The Delegate's Playbook – A MUN Masterclass

Model UN becomes a personal skills lab, with five seconds of courage to participate, invite others, and refine a working paper to unlock your potential for MUN success.

Explore the three-act flow of a Model UN committee: impressions, building, and culmination. Learn to establish collaboration, build alliances, and push for votes on a draft resolution.

Embrace the MaldiWen mindset to shed insecurity and reveal your best self in committee sessions, turning nerves about appearance or speech into confident performance.

Learn how moderated caucus, the formal part where the chair calls on delegations to speak, contrasts with unmoderated caucus, an open floor for collaboration and team formation.

Learn the need-to-know motions and rules of procedure for model UN. Use moderated and unmoderated caucus motions to push your country's agenda forward.

level up your speeches by naming your delegation at the start and end, shouting out another country to show listening, and pushing a meaningful idea that advances your agenda.

Use purposeful hand gestures to enunciate your points, keep motions in a center zone from shoulders to hips, avoid fidgeting, and invite the audience with confident microphone handling.

Learn to raise your placard and speak without a fully written speech by using a few bullet notes, building confidence, and advancing the committee's agenda.

Define and build effective working papers and draft resolutions, including preambulatory and operative clauses, to pass a paper and succeed in committee sessions.

Define preambulatory and operative clauses, explain their roles in working papers versus draft resolutions, and describe how the preambulatory setup matches the operative details to address a specific issue.

Develop precise operative clauses for Model UN by expanding detail and specificity, clarifying implications, and aligning action with the preambulatory context and the R2P framework.

Collaborate with your block and co delegate to build strong papers and draft resolutions, optimize time during unmoderated and moderated caucuses, and align on alliances to craft a better paper.

Master the dos and don'ts of clauses by building unique openings, creating detailed preambulatory and operative clauses, and using a pen when finalizing draft resolutions.

Learn to navigate the chaos of unmoderated caucuses by forming strategic blocks, adopting roamer and anchor roles, and maximizing your influence to climb the MUN ladder.

The roamer, a mobile half of the delegation, recruits support with quick 2–3 minute talks and acts as the eyes and ears of the bloc, reporting before unmoderated caucus.

Bridge the gap between moderated and unmoderated caucuses to maintain momentum, using block announcements to recruit allies and anchor progress.

Master effective blocks and unmoderated caucuses by applying organizational tips to transform chaos into productive discussion, while building lasting delegate relationships beyond the committee.

Forge alliances in your Model UN by using a threats and targets list to map enemies and allies, collaborate with your co-delegate, and grow your reputation beyond the committee.

Offer small acts of kindness, like gum or snacks, to break the ice and build alliances in committee bit by bit, without bribery or expectations.

Practice elevating others in committee sessions by sharing the spotlight, praising good ideas, inviting quieter delegates, and building inclusive alliances that earn respect.

Make consistent first impressions with every committee member by actively listening and engaging. Build a reputation as a diligent, reliable, trustworthy, and kind delegate who feels human.

Learn to go on offense for policy disagreements without personal attacks, and to handle rude delegates diplomatically, balancing firmness with tact.

Go on offense by drafting opposing papers, amending language, and securing sponsors and signatories to defend your country's interests in committee.

Explore the right of reply in parliamentary procedure, where a delegate can address attacks on character or motives. Avoid such interruptions by stating facts about policies and working papers.