UN Secretary Generals have established a number of high-level panels to promote new thinking and to jump-start reform action by governments. However, the eminent members of such panels -- often former heads of state, foreign ministers and other luminaries -- are usually rather conservative and "realistic" and they rarely challenge existing power arrangements. Because the eminent persons are too busy to spend much time on their duties, much of the work of the panels devolves to a small core staff and particularly the powerful post of staff director. But there are exceptions, the Commission on Global Governance, who worked independently of the UN, produced an interesting and moderately creative report in 1994.
In his second term as Secretary General, Kofi Annan established three panels to make recommendations on UN reform. In 2004, the "Panel of Eminent Persons on United Nations-Civil Society Relations" released a report that drew much criticism from NGOs who feared that the proposed changes could weaken the role of NGOs at the UN. Later in that same year, the "Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change" released its report which discussed some controversial issues including Security Council enlargement and the "responsibility to protect" doctrine. Towards the very end of Annan's term, the "Panel on System-Wide Coherence" released a report proposing to streamline the UN's work in development, humanitarian assistance and the environment.
While these panels solicited broad inputs, their conclusions are generally tailored to please the US and other powerful players at the UN. If implemented, their proposals may or may not actually improve the workings of the world body. The books on UN reform by Brian Urquhart and Erskine Childers, though not the result of a panel process, remain by far the most thoughtful and original contributions to the UN reform discussion.
