No, the United Nations hasn't planned the 'Great Replacement'

The claim

In a viral TikTok video, British far-right activist Tommy Robinson (real name Stephen Yaxley-Lennon) claims that the United Nations (U.N.) is the mastermind behind the so-called "Great Replacement."

"[In] every one of our countries, we're being replaced. There's a 177-page document from the United Nations on their plan to do this. This is planned," Robinson says in the video clip, which was uploaded to TikTok by an account dedicated to "U.K. News and Opinion." 

The TikTok (archived here) has been viewed over 87,000 times in five days, and many of the comments applaud Robinson for "speaking the truth" and "stating facts." Logically Facts was able to trace the clip to a ten-minute YouTube interview by a U.S. pro-Trump influencer that has been watched over 154,000 times since it was first published on August 14

However, the Great Replacement is a baseless far-right conspiracy theory, and the U.N. document Robinson is referring to is a study, not an executive order.

For context

Robinson has appeared frequently in the media recently as human rights groups such as HOPE not Hate have accused him of fuelling the racist riots that followed the knife attack in Southport, U.K., on July 29. Among other things, Robinson has amplified false reports claiming the attacker was an asylum seeker, described the riots as a result of "legitimate concerns," and called on his followers to join upcoming riots. 

His social media presence has been significantly boosted in the aftermath, with Robinson's X posts receiving five times as many daily views in the week following the stabbings, according to the Center for Countering Digital Hate. Similarly, an analysis by the Independent shows that social media videos with the keyword Tommy Robinson have gained more than 174.8 million views in the past month.

The idea that white Europeans are being "replaced" stems from the far-right Great Replacement conspiracy theory, which purports that mass migration from the Global South is an existential threat to white Europeans who, due to low birthrates, will become a minority in their own countries within a few generations. Tapping into grievances held in other conspiracy theory camps such as QAnon, this is often said to be the workings of a shadowy, globalist elite working behind the scenes, with progressive politicians, tech giants, and the media as its silent accomplices. 

However, the theory is unsubstantiated, and attempts to legitimize it have been debunked countless times (here, here, here, here, and here, for example). Robinson himself has also been fact-checked several times for spreading false information.

What about the U.N. document?

The U.N. document Robinson refers to is a 2000 report titled "Replacement Migration: Is it A Solution to Declining and Ageing Populations?". 

Published by the Population Division of the U.N. Secretariat's Department of Economic and Social Affairs, the study aims to explore whether immigration can be used to offset the demographic imbalance created by lower birth rates and higher life expectancies. That's because an imbalance between the ratio of the working-age population and the old-age population (the so-called potential support ratio) presents a demographic and economic challenge; it slows down GDP growth, requires more public funding to be spent on healthcare services, and means the working-age population will need to pay more to support the elderly. The study analyzed five scenarios in which replacement migration is used to achieve specific population objectives by 2050 in eight low-fertility countries and two regions. 

Importantly, the study finds that "maintaining potential support ratios at current levels through replacement migration alone seems out of reach, because of the extraordinarily large numbers of migrants that would be required." Instead, the report found that, in most cases, the current balance between the working-age and elderly population could be maintained by increasing the retirement age to 75. 

In other words, the report does not in any way act as a blueprint for a global replacement of white Europeans, as suggested by Robinson. PolitiFact reached the same conclusion in 2018 when Infowars claimed it had revealed a "U.N. plan to flood America with 600 million migrants."

Furthermore, the U.N. does not have the power to execute such an operation, as Robinson claims.

"The U.N. doesn't have that authority, and the document is an analytical report about demographics," Pål Wrange, a law professor focused on international law at Stockholm University, told Logically Facts. "The U.N. publishes all kinds of reports, partially to identify a mutual interest but also to make it easier for member states to make decisions."

Additionally, Wrange highlights that the report was published by the Population Division of the U.N. Secretariat's Department of Economic and Social Affairs rather than the Security Council—the latter of which is the only U.N. department with any decision-making authority.

The Security Council is the main global body for addressing threats to international peace and security. As such, it has the power to impose sanctions, authorize the use of force, deploy peacekeeping missions, and impose binding obligations on the 193 Member States. It consists of five permanent members – China, France, Russia, the U.K., and the U.S. – that can veto any resolution, plus ten additional elected Members that serve two-year terms.

"The chances of the major powers in the Security Council agreeing to introduce large-scale migration are less than microscopic," Wrange said. "Immigration has been discussed by the Security Council before, but in more of a negative way – that it constitutes a threat to security."

The verdict

The Great Replacement is a debunked conspiracy theory, and the 177-page U.N. "plan" to replace white Europeans is, upon examination, a demographical study that found large-scale immigration to be an unviable solution to population decline. Therefore, we have rated this claim as false.