At the dawn of 2026, this Preface Article to the EPL Special Issue 56 (1–2) provides a brief stocktaking since the “global wellbeing is in jeopardy” as the humankind's consumption is “at the rate of 1.7 planets a year”. The UN Charter originally did not contain any reference to the word ‘environment’ or ‘sustainability.’ Yet it's spirit can be traced to some Charter provisions and words embedded therein. Over the years, the UN has played the vanguard role for the global environment protection, global commons and sustainable development. Over the last 65 years after the 1960 UNGA resolution 1514 (1960), the UN has tried best to navigate between global developmental requirements and environmental imperatives. Upon the UN attaining historic milestone of 80-years in 2025, the new global headwinds brought intense pressures, humanitarian crises, persistent violent conflicts (affecting two billion people) geopolitical divisions and non-payment of UN's ‘assessed contributions’ reducing it to the “brink of bankruptcy”. The year of 2026 has arrived in the backdrop of 50-years (1975–2025) of UN processes for “revitalization” to make it fit for remaining part of the twenty-first Century. The future trajectory of the UN in the protection of the global environment need to be seen in this context. This preface-cum-article seeks to briefly provide a stocktaking and a look ahead for the UN's future role amid funding crunch, withdrawals from environmental entities and sidelining of the UN from its core function of maintenance of peace and security. 2026 has brought a renewed hope in the election process of the 10 th UNSG to lead the UN in 2027 to vindicate the solemn dedication to “We, the Peoples”. The article modestly urges for an audacity of hope and invites balanced ideational scholarly contributions to lead the way for securing our common planetary future in the UN-led world order.
Bharat H Desai (2026) studied this question.