Hitting the Ground Running: Annual Finnish Workshop for Incoming Members
The 22nd annual workshop for incoming members of the UN Security Council, titled “Hitting the Ground Running”, will be held on 21 and 22 November on Long Island, New York. The government of Finland is convening the workshop in cooperation with Security Council Report (SCR) and the Security Council Affairs Division of the UN Department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs (SCAD). Hanna Serwaa Tetteh, former Foreign Minister of Ghana and former Special Envoy of the Secretary-General for the Horn of Africa, will give the keynote address via videoconference.
Since 2003, the “Finnish Workshop” has provided an informal and interactive environment for frank discussion among current and incoming Council members about the inner workings of the Security Council. Denmark, Greece, Pakistan, Panama, and Somalia will serve on the Council in 2025-2026. Alongside other opportunities to prepare for Council membership, this workshop has helped incoming members to ‘hit the ground running’ when they enter the Council on 1 January. The workshop informs the incoming members about the demands and expectations of being an elected member and allows outgoing members to share advice and highlight lessons learned as they conclude their Council terms.
As in previous years, the workshop will be divided into three sessions. In the first session, participants will take stock of the Council’s performance in fulfilling its primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security. Members will also be encouraged to assess the challenges and opportunities of the year ahead. Questions that could be addressed include:
- How can Council members overcome their divisions to achieve constructive outcomes?
- What more could the Council do to ensure that its resolutions are implemented in practice?
- What steps can the Council take to better support UN peace operations and UN peace operation transitions?
- How could the Council undertake a bigger role in conflict prevention and peacebuilding?
The second session will focus on the Security Council’s working methods and its subsidiary bodies. Among the issues that might be addressed include how to promote a more equitable distribution of work among permanent and elected members; how to facilitate greater Council engagement with UN officials and concerned parties in the field for better follow up on the implementation of Council resolutions; ways to improve the Council’s interaction with organs such as the General Assembly and the Peacebuilding Commission (PBC); and how can the Council make more effective use of visiting missions.
In the third session, the outgoing Council members (Ecuador, Japan, Malta, Mozambique, and Switzerland) will reflect on their time on the Council and impart lessons learned. This session, which was added to the workshop’s agenda in 2007, offers an opportunity for the members who are ending their terms this year to share their insights on how to manage the workload in the Council, how to navigate difficult dynamics among members, and, in general, how to be an effective Council member.
Following the workshop, a report of the discussions—which are conducted under the Chatham House rule of non-attribution—will be published as an annex to a letter from the Permanent Representative of Finland to the President of the Security Council. The substance of the discussions is shared, but comments are not attributed to any of the participants.
Reports of this workshop since it began in 2003 can be found here.
