The only guiding text, Article 97 of the United Nations Charter, states "The Secretary-General shall be appointed by the General Assembly upon the recommendation of the Security Council."
To break the deadlocked selection of 1981, the Security Council began to take straw polls by secret ballot.
[6] Several months before the current secretary-general's term ends, a straw poll is taken by secret ballot among the members of the Security Council using a form of score voting.
[8][9][10] The voting is restricted to a small group of countries, takes place in secret, goes through multiple rounds, and is easily deadlocked.
No candidate from the Permanent Five has ever been nominated for the position of secretary-general, as it would increase the concentration of power in the United Nations.
However, the Soviet Union opposed him on geographical grounds, since the permanent headquarters of the United Nations would be in North America.
The permanent members then agreed on Trygve Lie of Norway, who had lost the election for president of the General Assembly to Paul-Henri Spaak of Belgium.
The United States argued that the General Assembly could extend Lie's term without a recommendation from the Security Council.
When a Latin American candidate appeared likely to win selection, the United States threatened to cast its first veto in the Security Council.
With no other candidate able to win the required seven-vote majority, the Security Council informed the General Assembly that it could not make a recommendation.
The Soviet Union had vetoed Lie's re-selection in 1950, and it considered the General Assembly's extension of his term in 1950 to be illegitimate.
With negotiations for a Korean Armistice Agreement in progress, Lie felt that a new secretary-general could restore a working relationship with the Soviet Union.
Both superpowers experienced a change of government during the selection, with Dwight Eisenhower's inauguration in January 1953 and Joseph Stalin's death in March 1953.
After three weeks of negotiations, France proposed Dag Hammarskjöld of Sweden, a candidate so obscure that the U.S. State Department was initially uncertain who he was.
[32] After a week of negotiation, the Soviet Union and the United States agreed on U Thant of Burma to take over Hammarskjöld's role.
However, the two superpowers deadlocked for four weeks on how many assistant secretaries-general there would be, with the United States insisting on five,[33] and the Soviet Union proposing three, four, six, or seven.
His re-selection was subsequently assured when Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev made several favourable references to Thant in letters to U.S. President John F.
After serving the equivalent of two full terms, U Thant announced his intention to step down as secretary-general at the end of 1971.
The Soviet Union attempted to draft Thant to stay in office,[43] but the United States promised to veto him so that he could retire.
[44] Max Jakobson of Finland was the leading candidate for most of the race,[45] but Kurt Waldheim of Austria won the most votes in the first round.
Prior to the third round, the U.S. and U.K. delegations received instructions to prevent Waldheim from being selected, but they decided to abstain and rely on the Chinese veto.
Javier Pérez de Cuéllar was selected for a term beginning on 1 January 1982, becoming the first secretary-general from Latin America.
The Non-Aligned Movement, whose members collectively hold a majority of the votes in the General Assembly, endorsed all of the candidates nominated by the OAU.
[50] However, the other four permanent members of the Security Council rejected the principle of regional rotation, and several non-African candidates were nominated during the straw polling.
In the sixth round, several of Chidzero's supporters abandoned him, fearing a United States scheme to prolong the voting and make room for a compromise candidate.
[52] After other members of the Security Council failed to persuade the United States to change its position, Boutros-Ghali suspended his candidacy on 5 December 1996.
The deadlock was broken when France abstained in the final round, allowing Kofi Annan of Ghana to win with a vote of 14-0-1.
Former Prime Minister of Portugal António Guterres led the polling from the first round and never lost the lead.