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U.S. President Donald Trump’s launch of the Board of Peace at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last week has been condemned as an imperial project and mocked for the motley crew that it attracted. Yet the derision cannot mask the geopolitical audacity of the initiative. Whether or not it succeeds, Trump’s Board of Peace already amounts to the most sweeping attempt to modify—if not supplant—the global order established in 1945. Unlike the many rhetorical assaults on the United Nations over the decades, Trump has produced a format and potential institution that could one day rival the U.N.

The Board of Peace began as a mechanism with a limited mandate to promote peace and reconstruction in Gaza following its pummeling by Israel after the brutal Hamas attack of October 2023. Last November, U.N. Security Council Resolution 2803 authorized Trump personally to lead this board. Trump has boldly expanded that mandate to cover peace and security beyond Gaza. He has not bothered to deny the growing accusations that his real goal is to marginalize the Security Council itself.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s launch of the Board of Peace at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last week has been condemned as an imperial project and mocked for the motley crew that it attracted. Yet the derision cannot mask the geopolitical audacity of the initiative. Whether or not it succeeds, Trump’s Board of Peace already amounts to the most sweeping attempt to modify—if not supplant—the global order established in 1945. Unlike the many rhetorical assaults on the United Nations over the decades, Trump has produced a format and potential institution that could one day rival the U.N.

The Board of Peace began as a mechanism with a limited mandate to promote peace and reconstruction in Gaza following its pummeling by Israel after the brutal Hamas attack of October 2023. Last November, U.N. Security Council Resolution 2803 authorized Trump personally to lead this board. Trump has boldly expanded that mandate to cover peace and security beyond Gaza. He has not bothered to deny the growing accusations that his real goal is to marginalize the Security Council itself.

Given the sweeping ambition of Trump’s board, one might have expected the BRICS forum—the self-appointed vanguard of anti-hegemonic politics and the champion of the global south—to rain fire on the U.S. president. But the BRICS turned out to be the lion that did not roar. Instead of confronting Trump, many of its members and aspirants have facilitated his project by either quietly joining or looking the other way.

The Board of Peace is structured around a powerful executive chair—Trump himself—with control over its........

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