WASHINGTON, D.C. — Americans rate the United Nations’ performance more negatively than positively on achieving five of its key objectives. They are least critical of the UN’s humanitarian assistance work, with 53% rating its performance as poor and 45% as good, and most critical of its efforts to maintain international peace and security, with 73% rating its performance as poor. Seven in 10 Americans also rate the UN poorly on protecting human rights and upholding international law. Slightly fewer, 63%, rate it poorly for supporting sustainable development.
These data are from a Sept. 1-14 web survey of more than 2,000 members of Gallup’s probability-based panel, conducted ahead of the General Debate portion of the United Nations General Assembly meetings.
The poll comes at a time when the international community faces many challenges, including conflicts between Russia and Ukraine, Israel and Hamas, and Iran and the United States.
The negative ratings of the United Nations are consistent with Americans’ recent evaluations of the organization’s overall job performance, with about six in 10 saying it is doing a poor job of solving the problems it has faced.
However, Americans still hold positive attitudes about the UN as an organization and its missions. Solid majorities believe the United Nations plays a necessary role in the world, that it should take a leading or major role in world affairs, and that the United States should remain a member. Gallup’s World Poll also finds broad approval globally of the UN as an institution.
Democrats Have More Positive Views of the United Nations
Opinions of the United Nations’ job performance vary most by partisanship, with Democrats more positive than Republicans and independents. Independents’ views tend to be closer to those of Republicans than of Democrats.
All three party groups rate the UN best on humanitarian assistance, with 55% of Democrats, 43% of independents and 36% of Republicans saying it is doing a good job in this area. The three groups all rate the UN least positively for maintaining international peace, with 32% of Democrats, 23% of independents and 19% of Republicans saying the UN is doing a good job.
College graduates are significantly more positive than non-college graduates in their views of the UN’s humanitarian efforts (51% vs. 41%, respectively) and support of sustainable development (39% vs. 32%). But educational subgroups rate the UN similarly on the other three dimensions.
Americans across all age groups generally hold similar views on how the United Nations is handling its major responsibilities.
Bottom Line
As has been the case for most of the past two decades, Americans support the United Nations as an institution but don’t think it is doing an effective job of handling the problems it has faced. The last time a majority of Americans approved of the job the UN was doing was in the period after 9/11. The UN has many global roles beyond keeping the peace, but even in those areas, Americans are more critical than approving of its performance.
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