 Today, a youth challenge has been mounted to the way we live, organize and govern ourselves that is much bigger than the UN alone. I would wager that my generation will have the keys seized from us. The UN has to be part of that future or pushed aside by it. I want to suggest, therefore, a manifesto for a repurposed UN that is both true to its charter but recognises the direction the winds are blowing. The protests of a generation cannot be brushed under the COVID carpet much longer. When the UN has touched the stars, that lift has come from civil society, not government. It is a call for the UN to seize the moment at a time of global crisis, to recover its relevance and to drive a new global consensus on tackling our collective weakness that COVID has so cruelly exposed and reinforced. There is a majority out there for a better governed and prepared, more caring and inclusive world, but that same majority has grown terminally impatient with existing institutions. The UN can be part of that failed past or attach itself to an emerging future. Let the campaign begin.