Second World Summit for Social Development 2025: UN Global Horizon Scanning for Governance and Social Development

Join the UN Futures Lab/Global Hub and UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN DESA) for a side event at the Second World Summit for Social Development 2025: UN Global Horizon Scanning for Governance and Social Development. This event aims to contribute to the Solutions Sessions at the summit by engaging a diverse range of stakeholders to collaborate in:

Understanding the evolving and complex development landscape through key governance interlinkages from a social lens
Advancing the discourse on emerging solutions and challenges in shaping development futures through signals, trends, and drivers of change
Promoting lived experiences and diverse voices to Leave No One Behind through a facilitated participatory foresight process

Background

The Second World Summit for Social Development will take place in Doha, Qatar, from 4 to 6 November 2025, bringing together Heads of State and Government, Ministers, and Delegates from around the globe. Thirty years after the landmark 1995 Copenhagen Summit, the Summit will provide a unique opportunity to assess progress, address gaps, and renew global commitments to the three interrelated pillars of social development:

Poverty eradication
Full and productive employment and decent work for all
Social integration

Bringing together horizon scanning insights across the UN System in an efficient and accessible manner

In a world shaped by accelerating change, the ability to anticipate emerging risks and opportunities is critical for decision-makers across the UN system. Horizon scanning brings together the perspectives and collective intelligence of different stakeholders to map possible changes. These present a wealth of information on signals, trends, and drivers of change that can be harnessed to inform decision-making, planning, and programming. To this end, the UN Futures Lab/Global Hub and UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN DESA) are collaborating on the UN Global Horizon Scanning initiative to develop an AI tool that can efficiently harness, consolidate, and analyze insights of horizon scanning initiatives from across the UN system.

This joint project aims to help users to draw on existing intelligence to deepen analysis, bridge synergies, facilitate cross-fertilization, and motivate collaboration in advancing their work. Building on the enthusiasm generated during a panel discussion and live demonstration of the AI tool at the 2025 STI Forum side event, improvements have been introduced based on feedback from participants representing UN entities, government, non-government organizations, private sector, and academia/think tanks. This is part of an iterative process to ensure that the initiative can meaningfully support the UN’s delivery of its mandates to its stakeholders. The UN Global Horizon Scanning AI Tool will be launched in December 2025 and will be made accessible to the entire UN system; by drawing on strategic foresight methodologies and processes, the tool will thus support more forward-looking and anticipatory planning, programming, and decision-making across the UN’s work. The outcomes of the session will feed into the learning and scaling process of the UN Horizon Scanning initiative ahead of the official launch of the UN Global Horizon Scanning AI Tool in December 2025.

What to expect

This virtual side event will feature a brief introduction to the UN Global Horizon Scanning initiative, including a short live demo of the UN Global Horizon Scanning AI Tool. This will be followed by a presentation of emerging insights generated by the tool, with a specific focus on the Summit’s thematic priorities and the Draft Doha Political Declaration:

Emerging signals, trends, and drivers of change related to the Summit’s three pillars: (i) Poverty eradication, (ii) full employment, and (iii) social integration and their interlinkages with governance
Key interlinkages, convergences, and divergences among cross-cutting issues: (i) Governance; (ii) food security and nutrition, (iii) physical and mental health, (iv) digital transformation, (v) education, (vi) climate action (vii) disaster reduction, (viii) gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls, (ix) combatting racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia, and related intolerance (x) housing, water, and sanitation, (xi) ensuring safe, orderly, and regular migration pathways, and (xii) financing sustainable development

Participants will then engage in an interactive dialogue using virtual tools to allow for exchange and joint reflection, and a multistakeholder panel will unpack the implications of these insights on broader issues of governance, security, and human rights, with a specific focus on linking insights with decision-making.

Speakers and programme to be announced soon

Learn more and watch the recording of the STI Forum 2025 side event

Learn more about the Second World Summit for Social Development 2025