In the recent past there have been several high-profile unilateral, bilateral and multilateral declarations calling for a world free of nuclear weapons, further efforts to prevent proliferation and initiatives to secure nuclear material from falling into the hands of non-state actors, particularly terrorists groups. This work seeks to provide a concise and comprehensive analysis of the role of global institutions in this campaign. This work: provides a brief historical survey of the key international institutions as well as their major achievements details the new challenges that confront these institutions, particularly in the post-Cold War world analyses examine the role of the ad-hoc arrangements which emerged to address these specific challenges and their impact on the existing international institutions that they were meant to strengthen suggests a series of initiatives both ad-hoc and institutionalized which could reform and reinvigorate the institutions to carry out their widening and deepening mandates evaluates the prospects of these institutions in not only carrying out their basic disarmament and non-proliferation mandates but also establishing the norms and code of conduct for an eventual world free of nuclear weapons. Seeking to establish the reasons behind the inability of international institutions to carry out their mandates, and examining what will be necessary to ensure the future success of these initiatives, this work is an invaluable resource for all students, scholars and policy makers.