanitarian Funding, Conditionality, and Field-Level Impact

U.S. policy shifts in 2025-26 have reduced both assessed contributions to the UN system and the predictability of humanitarian financing. Together, funding cuts and increased conditionality have weakened the neutrality and effectiveness of multilateral humanitarian response, with direct consequences for populations dependent on critical assistance. Humanitarian agencies have already been forced to suspend or scale back programmes addressing displacement, food insecurity, child nutrition, shelter, and basic services in conflict-affected and disaster-prone contexts. Humanitarian actors warned that the accompanying message that the UN "adapt, shrink or die"-signals a shift toward conditional, politically prioritised financing, with significant implications for the needs-based foundations of the global humanitarian system.

Major UN agencies, including UNHCR, OCHA, and the World Food Programme, have acknowledged that budget shortfalls are disrupting the delivery of essential aid to vulnerable populations. Speaking at the UN’s 80th anniversary in January 2026, Secretary-General António Guterres warned that cuts in humanitarian funding and fragmented cooperation are "not abstract pressures," but translate directly into fewer people reached, weaker civilian protection, and reduced capacity to respond to crises.

EU and French humanitarian funding is also under pressure. Several EU member states have reduced official development assistance (ODA) budgets, contributing to a broader decline in humanitarian financing in 2025. In France, recent budget planning anticipates notable cuts to humanitarian and development aid to help reduce the public deficit. These reductions reflect competing national budget priorities, notably increased defence and security spending in light of the need for the EU strategic autonomy.

Climate, Environment, Energy, and Sustainability Governance

This largest cluster reflects U.S. disengagement from environmental science-based norm-setting - climate mitigation, biodiversity protection, energy transition, and sustainability governance.

Withdrawal from the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change also entails leaving the Paris Agreement. More broadly, stepping away from climate, biodiversity, and environmental cooperation frameworks distances the U.S. from the institutional foundations of global environmental action and contributes to the politicisation of climate science. The cluster also includes withdrawal from international energy bodies such as the International Renewable Energy Agency, signalling resistance to coordinated approaches to renewable energy and the global energy transition. This move has been widely criticised by the international scientific community as undermining evidence-based policymaking.

For the EU, U.S. disengagement increases the burden of leadership in sustaining the Paris Agreement while weakening transatlantic alignment on climate and energy standards. For France, which played a central diplomatic role in securing the Paris Agreement, it reduces a key arena of multilateral influence and increases responsibility for defending science-based environmental governance within the international system.

Protection of Civilians, Human Rights, Democracy and Rule of Law

Women, the UN Population Fund, the UN Democracy Fund, mandates on Sexual Violence in Conflict and Children in Armed Conflict, as well as international law and norm-setting organisations. The withdrawals build on the U.S. decision of 4 February 2025 to exit the UN Human Rights Council. These mechanisms do not exercise enforcement authority. Their influence derives from agenda-setting, legal and constitutional guidance, and systematic monitoring and reporting related to the protection of civilians, human rights, democratic governance, and the rule of law.

In U.S. domestic political discourse, several of these bodies have increasingly been framed through the lens of "wokism" and identity politics, and are often grouped with broader critiques of international assistance, including former USAID programmes. In practice, they play a central role in documenting violations, supporting accountability processes, and strengthening protection frameworks for civilians-particularly women and children-in conflict-affected and fragile settings.

Peacebuilding, Conflict Prevention, and Stabilisation

Though smaller in number, this cluster is strategically critical. It covers institutions designed to prevent conflict escalation and relapse through early warning, political engagement, and post-conflict stabilisation.

Withdrawals include the UN Peacebuilding Fund, the Peacebuilding Commission, and related mechanisms addressing structural drivers of conflict such as weak institutions, exclusion, and fragile peace agreements, while supporting reconciliation and trust. The same preventive logic applies to cultural and societal dimensions of peacebuilding. U.S. withdrawal from the UN Alliance of Civilizations signals a retreat from intercultural dialogue as a tool for conflict prevention, reconciliation, and social cohesion.

Overall, this disengagement reflects a shift from prevention toward reactive crisis management. Reduced investment in political solutions and institution-building increases the risk of conflict relapse and raises humanitarian, financial, and political costs for other actors once violence resumes.

Limited but tangible reform efforts in this area are underway within the UN Secretariat. On 12 January 2026, the UN GA endorsed the establishment of a unified Peacebuilding and Peace Support Office. It recognises the need for greater coherence and institutional integration between prevention, peacebuilding, and post-conflict support under current geopolitical constraints.

For the EU and France, this shift increases reliance on EU conflict-prevention and stabilisation instruments, including civilian missions and financial support mechanisms, at a time when these tools already face significant pressure.

Transnational Security Cooperation

This cluster covers technical and sectoral cooperation mechanisms that support global security governance, including frameworks on counterterrorism, cyber security, maritime security, counter-piracy, and conventional arms control.

These bodies do not impose binding security obligations or regulate the use of force. Their value lies in facilitating information-sharing, transparency, risk reduction, confidence-building, capacity-building, and operational coordination in addressing transnational threats.

Budgetary and Operational Impact of Unpaid U.S. Contributions

U.S. disengagement has also taken a financial form. The U.S. is assessed to contribute about 22% of the UN’s regular budget and 26% of the peacekeeping budget. As of December 2025, the UN faces around USD 1.6 billion in unpaid assessed contributions from Member States, with the U.S. representing the largest single share of outstanding dues across the regular and peacekeeping budgets.

This contributes to a broader liquidity crisis that Secretary-General António Guterres has described as among the UN’s most acute in years. He has warned that assessed contributions are legally binding obligations under the UN Charter, not voluntary pledges, and that late or non-payment undermines the organisation’s ability to function. Their suspension has constrained planning, reimbursement of troop-contributing countries, and core administrative and field operations, forcing the Secretariat to defer expenditures, slow deployment and procurement cycles, and resort to short-term internal borrowing.

This financial strain compounds the political effects of U.S. withdrawal from selected institutions. Even where mandates remain formally intact, unpredictable funding weakens operational capacity and erodes institutional credibility. Given the U.S. historical role as the UN’s largest contributor, persistent non-payment shifts financial pressure onto other member states and increases the risk of uneven and delayed implementation of mandates.

The U.S. National Security Strategy as Context

The January 2026 withdrawals are best understood in the context of the 2025 U.S. National Security Strategy (NSS), which advances a sovereignty-centred doctrine in which multilateral engagement is selective, transactional and subordinate to immediate national interests rather than a defining feature of U.S. global leadership. The strategy departs from the post-Cold War view that engagement in norm-setting and preventive institutions enhances U.S. power, instead prioritising freedom of action and domestic economic sovereignty.

Within this framework, the strategy highlights President Trump’s role in advancing the resolution or containment of conflicts through transactional mediation rather than through institutionalised multilateral processes. Democracy and human rights promotion is no longer presented as a central organising principle of U.S. external engagement. 

More broadly, the NSS signals a return to sphere-based thinking, drawing on elements of the Monroe Doctrine and what some analysts describe as a "Donroe Doctrine": selective engagement within clearly defined areas of primary interest, combined with disengagement from universal governance frameworks beyond those spheres.

In transatlantic terms, the NSS refers to the EU as "Europe," reflecting a state-centric framing of security responsibilities rather than the EU’s supranational role. Although NATO remains part of the strategic architecture, collective defence is treated as increasingly conditional, with greater emphasis placed on European allies’ responsibility for capabilities and burden-sharing.

Global Implications: Can Multilateral Governance Remain Effective?

Institutionally, the UN and the broader multilateral system will endure. Treaties remain in force, mandates continue to apply, and organisations will keep operating. The central challenge is not survival, but declining political weight and operational effectiveness under conditions of selective U.S. disengagement. As a principal architect of the post-war international order, U.S. withdrawal from normative and preventive institutions-while continuing to shape key security and economic decisions-weakens multilateralism. This effect is compounded by reduced U.S. financial contributions, given Washington’s historic role as a leading funder of UN agencies, peace operations, and specialised bodies.

U.S. disengagement also affects UN peacekeeping and humanitarian action. Even without a formal withdrawal from peacekeeping, reduced political backing and funding weaken early warning, mediation, and peacebuilding functions. Humanitarian agencies face acute constraints that limit their ability to deliver life-saving assistance in conflict-affected settings. Peacekeeping is increasingly narrowed to stabilisation and containment, with higher human and financial costs. 

In his latest speeches, UN SG Guterres described 2025 as a “profoundly challenging year for international cooperation,” warning that “powerful forces” are undermining global cooperation, humanitarian action, peace operations, and respect for international law. He warned that the international system is operating in a context of increasing chaos, driven by conflict, impunity, and widening inequality. The gap between political commitments and operational capacity continues to widen, increasing risks for both affected populations and UN personnel.

World leaders have expressed caution toward the "Board of Peace" announced by President Trump on 16 January - an informal, U.S.-led grouping of selected states intended to broker reconstruction of Gaza but also other conflict settlements outside UN frameworks. They have warned that expanding such ad hoc mechanisms risks sidelining the UN’s central role in international peace and security. President Trump invited President Macron to join the new body as well but the latter has declined the invitation, reaffirming its attachment to international law and the primacy of the UN Charter over the U.S.-designed ad hoc arrangements. President Donald Trump’s statement on 20 January that his Board of Peace "might" replace the UN is likely to compound concerns that the body will become a vehicle for him to supersede the body established 80 years ago to maintain global peace.

He warned that the international system is operating in a context of increasing chaos, driven by conflict, impunity, and widening inequality. The gap between political commitments and operational capacity continues to widen, increasing risks for both affected populations and UN personnel.

The "Board of Peace" Launched by President Trump

World leaders have expressed caution toward the “Board of Peace” announced by President Trump on 16 January viewing it as sidelining the UN’s central role in international peace and security. Initially presented as a mechanism to support post-conflict stabilization and reconstruction in Gaza on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in September 2025, the initiative has since been described as a format that could be applied to resolve other conflicts outside UN frameworks.  Trump has sent invitations to about 60 Heads of States to join the body. President Macron has explicitly declined the invitation, reaffirming its attachment to international law and the primacy of the UN Charter over the U.S.-designed ad hoc arrangements. Sweden and NATO member Norway have also adopted the same approach, while as of 21 January, Germany and Italy have not responded to the invitation and NATO member Canada has confirmed participation conditionally.

President Donald Trump’s statement on 20 January that his Board of Peace “might” replace the UN is likely to compound concerns that the body will become a vehicle for him to supersede the body established 80 years ago to maintain global peace. The proposed governance model—under which permanent membership would require a $1 billion financial contribution—has raised concerns about accessibility and the risk of framing peace governance through a pay-to-participate logic. Trump formally launched the Board of Peace by signing its founding charter during a ceremony on 22 January 2026 in Davos, on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum with participation of roughly 19 heads of states.

The Need for Profound UN Reform

U.S. disengagement is not necessarily permanent, as future administrations may revisit these choices. Yet uncertainty itself carries costs, undermining institutional stability and long-term planning. Whether or not the U.S. re-engages, the current selective withdrawal is accelerating the urgency of reform and testing the resilience of the multilateral system.

Beyond administrative efficiency, UN reform centres on the Security Council (SC) itself. The Council’s composition and decision-making practices remain misaligned with contemporary geopolitical realities. Persistent lack of action on major conflicts, uneven regional representation, and the extensive use of the veto reinforce perceptions that the Council reflects post-World War II power balance rather than today’s international order. In the context of selective U.S. disengagement from preventive and normative institutions, this imbalance further weakens the link between SC authority and the broader multilateral system.

Since the end of the Cold War, veto use in the UN SC has been highly uneven among its permanent members. Russia has exercised the veto most frequently, particularly since 2011, primarily on Syria and, more recently, Ukraine. The U.S. is the second most frequent user, largely in relation to the Israel-Palestine conflict. China has employed the veto more selectively, often alongside Russia on issues framed as sovereignty or non-interference. By contrast, France and the UK have used the veto rarely in recent decades, and France has not exercised it since 1989.

The EU and France have long argued that the SC must become more effective and credible through improved working methods, greater transparency, and stronger links with the General Assembly. France has supported the reform of the Council and promoted restraint in veto use in situations involving mass atrocities through the France-Mexico initiative, arguing that permanent members have a special responsibility to prevent large-scale violence.

Amid increasing geopolitical polarisation within the Security Council, the UN has not authorised a new peacekeeping mission for more than a decade, following the French-initiated establishment of the Stabilization Mission in the Central African Republic in 2014. Since then, Council activity has focused largely on renewing, adjusting or withdrawing existing missions.

EU and French Official Reactions to the U.S. Retreat from Multilateralism

The EU’s institutional response to the U.S. retreat from multilateral commitments has focused primarily on the climate dimension, expressing regret over U.S. withdrawals and reaffirming continued EU commitment to international climate cooperation and environmental governance. Beyond climate, EU representatives have reiterated support for human rights, gender equality, and the rules-based international order, but without articulating a consolidated political or institutional response proportionate to the scale of U.S. disengagement across multiple pillars of multilateral governance.

France’s reaction has been more explicitly political and strategic. In his annual speech to French ambassadors on 8 January 2026, President Emmanuel Macron warned that the U.S. was "breaking free from international rules," situating U.S. withdrawals within a wider erosion of its collective commitments. Macron has explicitly grounded France’s foreign policy in the principle of sovereignty and equality of nations as enshrined in the UN Charter. This framing has reiterated France’s continued support for Ukraine and its position recognising Greenland as an integral part of Denmark. At the World Economic Forum in Davos, President Macron warned on 20 January that the world is drifting toward "a world without rules," with international norms increasingly overshadowed by unilateral power dynamics. He stressed the importance of upholding international law and the rule of law, rejecting the dominance of "the law of the strongest" and calling for a reaffirmation of multilateral cooperation under established global legal frameworks.

Taken together, EU and French reactions reveal a divergence between institutional restraint at the EU level and a more assertive French effort to politically defend multilateralism, sovereignty, and collective rules in the face of U.S. disengagement. While the EU has prioritised continuity and reassurance, France has increasingly positioned itself as a political guarantor of multilateral norms-highlighting both leadership ambition and the limits of cohesion within Europe’s response.

Implications for the EU

U.S. withdrawal from multilateral commitments marks a qualitative shift in how multilateralism functions for the EU and France. The EU has long positioned itself as a normative power, projecting influence through rules, standards, and regulatory capacity -implicitly relying on sustained U.S. political backing. With that anchor weakened, maintaining institutional effectiveness, norms, and values increasingly requires greater EU political leadership, internal coherence, and a readiness to absorb higher diplomatic and financial costs across climate governance, peacebuilding, development coordination, human rights and democracy support, and crisis management.

The erosion of preventive multilateral mechanisms increases reliance on EU instruments under the Common Foreign and Security Policy, including CSDP missions and the European Peace Facility. Combined with the pressures generated by the war in Ukraine and the pursuit of European strategic autonomy, this expanded role risks overstretchingoverstretch unless accompanied by clearer prioritisation. In this context, multilateralism functions less as a channel for extending EU influence than as a system whose continued stability increasingly depends on sustained European engagement.

For France, as a permanent member of the UN SC and a key advocate of conflict prevention and UN-EU complementarity, U.S. disengagement from preventive and normative pillars makes France assert its responsibility for sustaining institutional coherence and political credibility. Within the EU, France’s position is seen by some partners as necessary leadership, while others remain concerned about uneven distribution of political, financial, and operational burdens. Domestically, continued multilateral engagement is supported by those who view it as essential to France’s international standing, but questioned by others who argue that even the current level of diplomatic and financial commitments represents a burden without tangible benefits.

Conclusion

The U.S. withdrawal from a broad range of multilateral institutions does not mark the end of multilateral governance, but it does represent a structural shift in how power, responsibility, and legitimacy are exercised within it. While disengaging primarily from normative, preventive, and humanitarian institutions, the U.S. retains influence over security and economic decision-making.

This selective approach narrows the scope of U.S. participation in multilateral frameworks and contributes to their contestation. Globally, this weakens the coherence and predictability of collective governance and intensifies pressure for UN reform. Concerns about effectiveness, legitimacy, and decision-making-especially within the Security Council-are intensifying as political commitment fragments and resources diminish.

For France, as a permanent member of the Security Council, this reinforces a structural responsibility to uphold institutional credibility and advance reforms necessary for multilateral governance to remain viable under changing geopolitical conditions.

Copyright image : Kena BETANCUR / AFP