Corporate engagement and accountability and the UN’s Next Chapter
Implementing Action 55(c) of the Pact for the Future
A year after the adoption of the Pact for the Future and amid the UN80 reform process, the UN’s role must be redefined so it can be reinforced to meet the challenges of a changing world. In this new phase, the responsibility of business in contributing towards our global agendas on climate, nature, people, and AI can no longer be voluntary, it must become the norm.
When world leaders endorsed the Pact for the Future at the 2024 UN General Assembly, they signaled a collective effort to rebuild trust in a multilateral system under strain. One year on, that vision faces mounting pressure and the rules-based order seems increasingly fragile. Yet amidst the uncertainty and pushback, a quiet shift is still underway – one that positions the private sector as central to implementing global commitments.
In the margins of UNGA80 and New York Climate Week, the role of business is key across every major agenda, described as an “inescapable partner”. These conversations often focus on innovation and financing, but the underlying message is the private sector has a responsibility for people and planet, and the expectation for strong business leadership is needed now more than ever.
Action 55(c): driving business contribution and accountability
Action 55(c) calls for encouraging private sector contribution and strengthening its accountability in the implementation of UN agreements. The 2025 Seville Commitment, in paragraph 34(c), further affirms the need for UN Member States to clarify business responsibilities and guide their contribution to multilateral frameworks. Together, these provisions create an opportunity to redefine the role of the private sector in multilateralism.
This logic has precedent. The UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs) redefined expectations for corporate conduct across jurisdictions and industries setting a powerful global norm. More recently in 2021, the Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF)’s Target 15 commits Member States to ensure companies disclose their biodiversity impacts and dependencies, creating a global expectation for business and integrating business reporting into national obligations for the first time. This demonstrates how business responsibility can become articulated as part of UN agendas and therefore central to their delivery.
Furthermore, the Global Digital Compact (GDC), an annex of the Pact for the Future and central to UNGA80 discussions, illustrates how private sector responsibility can be embedded from the outset. It directly calls on companies to uphold digital rights, transparency, and responsible innovation and more, alongside Member State commitments, establishing a precedent for a shared governance in the digital space.
This approach was illustrated during High-Level Week with the launch of two major commitments from the GDC on AI governance: the Global Dialogue on AI and the Independent International Scientific Panel on AI. By promoting the ethical development and deployment of AI by technology companies, the UN is reasserting its role as a normative anchor, not through direct regulation or market enforcement, but by establishing shared standards for responsible digital behaviour.
Before the GDC, global discussions on digital development were largely dominated by a few major powers, such as the United States, China, Japan, India, and the United Kingdom. Since the Compact’s adoption, however, the entire UN membership now has a voice in shaping the digital future. UN Secretary-General António Guterres described this as “historic,” noting that “for the first time, every country will have a seat at the table of AI.” During High-Level Week, for example, Zambia spoke about Africa’s role in shaping the GDC[1] and the continent’s digital transformation, presenting its new national digital strategy[2] alongside other countries, including Nigeria, for the first time[3].
Why Action55(c) matters in the future of multilateralism
In today’s fragmented geopolitical climate, the UN’s continued legitimacy depends on its ability to move from setting commitments to driving implementation. This requires a whole-of-society approach, recognising that global goals can only be achieved through the participation and responsibility of all actors, including business.
This implies that the responsibility of business should therefore not be defined through member state-led negotiations. Like with the creation of the UN Guiding Principles for Business and Human Rights, we need a multi-stakeholder process to define the responsibility of business. Allowing business, investors, policy makers, civil society, and academia to sit at the table to come up with guiding principles that set out the responsibilities of business, as well as where they end in relation to the responsibilities of states. The outcome of this process can then be considered for adoption by member states.
This approach would also be in line with the Global Governance Innovation Report 2025. This report describes the need for stronger responsibility-based mindset in global environmental governance through embedding ‘Responsibility Chains’ – frameworks linking governments, corporations, investors, and consumers through shared accountability across production, consumption, emissions, and finance[4]. This approach operationalises the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities beyond states alone.
A global shift toward responsibility, reinforcing Action55(c)
A broad shift toward greater responsibility and accountability is taking place across the multilateral ecosystem, aiming to align business conduct more closely with global goals. These developments reinforce and operationalise the ambition of Action 55(c), which seeks to formalise private-sector contribution and accountability in implementing UN agreements.
The International Court of Justice’s recent advisory opinion on climate obligations affirmed that parties of the UNFCCC have an obligation to adopt measures to mitigate and adapt to climate change, meaning that the Paris Agreement and COP decisions are likely to increasingly serve as references for the work of national courts [5]. Although the Paris Agreement and its Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) do not explicitly define corporate responsibilities, achieving national climate goals depends heavily on private sector action. Companies must therefore develop credible transition plans aligned with national implementation pathways. However, recent research from WBA indicates that only 12% of companies in high-emitting sectors currently have targets consistent with limiting global warming to 1.5°C[6]. This concern is shared by a growing coalition of stakeholders. Notably, COP30 President Ambassador André Corrêa do Lago, who in his Seventh Letter to Parties, underscored the urgent role of the private sector in accelerating the energy transition and identified business integration into global processes as one of his six key priorities.
At the same time, innovative fiscal mechanisms are embedding responsibility into practice. The Global Solidarity Levies Initiative – championed by Barbados, France, and Kenya – proposes levies on high-emitting industries to fund climate adaptation, anchored in the principle that polluters must pay. Similarly, the Cali Fund, launched under the Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) with support from the UK and Chile, ensures that companies benefiting from genetic resources contribute to conservation and restoration. Together, these developments reflect a shared principle, companies that benefit from global systems must help sustain them, while those that degrade them must contribute to their repair.
This broader growing momentum provides a strong foundation for advancing Action 55(c) as a mechanism to consolidate and connect these emerging norms of corporate responsibility within the multilateral system.
Driving Action 55(c) forward: next steps
As Action 55(c) is implemented under the mandate of the UN Global Compact, momentum is growing to embed corporate accountability as a system-wide UN function. WBA’s collaboration with the UN Global Compact, including a high-level multistakeholder roundtable during UNGA80, highlighted that the transformative potential of Action 55(c) lies in connecting existing initiatives and defining shared responsibilities across global frameworks. Action 55(c) therefore provides a blueprint for renewing multilateralism through collective corporate accountability.
As we look ahead to COP30 in Belém and the Second World Summit for Social Development, WBA will continue to advance Action 55(c), connecting global commitments with evidence of business performance to ensure multilateralism delivers tangible outcomes for people and planet.
[1] https://efficacynews.africa/2025/09/23/zambia-highlights-africas-role-in-shaping-the-global-digital-compact/
[2] https://www.mots.gov.zm/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/National-Digital-Transformation-Strategy.pdf
[3] https://www.trade.gov/country-commercial-guides/nigeria-digital-economy
[4]
[5] https://plataformacipo.org/en/publications/policy-brief-cop30-addressing-implementation-volume-2-n-4-2025/
[6] https://www.worldbenchmarkingalliance.org/news/2021-2024-in-review-lessons-on-corporate-climate-preparedness/
