New book highlights the enduring relevance of the UN Charter in its 80th year
This year, 2025, marks the 80th anniversary of the United Nations Charter (the Charter) – a landmark document that continues to serve as the bedrock of international law and global cooperation. In honour of this milestone, the International Bar Association (IBA), through its Special Projects Fund, provided financial support for the research and publication of a new book titled The UN Charter: Five Pillars for Humankind. This comprehensive work explores the origins of the Charter, its five fundamental pillars – peace and security, human rights, economic and social progress, international law, and peacemaking – and the ongoing relevance of these purposes and principles in today’s interconnected world.
In the book, authors Dr Mark Ellis, IBA Executive Director, and Ambassador David J Scheffer, Professor of Practice at Arizona State University, frame the Charter as ‘the most important secular document.’ They reaffirm the Charter’s role in upholding the universal principles of human conduct and emphasise the ongoing responsibility of signatory nations to honour those values, including protecting international human rights and fundamental freedoms, respecting the rulings of the UN’s principal organs such as the International Court of Justice, and maintaining international peace and security.
Mary Robinson, a former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and a past President of Ireland, penned the book’s foreword. In it she stated: ‘Throughout decades of public service at the national and international levels, I have regarded the United Nations Charter as the foundational constitutional document to guide governments, international organizations, and the global populace. The U.N. Charter establishes, for the ages, both aspirational goals and the institutional means (particularly through the United Nations and its specialized agencies) to achieve them. The fact that the U.N. Charter is sometimes overshadowed in the chaos of daily policymaking across the world or challenged by skeptics questioning its relevance does not diminish its significance.’
Ms Robinson notes in the foreword: ‘With the 80th anniversary of the U.N. Charter unfolding in the year 2025, David J. Scheffer and Mark S. Ellis have written this book honoring the continuous and critical relevance of the Charter in the management of world affairs. They make the case that the Charter indeed remains “the world’s most important secular document.” I know from my own lifetime of experiences the truth of that maxim.’
As well as outlining the principles enshrined in the Charter, the book addresses contemporary ‘existential challenges’ – climate change, wars of aggression, pandemics, large-scale migration, rising authoritarianism, threats from artificial intelligence (AI) and nuclear proliferation – that may initially appear far removed from the creation of the Charter in the 1940s, but which the authors argue should be governed by the same foundational principles. The authors advocate for a modern interpretation of the Charter’s provisions to ensure their continuing relevance when facing these challenges.
In addition, the book delves into the history of how the UN was created; the agreements and alliances that pre-dated the Charter, including the Covenant of the League of Nations in 1919 and the Atlantic Charter in 1941, and the aspirations of nations’ leaders following the end of the Second World War, to develop an international system that would ensure such destruction remained in the past and would never re-emerge.
In the introduction to The UN Charter: Five Pillars for Humankind, the authors write: ‘We have written this book about the U.N. Charter […] First and foremost […] to reintroduce the Charter to current generations of global citizens and to explain the Charter’s lasting significance in managing life on Planet Earth.’
Dr Ellis commented: ‘With its tenets guiding us through the complexities of contemporary challenges, the United Nations Charter remains the foundational document of international law and should serve as a crucial moral compass for the global community and reaffirm our collective obligation to uphold human rights, peace, and security for all.’
Ambassador Scheffer said: ‘The United Nations Charter is not merely a historical artifact. Its fundamental ideas are more pertinent now than ever before, offering the necessary framework to deal with existential concerns and to ensure that justice, human dignity and the pursuit of peace are central to international relations.’
The beginning of the UN Charter reads: ‘We the peoples of the United Nations determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind.’
Hans Corell, Former Under-Secretary-General for Legal Affairs and the Legal Counsel of the United Nations said of The UN Charter: Five Pillars for Humankind: ‘This is an extraordinary book. An excellent combination of history and future. It should definitely be used widely in educating present and coming generations about the importance of the UN and international law. It should also be read by representatives of UN member states, in particular of the P5 of the UN Security Council. It is unacceptable that all of them do not consequently perform as required by the UN Charter.’
The first edition of The UN Charter: Five Pillars for Humankind, was released by Springer on 23 July 2025.
ENDS
Contact: IBApressoffice@int-bar.org
Notes to the reader:
- Click here or here to purchase a copy of The UN Charter: Five Pillars for Humankind.
- The authors of The UN Charter: Five Pillars for Humankind, both distinguished legal experts, bring decades of experience in human rights, international law, and diplomacy. Dr Mark Ellis served as Legal Advisor to the Independent International Commission on Kosovo, was the first Executive Director of the Central European and Eurasian Law Initiative (CEELI), is a Fellow of King’s College, London, and received the Order–Defender of the Ukrainian Bar in 2022. Ambassador David J Scheffer is a Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and served as the first United States Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Issues (1997–2001) and was the UN Secretary General's Special Expert for UN assistance to the Khmer Rouge Trials (2012-2018).
- Related material:
- The International Bar Association (IBA), the global voice of the legal profession, is the foremost organisation for international legal practitioners, bar associations, and law societies. Established in 1947, shortly after the creation of the United Nations, with the aim of protecting and promoting the rule of law globally, it was born out of the conviction that an organisation made up of the world's bar associations could contribute to global stability and peace through the administration of justice.
- The book was funded by the IBA’s Special Projects Fund so the authors could secure research assistance and other support. Without this funding, completing this important book would not have been possible.
- Find the IBA on social media here:
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