"In this episode of the ACUNS Current Issues Podcast series, host Gwenith Cross speaks with Sam Daws, Director of the Project on United Nations Governance and Reform at the University of Oxford. Mr Daws discusses the UN’s future role and how it must adapt to remain credible in a rapidly changing world. He praises the UN’s track record in keeping the peace but argues that sustaining peace and preventing future conflict will require a greater integration of the UN’s development, humanitarian and peace and security pillars. He outlines how the involvement of women makes a vital contribution to the peaceful settlement of disputes, and advocates that they should hold more leadership positions. He describes the transformative shifts underpinning the new Sustainable Development Goals: a human rights based approach, putting climate change and social equity at the core, economic transformation for jobs, peaceful societies and accountable institutions, and a new global partnership based on solidarity and mutual accountability between North and South. He explains that traditional aid is being supplanted by foreign investment, remittances and local taxation, and that harnessing innovation and new scientific discoveries will transform the trajectory of international development The next Secretary General must lead a radical transformation of how the UN works, but there are many exceptional women and men able to rise to this challenge."