At the Rio+20 Conference, held in Rio de Janeiro in June 2012, member states agreed to launch a process to develop a set of sustainable development goals (SDGs). With this decision, they made clear that they would draft the goals themselves (while the Millennium Development Goals had been drafted by UN experts). The Rio+20 Outcome Document did not elaborate specific goals but stated that the SDGs should be limited in number, aspirational and easy to communicate. The goals should address in a balanced way all three dimensions of sustainable development and be coherent with and integrated into the UN development agenda beyond 2015. A 30-member Open Working Group (OWG) of the General Assembly was tasked to prepare a proposal on the SDGs.

The Open Working Group was established on 22nd of January 2013 by decision 67/555 (see A/67/L.48/rev.1) of the General Assembly. Since more than 30 states were interested in joining the group, member states decided to use an innovative, constituency-based system of representation that is new to limited membership bodies of the General Assembly. This meant that most of the seats in the OWG were shared by several countries. The OWG met monthly from March 2013 to July 2014.

Non-governmental stakeholders were involved through the Major Groups. In its first eight sessions, the OWG focused on stocktaking, deliberating very openly on one or more specific topics in each session. Human rights and the right to development were discussed in Session 6 in December 2013, governance and peace were discussed in Session 8 in February 2014. From February to July 2014, the OWG drafted a proposal for SDGs to the General Assembly.