Brookings: Topics - Group of Eight

More Effective Aid: the G8’s Approach to Food Security

David Gartner and Homi Kharas — Fri, 18 May 2012 15:11:00 -0400

As G-8 leaders meet to review their progress around the 2009 L’Aquila commitments on food security, they should borrow lessons from previous G-8 initiatives and foster more participatory and performance-based institutions. In the 21st century, the state-centric paradigm of development must increasingly embrace a greater role for non-state actors in order to successfully leverage resources, catalyze effective implementation and achieve results. The focus on private sector investment in food security at this year’s G-8 summit reflects this reality, however key governance structures have not yet adopted the best practices from earlier G-8 initiatives in fields such as global health. The Global Agriculture and Food Security Program (GAFSP) should move toward more participatory governance, especially at the country-level, and more performance-driven approaches to allocating resources to those countries facing the greatest risk of malnutrition.

As we found in a recent paper examining vertical funds across global health, education and agriculture, the structural characteristics of development institutions are critical to shaping their ultimate impact. More independent, more participatory and more performance-based vertical funds are outperforming less independent, less participatory, and less performance-based vertical funds when it comes to resource mobilization, learning and development impact. In the agriculture sector, GAFSP reflects some of these insights in that it allows civil society organizations to be non-voting members of its board and requires that 30 percent of its public sector window investments be assessed through rigorous impact evaluations. However, GAFSP does not engage adequately with non-state actors to scale up programs, has limited mechanisms for country-level participation, and does not yet explicitly tie future funding flows to performance.

In the wake of the 2009 L’Aquila commitments, there was initially a significant increase in agricultural funding in 2010. However, only seven of the 40 donors in L’Aquila have actually pledged resources to the GAFSP and less than one-quarter of the $22 billion commitment was disbursed as of last July. In addition, just 17 percent of all agricultural aid is currently directed towards the 25 countries with the highest levels of hunger. The latest round of proposals to GAFSP is slated to total less than one percent of the L’Aquila commitment and multilateral vertical funds still represent less than one-quarter of funding for the sector. In order to come close to meeting the original G-8 commitment, more effective global financing mechanisms and more diverse implementers will be required along with more robust commitments of resources from G-8 countries and private actors.

The G-8 should support a greater role for non-state actors in the governance and implementation of GAFSP resources as it seeks higher levels of investment from private actors. Specifically, it should require all national plans that it funds to be truly country-driven with civil society actors actively involved in creating and implementing the underlying strategy. In addition, GAFSP should encourage non-state actors, as well as national governments, to scale up initiatives using its resources in order to expand the capacity to rapidly scale-up impact. Finally, GAFSP should more explicitly embrace a performance-driven model of financing by requiring that funding flows for all recipients be tied to their contribution to achieving key targets, including reducing malnutrition and improving small-holder productivity. With stronger financial backing from the G8 and reforms along these lines, the GAFSP could make an important contribution to furthering food security.

Authors

Image Source: Reuters

The Other Half of the Battle: Obama, the G8 and Food Security in Africa

Mwangi S. Kimenyi and Witney Schneidman — Fri, 18 May 2012 14:21:00 -0400

Tomorrow in Chicago, President Obama will roll out phase two of his administration’s signature food security initiative, Feed the Future. In order to underscore the importance that he attaches to this flagship program, Obama has invited the leaders of Ethiopia, Benin, Tanzania and Ghana – which are all key Feed the Future partner countries – to participate in the G-8 meeting on Saturday at Camp David.

There is no question that food security deserves to be discussed as a priority at the G-8. One-quarter of the people in sub-Saharan Africa are undernourished and one-third of African children are stunted in their development. As Helen Clark, the administrator of the U.N. Development Program notes in Toward a Food Secure Future, the first ever Africa Human Development Report, “the silent crises of chronic malnourishment and seasonal hunger do not receive nearly enough attention.”

President Obama was influential in persuading the G-8 leaders to focus on food security at the 2009 G-8 meeting in L’Aquila, Italy where world leaders pledged $20 billion over three years to address the problem. The U.S. itself committed to invest $3.5 billion.

In addition to building on Feed the Future, which reportedly will include a major private sector initiative, President Obama will face several challenges over the next two days related to food security.

The first will be to convey a sense that Feed the Future is beginning to have an impact in reducing malnutrition, increasing crop yields and increasing national and private sector investments in agriculture. Even though this program has the potential to significantly improve food security in the region, the results have yet to be realized by the intended beneficiaries.

A second challenge will be to ensure that the financial commitments made in 2009 by the G-8 partners are being honored. Finally, any new commitments and programs need to be accompanied by clear bench marks so that progress can be measured and accountability assured.

President Obama is to be applauded for reversing a long downward trend in U.S. attention to global food security issues. Putting in place initiatives that make a qualitative and sustainable difference is the other half of the battle.

Authors

Mwangi S. Kimenyi
Witney Schneidman

Image Source: Thierry Gouegnon / Reuters

Russia Stays Home

Javier Solana — Thu, 17 May 2012 12:44:00 -0400

Just three days before his return to the Kremlin as Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin met behind closed doors at his residence in Novo-Ogaryovo, outside Moscow, with US National Security Adviser Tom Donilon, who was there to transmit President Barack Obama’s renewed determination to strengthen cooperation with Russia. But Donilon returned home empty-handed: Putin will attend neither the G-8 summit on May 18-19 at Camp David, nor the NATO summit in Chicago on May 20-21, despite Obama’s effort to accommodate Russia by moving the G-8 summit from Chicago.

As a result, what would have been the first meeting between Obama and Putin after his return to the Russian presidency has been postponed until the G-20 summit in Los Cabos, Mexico, set for June 18-19. This delay has provoked much speculation.

Some point as a cause of Putin’s absence to recent tensions between Russia and the United States arising from Putin’s increasingly harsh response to the protests by his opponents at home. Others suggest that Putin’s aloofness stems from Kremlin infighting.

Whatever may be driving Putin’s behavior, this month’s two summits will affect relations between the two countries considerably, given the global security issues to be discussed by the G-8 and the need to arrange for Russia’s participation in NATO’s anti-missile shield.

Two matters – besides the shaky global economy – are especially important for the G-8 summit. First, Iran’s nuclear program is now on the diplomatic front burner. After more than a year of deadlock, negotiations resumed in April. Russia, as a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, participates in these talks, and its cooperation is essential to resolving one of today’s most vexing international problems.

Much the same can be said of Russia’s role in resolving the crisis in Syria, owing to the strategic relationship that the two countries have maintained since the Cold War. Indeed, with the growing possibility that former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s peace plan for Syria might fail, and that civil war might erupt, Russia could be the international community’s only effective interlocutor left.

In addition, it is essential to align the positions of Russia and the West on the anti-missile shield system now being developed by NATO, which will be a subject for discussion in Chicago. The principal aim of the system is to protect Europe and the US from possible attacks by short- and medium-range ballistic missiles from Iran and North Korea. But Russian leaders are skeptical about the true objectives of a shield, believing that it would undermine Russia’s security by curtailing the retaliatory (and thus deterrent) capacity of its nuclear missiles.

In 2009, the “approach by stages of adaptation” launched by Obama seemed to ease bilateral tensions and prepared the way for the 2010 New START arms-reduction treaty, in which Russia and the US took a strategic leap to cut the number of nuclear-missile launchers by half. Following on this progress, at the end of 2010, the Russians agreed to study the possibility of cooperating with NATO on anti-missile defense.

But the US was unable to offer legal – not just political – guarantees that an anti-missile system based in Europe would not obstruct Russia’s strategic potential. As a result, Russia is now so mistrustful that its military chief of staff, General Nikolai Makarov, recently declared that his country would not rule out pre-emptive attacks to destroy any part of the anti-missile shield that it views as a threat to its own security.

One of the main arguments for this posture was Russia’s uncertainty about whether later steps in the “approach by stages of adaptation” might be a threat to its strategic ballistic missiles. Moreover, Russia opposes the deployment of military facilities in countries – like Romania – that joined NATO after 1999, a point made recently by former US ambassador to Ukraine Steven Pifer of the Brookings Institution.

In view of the seriousness of the questions under consideration at the two summits, Putin’s presence would have been helpful. In addition to the inherent value of improving the personal chemistry between leaders, reducing tensions in the relationship between Russia and the West has become indispensable, given that negotiations over the missile shield, Iran, Syria, and other issues are bound to be long – and that the solutions are linked.

Indeed, acceptable solutions today would open the way for an unprecedented nuclear-arms agreement in 2013. This is a matter of major importance, for which a good understanding between Russia and the US is essential.

We must do everything within our power to realize Donilon’s proposal to Putin to, in essence, “reset the reset” and bridge the gap between the two countries concerning the future disposition of their nuclear arsenals. For Obama, success would vindicate the Nobel Peace Prize that he was awarded in 2009. Russia, we can be sure, would benefit as well.

Authors

Javier Solana

Image Source: © RIA Novosti / Reuters

Previewing the G-8 and NATO Summits: An Examination of the Summits’ Top Agenda Items

Wed, 16 May 2012 10:45:00 -0400

Event Information

May 16, 2012
10:45 AM - 2:00 PM EDT

Root Room
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
1779 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Washington, DC

In the coming week, the United States will host both the G-8 and NATO Summits, two important gatherings of world leaders focusing on a number of critical global issues including Europe’s economic stability, cooperation and security concerns in Afghanistan and the Middle East, and recent political changes among the G-8 member states.

On May 16, in advance of the summits at Camp David and in Chicago, the Managing Global Order project at Brookings hosted Michael Froman, assistant to the president of the United States and deputy national security adviser for international economic affairs at the National Security Council and the National Economic Council, for an overview of the summits’ key issues. Froman currently serves as the U.S. Sherpa for the G-20 and G-8 Summits, and is responsible for coordinating policy on international trade, investment, energy security and climate change, and development and democracy issues. Following his remarks, two panels featuring Brookings Senior Fellows Bruce Jones, Justin Vaisse, Suzanne Maloney and Bruce Riedel, examined the summits’ top agenda items. The first panel discussed how G-8 member states can better cooperate to engage emerging powers and outline how the outcome of the French election affects the summit and transatlantic relations. The second panel examined the various security issues on the agenda for the G-8 and NATO summits, including Iran, the Arab Awakening, and Afghanistan. Vice President Martin Indyk, director of Foreign Policy, and Senior Fellow Dan Byman, director of research for the Saban Center for Middle East Policy, moderated the panel discussions.

After each panel, participants took audience questions.

Video

Transcript

Uncorrected Transcript (.pdf)

Event Materials

20120516_g8_nato_summits_transcript_uncorrected

Participants

Panelists

Martin S. Indyk

Michael Froman

Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Adviser for International Economic Affairs

The G-8 Summit's Most Pressing Issues

Bruce Jones — Tue, 15 May 2012 12:59:00 -0400

President Obama will host leaders from the world’s eight leading industrial nations at his Camp David retreat this weekend for talks on some of the most pressing global issues. While Vladimir Putin, Russia’s president, won’t make it to the summit, leaders from United States, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United Kingdom will attend.

Video

The G-8 Summit's Most Pressing Issues

Image Source: Reuters

Perspectives on the G-20 Foreign Ministers' Meeting

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 11:23:00 -0500

On February 19-20, the Mexican government hosted the first ever meeting of the G-20’s foreign ministers. This is an important development in the international architecture for managing the evolving relations between the established and the rising powers. We invited scholars and officials from the G-20 nations to write, in their personal capacity, about the meeting, what it should do, and what it portends in global governance and the management of the changing global order.

United States

Bruce Jones
Senior Fellow and Director, Managing Global Order Project at Brookings
Director, Center on International Cooperation, New York University

This weekend, the Mexican government will host a meeting of the G-20’s foreign ministers, in Los Cabos. The meeting has been overshadowed by the drama at the UN Security Council, where the US and its allies have clashed with China and especially Russia over violence in Syria. But the Los Cabos meeting constitutes a step change in the governance of global issues.

The G-20 Summit of leaders itself has played a crucial role since November 2008. First, and vitally, in avoiding a global depression, through it’s coordinated stimulus program and refinancing and remandating of the IMF. Second, since the crunch phase of the global financial crisis, the G-20 has made important headway in laying the groundwork of financial regulation, economic surveillance and oversight to reduce the risks of the next crisis. That is an unfinished business, and the Eurozone crisis highlights continuing challenges. Superficial journalism has highlighted ongoing disputes, or less than dramatic Summit outcomes; but overall, the G-20 is a major success story.

One of the more subtle successes of the G-20 is that it has started to foster the habits of cooperation among a set of countries that have not yet had to develop those habits. The G-7 western allies have forty years of experience of working together, and shared values that bind. The critical insight that President Bush had in his last days in office was that the global financial crisis was a bigger problem than the West alone could handle. A wider group was going to be necessary for the crisis response; and moving ahead, building the infrastructure for cooperation between the established and emerging powers is the necessary condition of managing global order. It’s a historical irony that it was President Bush rather than the more globally minded President Obama that made the decisive moves on the G-20 and the IMF, but the pattern was well set and the Obama administration has deepened the work on both fronts.
Because of the scale of the global financial challenge, G-20 managers resisted early calls – including from this project – to widen the agenda of the G-20. They were right. Had the G-20 diverted focus from its core function of protecting the global financial system and maintaining a stable international economic order, not only would we not now be in an incipient global recovery, relations between the major and the emerging powers would have deteriorated rapidly. A continued concentration on core issues is warranted. Over time, though, the G20’s managers have found some bandwith to begin working together on other issues, from development to fossil fuels subsidies.

What’s left behind is foreign and security policy. There are several issues where the established and emerging powers have differences of view on that agenda – Syria is only the most acute and most obvious of them. But there are a raft of other issues where the major powers have shared interests or, more commonly, where they have a shared interest in avoiding a deep crisis – like in Iran. China may not agree with the U.S. approach on Iran, but they have a fundamental interest in avoiding a deep crisis that closes the Straits of Hormuz – and they warned Iran on this in sharp terms in January 2012. There’s perhaps no more important challenge in global order than beginning to set the pattern of finding areas of common agreement, and working through differences short of crisis, between the major and the rising powers. That will not encompass all issues – there will still be many areas that are simply subject for bilateral relations, or for ongoing dispute. It’s surely in all our interests, though, that that set of issues be as small as possible, and that we build up similar habits of cooperation, or at least habits of deconfliction, where fundamental values aren’t in conflict.

In this regard, the G-20 foreign ministers meeting in Los Cabos represents the first real opportunity we’ve had to begin that work. Yes, the emerging powers have happened to be in the Security Council over the last two years, and China has a permanent seat there. But the Security Council is a tool for crisis management and negotiation, not for forging new habits and not for building confidence. Broader confidence building processes will results in a narrowing of the gap in the Security Council, not the other way around.

Several countries resisted the Mexican initiative, or hesitated in accepting the invitation. Among the first foreign ministers to say yes was US Secretary of State Clinton. The rest quickly followed.

It was the right move. Perhaps not much will come out of the Los Cabos meeting – and the Mexicans have wisely tried to downplay expectations by emphasizing that it’s an “informal meeting”, rather than a Summit. That’s the right move too. A search for formal agreements or communiqués would simply push this back into a space of unproductive negotiations. Far more important is relationship building, building shared perspectives on key security issues, and an informal space for back room negotiations. I suspect that Secretary Clinton will use quite a lot of her time in Los Cabos cornering her Chinese and Russian colleagues on the Syria question – and that’s very much to the good.

So, Felicidades to Mexico on an important initiative. With modest expectations, and some creative leadership, a foreign ministers process for the G-20 can fill an important gap. We may still face a “G-Zero” future of unmanaged problems and centrifugal tensions between the major powers; but we’re not there yet. The Mexican initiative is a step in the right direction.

Brazil

Celso Amorim
Writing in a Personal Capacity

Not too long ago, some months after the Lehman Brothers débacle, I was invited to talk to French and international students at the Science Po in Paris. I was then the Brazilian Foreign Minister. Among other things, I remember having said that the G-8 was dead, a statement that generated a lot of criticism in the media, not least in Brazil. A few months later, the President of the United States, expressed essentially the same view, in softer words. During the Pittsburgh summit, President Obama said that the G-20 had become the main international forum for economic matters. And a process of change, still incomplete for sure, took place in formal financial institutions such as the IMF and the World Bank. Today, after a succession of crises in Europe, no one with a minimum knowledge in international economics would dare contradict that view. Indeed, how can world economic problems be solved without the participation of the BRIC countries? As a consequence the world governance in financial and economic affairs was drastically reformed in a period of not more than two or three years.

Nothing remotely similar to these momentous changes happened in the field of peace and security. After two decades of intense and often tedious discussions in the UN, the Security Council remains exactly with the same format designed sixty years ago in San Francisco. Given its lack of representativeness and legitimacy, it is no wonder that the Council cannot deal appropriately with such important subjects as the several dimensions of the so called Arab Awakening,or, more pointedly, with burning issues such as the Iranian Nuclear Program, not to speak of a more structural response to the problems of Africa. One of the reasons that made the changes in the governance of international economic affairs possible was the relative informality of fora such as the G-7/G-8 as well as the more flexible procedures for reform in the international financial institutions (in contrast with the ultra-rigid requirements for reforming the UN Charter).Without exaggerating the scope of the changes that may begin with the February meeting of Foreign Ministers in Mexico, one is allowed to hope that it can at least initiate a process which someday will impact on the more formal institutions that deal with political and security matters. In order that such a process may take place, it essential that the FM meeting focuses on concrete questions - such as the ones mentioned here - and does not lose much time and energy on more abstract issues of institutional nature. Nor should it bother too much with other subjects - important as they may be - which have already found an appropriate locus for debate, such as climate change. In other words, for a political G-20 to become a relevant forum it must not develop a theory about walking. Like the Greek philosopher who rebutted the sophistic argument on the logic impossibility of movement, it must simply walk.

China

Shen Dingli
Professor of International Relations, Director of the Center for American Studies, and Executive Vice Dean of the Institute of International Affairs, Fudan University, Shanghai

The G-20 emerged from global financial crisis in 2008 to bail out the market as an informal ad hoc grouping. Thus far it still has utility as the debt of both the United States and eurozone has to be cut and global trade rebalanced. This type of global governance entails new institutions such as the G-20 to play a constructive role which the UNSC and G-8 could not play effectively.

The Summit meeting and Financial Ministerial Level meeting of the G-20 addresses present economic and financial dimensions but to better institutionalize the G-20 has to structure more formally and tackle broader international affairs. Bringing international political and security affairs to the G-20 agenda could empower G-20 in a structural way.

The upcoming G-20 Foreign Ministers’ informal meeting from February 18-20 in Mexico renders such an opportunity for the most influential established powers and most important emerging nations to timely address issues of common interest beyond global economic recovery and rebalancing. The foreign ministers could plausibly set a new paradigm of the organization and offer a chance of consensus on crucial issues.

Syria and Iran are two such crucial matters that the Foreign Ministers’ meeting will find it hard to ignore. As the G-20 is not the G-8, it gives more authoritativeness and representativeness of the world powers to approach to the two crises in a balanced manner. Also, as the G-20 is not the UNSC, which has to make critical decision when needed, it tends to allow sufficient deliberation without splitting the organization. Rather, it permits more time for consensus building before the UNSC would vote on Syrian, and Iranian, cases. Established powers would have more chances to hear the common voices of Russia, China and India while the emerging powers could also debate among themselves, which is more ideal than the UNSC itself.

Ambassador Wu Jianmin
Professor of International Studies, China Foreign Affairs University
Chairman, Shanghai Centre of International Studies

The G-20 is a reflection of the profound changes underway in world affairs. These changes are far from over. As a new group on the international arena, the G-20 is still evolving. The informal meeting of the G-20 foreign ministers, to be held on February 18-20 in Mexico, is a natural development of its evolution, since economics, politics and security are all interrelated.

The very existence of the G-20 is closely tied to financial crises. The G-20 was set up in 1999 in the aftermath of Asia Financial Crisis. The G-20 summit was born in 2008 out of the current financial crisis. In the Chinese language, crisis consists of two characters: danger and opportunity. Indeed, the mankind advances from crisis to crisis.

The performance of the G-20, since 2008, proves to be positive. Some believe that the “heroic phase” of the G-20 is over. I disagree. The evolution of the G-20 is a long process. We have to judge it in a comprehensive way. Thanks to the G-20, the current financial crisis didn’t turn into a great depression. This is a remarkable achievement. We all know the current crisis is deepening. This is a global problem. A global problem requires global solution. A global solution requires international cooperation.

The composition of the G-20 is not homogeneous. Among the G-20 countries, the situation varies from one to another. They have different political systems, different cultures, different histories and they are in different stages of development. It is quite natural that they have divergence of views. To advance the G-20’s work, one has to focus on shared interests. This is the key to success. On the basis of shared interests, G-20 can build up consensus, which leads to action. It was true of G-20 summit in the past. It will also be true of the forthcoming informal meeting of the G-20 foreign ministers.

Australia

Michael Fullilove
Director, Global Issues Program, Lowy Institute for International Policy, Sydney, Australia
Nonresident Senior Fellow, Foreign Policy, The Brookings Institution

Australia is a wealthy nation with a small population occupying a large continent located a great distance from our historical sources of security and prosperity. As a result, all Australian governments have been concerned to join (and, if necessary, erect and strengthen) institutions through which they can influence global decisions and touch the global flows of power – including the United Nations, alliance institutions and APEC.

Australia’s foreign minister, Kevin Rudd, served as prime minister during the global financial crisis and was one of the forces behind the designation of the G-20 as the premier forum for international economic cooperation.

As one of the progenitors of the G-20, Australia is keen to see the institution develop and strengthen further. Last year saw the first meeting of G20 finance and development ministers; now G-20 foreign ministers are convening for the first time. For Canberra, the fact of the meeting itself is important: it shows the stitching together of the group.

Foreign ministers will assemble in Los Cabos at a time of great stress and concern about the global economy. Growth prospects are down; Europe’s financial problems are affecting other national economies; capital flows to developing countries have withered. Foreign ministers are particularly well-placed to engage on the human and social costs of the global crisis.

Australians are a practical people. The government wants a good discussion on the meeting’s agenda items, including global governance, green growth and human development. More importantly, though, Canberra hopes for some sharp, clear positions.

Food security is an area demanding extra action, including the implementation of pre-existing commitments as well as addressing the long-term trends. The Australian government would like to explore innovative ways of leveraging private-sector funds for development. It also looks for recommendations on dealing with youth unemployment that can be put to G-20 leaders later in the year.

We don’t know how the G-20 will develop in the future. The best way to preserve its position is to make every post a winner – including this first meeting of foreign ministers.

Spain

Giovanni Grevi
Senior Researcher, Fundación para las Relaciones Internacionales y el Diálogo Exterior (FRIDE), Madrid

The first informal meeting of G-20 Foreign Ministers in Mexico should be welcomed for three reasons. First, the G-20 is a process promoting shared responsibility. As such, it should afford some flexibility to tackle important issues related to its core economic agenda. This has been the case, for example, with development and food security. Second, while foreign policy issues can prove divisive, disagreements are not cast in stone but are subject to evolving assessments and perceptions. Those are the two levels at which informal meetings in the G-20 context can make a difference over time. Third, informally discussing foreign policy issues within the G-20 process would help underpin the authority of the UN Security Council. The G-20 could perform as an important platform for confidence building or de-confliction, paving the way for debates at the UNSC level, where decisions belong.

That said, given the different sensitivities of G-20 members on addressing foreign policy in the G-20 context, this should be done in a prudent and incremental way. It will be up to G-20 leaders to decide whether any item discussed by Foreign Ministers will climb up to summit level. Two criteria should guide this decision, namely a clear chance of successful agreement and a clear link between political, security and economic concerns. In short, added value. The agenda put forward by the Mexican Presidency may benefit from a more targeted approach to common transnational challenges and vulnerabilities. Relevant issues could include so-called flow security (keeping material and virtual commons such as the cyberspace safe and open); resource governance; the security implications of climate change in specific regions; and countering illegal trafficking of drugs and people. Foreign Ministers could address controversial geopolitical issues more comfortably in ad hoc side-meetings than in plenary debates.

The G-20 will thrive or wither away based on its capacity to cope with the permutations of the financial and economic crisis. But it would be delusional to think that focusing on economics while cross-border risks spread and geopolitical crises fester will preserve the prosperity of G-20 members. The G-20 need not shift its core focus. Likewise, it should not compete with other bodies. But to the extent that it can help coping with shared political challenges threatening economic security, it should.

South Korea

Dong Hwi Lee
Professor, Institute of Foreign Affairs and National Security (IFANS), Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, South Korea

A G-20 foreign ministers' meeting will be convened for the first time in Mexico, where the next G-20 summit will be held, during February 19-20, 2012. It is an encouraging development, for it improves the prospects for the G-20 process to evolve into a truly premium forum as global governance undergoes significant changes.

Foreign ministers' talks are expected to make three key contributions to upgrading the G2-0.

First, the G-20 foreign ministers' talks can provide a venue for addressing so-called "hybrid issues," for example energy and climate change, which characterize international relations in the 21st century, and to which both economy and security are inextricably linked. By tackling such issues, the G-20 can continue to broaden its scope of agenda and thereby cement its raison d'etre.

Second, the foreign ministers' talks can function as a forum for the world's major economies to effectively respond to the political uncertainty that may very well result from global economic instability. The G-7 is a case in point. It started out as an economic forum, but ultimately G-7 foreign ministers' meetings offered a useful safety net as the world struggled to overcome the political fallout from the collapse of the Cold War structure. The advantages of G-20 foreign ministers' meeting will only be redoubled this year, for a series of leadership transitions around the world will fuel uncertainties, let alone the turbulence already apparent in the Middle East.

Third, if the foreign ministers' talks do evolve into one of the systemic pillars of the G-20 process, the meetings will serve as an essential mechanism for efficiently innovating the G-20 process. The larger membership compared to the G-8, disparate cultural backgrounds among member states, and demand for record- keeping/evaluation are some of the many practical needs that need to be met, resulting in calls for further expanding secretarial function in the future. All in all, the G-20 foreign ministers' meetings will be significant on their own merit. More importantly, they will play a significant role in advancing institutionalization of the G-20.

Argentina

Rut Diamint
Professor, Universidad Torcuato Di Tella, Buenos Aires
Researcher, National Council of Scientific and Technologic Research (CONICET)

The emergence of the G-20 forged expectations of a possible democratization of the international order. Several elements came together to strengthen that illusion. First, there was evidence that the G-8 was no longer able to determine the rules of the international system. Second, there was widely spread and harsh criticism directed toward the legitimacy of the United Nations Security Council. The third was the emergence of middle powers with prospects of sustained growth and respect for international norms and values. The fourth was a national and global civil society more involved in the claim for national and universal standards of justice. The fifth was the emblematic supremacy of human rights laws. The final element was a recognition that major blunders, such as a financial meltdown, are not exclusively committed by developing nations.

In this context the G-20 was supposed to open a more inclusive and egalitarian dialogue. Unfortunately, the G-20 did not achieve convincing efforts towards global security. It is true that we could argue that behind the notion of global governance supported by the G-20 meetings is the paradigm of peace and a peaceful conflict resolution. But, when talking about specific proposals, security is too tied to economic interests. Encouraging protective measures to prevent colossal disasters, like the Fukushima nuclear accident in Japan, or condemning all forms of terrorism are, without a doubt, valuable initiatives but they also may be seen as mere rhetorical and bombastic announcements. The scope of the dialogue changed, but the logic is still the same—a realist one extremely related to the balance of power.

The expectation of an egalitarian and pluralistic G-20, representing a greater diversity, and at the same time restricted to the most powerful international actors from the perspective that they will assume greater responsibility for stabilizing the world and assist especially needy countries, but without the typical vices of the specialized bureaucracies of most of the multilateral agencies, is regrettably absent.

The reform of financial institutions that ignores the crucial importance of developing a comprehensive program of stability and security has no future. It is time to attach to G-20 cooperation policy, specific clauses that clearly induce to the respect for human rights, the elimination of double standards, and the
compliance with international agreements. Undeniably, the vocation of being more global and plural leads to the establishment of commonly accepted standards of conduct in the international security field. There is not global economic governance without global security.

India

WPS Sidhu
Senior Fellow, Center for International Cooperation, New York University

Like the G-7/G-8, which began life as a purely economic club of the world’s biggest economies, the G-20 too is evolving from an ad-hoc gathering of select nations to fix the world’s financial and economic woes into an institution concerned with international peace and security. The first ever meeting of G-20 foreign ministers in Los Cabos, Mexico this weekend marks this crucial transition.

This shift could not have come at a more appropriate time. With post-Gaddafi Libya in disarray, the bitter dust-up over Syria in the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), and the looming war clouds over Iran, there is an urgent need for a forum like the G-20 to try and carve out a common, cooperative approach on all these issues amongst its members.

But is it, perhaps, too optimistic to assume that the G-20 will succeed where other forums have failed? Yes and no.

It is certainly optimistic to assume that a single meeting, even in the tranquil setting of Los Cabos, will be able to overcome the deep divisions between the established powers and the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) in particular. Nonetheless, the G-20 meeting does offer a useful venue to try and bridge these differences and would be an opportunity for the established and reemerging powers to engage at two levels: strategic and tactical.

At the strategic level the G-20 members could try and explore normative areas of convergence, especially over the concepts of responsibility to protect, given that there was a broad support for the principle (as apparent in UNSC resolutions 1970 and 1973) but serious disagreement on how it should be implemented.

In addition, the group could also consider the Brazilian idea of “responsibility while protecting” which needs to be further elaborated outside of the charged atmosphere of the UNSC setting. Moreover, there is also need to explore the responsibility for post-conflict reconstruction. As the Libyan case has amply demonstrated, a successful (albeit prolonged) military campaign and regime change alone does not guarantee greater security or better governance for the populace.

Against the backdrop of these broader normative debates, which are likely to continue beyond Los Cabos, there are several tactical issues that require urgent attention. Syria is prominent among them.

Given that there now appears to be overwhelming (if not unanimous) support for a political transition in Syria could a common agenda be worked out within the G-20 framework, especially one that takes on board the Russian and Chinese sensitivities as well as lessons from the Libyan experience? If such an understanding could be reached in Los Cabos, it could contribute to a more cooperative approach among the key powers in the UNSC.

Here, it is worth remembering that it was a similar G-8 meeting in Berlin in June 1999 that helped to resolve the tensions, particularly between Russia and the United States, over the bombing of Kosovo and paved the way for the consensus UNSC resolution 1244 and post-conflict reconstruction. While it could be argued that a G-8 consensus was easier, given the smaller membership, if the G-20 were to achieve a similar breakthrough, it would carry greater conviction given the more representative and diverse nature of the bigger group. The more representative nature of the G-20 would be an important asset in dealing with the gathering storm over Iran.

Finally, given the present stalemate over the UNSC reform process and assuming that this is first of regular G-20 foreign ministers meetings, this forum would be the only venue where the permanent members of the UNSC and the aspirant members, notably Brazil, India and South Africa would be able to interact on a regular basis on international peace and security issues.

Authors

Celso Amorim
Rut Diamint
Shen Dingli
Michael Fullilove
Giovanni Grevi
Ambassador Wu Jianmin
Bruce Jones
Dong Hwi Lee
WPS Sidhu

Image Source: © STRINGER Mexico / Reuters

Global Leadership in Transition : Making the G20 More Effective and Responsive

Colin I. Bradford and Wonhyuk Lim, eds. — Wed, 15 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0400

Brookings Institution Press with the Korean Development Institute 2011 353pp.

Global Leadership in Transition calls for innovations that "institutionalize" or consolidate the G20, helping to make it the global economy’s steering committee. The emergence of the G20 as the world’s premier forum for international economic cooperation presents an opportunity to improve economic summitry and make global leadership more responsive and effective, a major improvement over the G8 era.

The origin of Global Leadership in Transition—which contains contributions from three dozen top experts from all over the world—was a Brookings seminar on issues surrounding the 2010 Seoul G20 summit. That grew into a further conference in Washington and eventually a major symposium in Seoul.

“Key contributors to this volume were well ahead of their time in advocating summit meetings of G20 leaders. In this book, they now offer a rich smorgasbord of creative ideas for transforming the G20 from a crisis-management committee to a steering group for the international system that deserves the attention of those who wish to shape the future of global governance.”—C. Randall Henning, American University and the Peterson Institute

Contributors: Alan Beattie, Financial Times; Thomas Bernes, Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI); Sergio Bitar, former Chilean minister of public works; Paul Blustein, Brookings Institution and CIGI; Barry Carin, CIGI and University of Victoria; Andrew F. Cooper, CIGI and University of Waterloo; Kemal Derviş, Brookings; Paul Heinbecker, CIGI and Laurier University Centre for Global Relations; Oh-Seok Hyun, Korea Development Institute (KDI); Jomo Kwame Sundaram, United Nations; Homi Kharas, Brookings; Hyeon Wook Kim, KDI; Sungmin Kim, Bank of Korea; John Kirton, University of Toronto; Johannes Linn, Brookings and Emerging Markets Forum; Pedro Malan, Itau Unibanco; Thomas Mann, Brookings; Paul Martin, former prime minister of Canada; Simon Maxwell, Overseas Development Institute and Climate and Development Knowledge Network; Jacques Mistral, Institut Français des Relations Internationales; Victor Murinde, University of Birmingham (UK); Pier Carlo Padoan, OECD Paris; Yung Chul Park, Korea University; Stewart Patrick, Council on Foreign Relations; Il SaKong, Presidential Committee for the G20 Summit; Wendy R. Sherman, Albright Stonebridge Group; Gordon Smith, Centre for Global Studies and CIGI; Bruce Stokes, German Marshall Fund; Ngaire Woods, Oxford Blavatnik School of Government; Lan Xue, Tsinghua University (Beijing); Yanbing Zhang, Tsinghua University.

ABOUT THE EDITORS

Colin I. Bradford

Wonhyuk Lim

Wonhyuk Lim is director of policy research at the Center for International Development within the Korea Development Institute. He was with the Presidential Transition Committee and the Presidential Committee on Northeast Asia after the 2002 election in Korea. A former fellow with Brookings’s Center for Northeast Asian Policy Studies, he has written extensively on development and corporate governance issues.

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The G8 and the Threat of Bloc Politics in the International System

Richard Gowan, Bruce Jones and Emily O'Brien — Tue, 24 May 2011 12:32:00 -0400

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

On May 26 and 27, France hosts the annual G8 Summit. Although the French have prepared a wide-ranging agenda – covering everything from internet security to the Arab Spring – there is skepticism that the G8 remains relevant in the post-financial crisis world. The G20 has eclipsed it as the primary forum for financial diplomacy, while talks between G8 foreign ministers on Libya this March delivered little.

There are, however, two recurrent arguments for maintaining the G8:

* It acts as an insurance policy for its members against the failure of the G20, a risk highlighted by ill-tempered exchanges over currency issues at the last year’s G20 summit in Seoul.

* It is a useful political club for liberal Western democracies (plus or minus Russia), whereas the G20 contains a less ideologically coherent group of major powers.

This paper argues that neither of these arguments is fully convincing. Although the G20 has lost some of its early momentum as the financial crisis has receded, it has still engineered progress on International Monetary Fund (IMF) reform, monitoring global imbalances and financial regulation. Progress has rarely been smooth, but the overall level of international cooperation involved is still greater than might have been predicted before 2008.

The political argument for the G8 is also problematic. It is not clear that the forum is fully effective in either (i) handling dramatic political events such as those of the Arab Spring or (ii) persuading Russia to deepen its alignment with the Western political system. The persistence of the G8 has been cited as a stimulus for the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) countries to form an alternative caucus of their own. At a summit this April, the BRICS leaders mounted a thinly-veiled attack on NATO’s Libya campaign.

Some Western leaders believe that shifts in the balance of global power actually reinforce the case for a largely Western political forum such as the G8. The most pressing issue is not, in fact, whether to maintain or discontinue the G8, but instead to identify ways to draw non-Western powers into security cooperation. Options for doing so include a more serious American-led push for U.N. Security Council reform, the creation of a forum for G20 foreign ministers to discuss joint threats informally, or issue-specific configurations that bring western and non-western actors together based on interests.

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Authors

Richard Gowan
Bruce Jones
Emily O'Brien

Image Source: © Pascal Rossignol / Reuters

Obama, Medvedev and Missile Defense

Steven Pifer — Fri, 20 May 2011 14:08:00 -0400

When Presidents Obama and Medvedev hold their bilateral on the margins of the May 26-27 G8 summit in Deauville, France, missile defense will figure high on the agenda. U.S. officials hope the meeting will produce progress, perhaps in the form of agreed principles for missile defense cooperation. It remains uncertain, however, whether Moscow will be able to overcome its apparent ambivalence on the issue.

Last November in Lisbon, Medvedev agreed with his NATO counterparts to explore NATO-Russia missile defense cooperation. That welcome development opened a prospect of changing missile defense from an irritant in East-West relations to a subject of collaboration. Some Russian experts termed missile defense cooperation a “game-changer” capable of transforming Russian views of the Alliance and United States. As one retired Russian general put it, real cooperation would make NATO and Russia “allies” in jointly protecting Europe against missile attack.

Since November, discussions have proceeded in NATO-Russian and U.S.-Russian channels. They reportedly have made good progress toward understandings on practical issues, including a U.S.-Russia defense technical cooperation agreement, which would permit the exchange of classified information; the concept of a joint NATO-Russia center to exchange early warning data; and joint missile defense exercises.

Recent signals from Moscow, however, have been less encouraging. The Russian foreign ministry reacted dourly in early May to the U.S.-Romanian agreement on a site for basing U.S. SM-3 missile interceptors in 2015. Senior Russian officials subsequently insisted that Moscow requires “legally-binding guarantees” that U.S. and NATO missile defenses would not target Russian strategic ballistic missiles.

The Russian demand for legally-binding guarantees reflects a desire for certainty in an uncertain world. The Bush 43 administration altered the Clinton administration’s missile defense plans and accelerated deployment of ground-based interceptors in Alaska and California. In turn, the Obama administration significantly reconfigured its predecessor’s plans for deploying missile defenses in Europe. Russians ask what they might expect from a new administration on missile defense.

But legally-binding guarantees would require Senate ratification. Last year’s debate on New START ratification made clear that finding 67 Senate votes for a treaty on missile defense would be a mission impossible. What Washington can offer are political assurances: it has been U.S. policy for some 20 years to develop a defense against a limited ballistic missile attack. The United States is not trying to defend against the large, sophisticated Russian strategic ballistic missile force. U.S. officials doubt the missile defense system planned over the next decade would have much capability, if any, against Russian missiles … and some nongovernmental experts question whether the system will be all that effective against even rudimentary long-range missiles.

The question for Deauville is whether Medvedev can settle for political assurances. If so, it would open an important avenue of cooperation. U.S./NATO-Russian missile defense interactions, including a jointly manned early warning center, would provide a great deal of transparency about U.S. missile defense plans and capabilities—and their limitations—as well as breaking down lingering Cold War stereotypes. Regularized interactions could ease Russian concerns, provide for enhanced missile defense of Europe, and remove the issue as a potential roadblock in the way of negotiations on further nuclear arms cuts.

Authors

Steven Pifer

Two Silver Linings at the 2010 G8 and G-20 Summits

Bruce Jones — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 13:59:00 -0400

Most of the commentary on the Canadian G8 and G20 meetings will focus on the failure to coordinate policy on two key issues: the shift from stimulus to debt reduction and common regulation of the international financial sector. The attention to these two failures is much deserved - a collective response to the lingering effects of the financial crisis is as important now as it was in the fall of 2008. While the G20 meeting has been the target for the majority of the criticism, the real divide was within the G8. I will return to that point in a moment.

The G8 and G20 leaders generated other targets to shoot at in Canada. The G8’s decision to walk away from its aid pledge is being lamented by the development crowd, though I’d find the critique more compelling if I thought that aid mattered very much for development; all the evidence is that trade, policy, and stability matter more. That point makes even more lamentable Canada’s effort to create a rationale for the G8, rather than the richer grouping of the G20, to focus on development – part of the G8’s “comparative advantage”, Canada argued. Really? With few exceptions, China, India, Brazil and South Africa are larger trading partners to the developing countries than any G8 member, and on economic investment, China is already spending more money in Africa than the entire G8 put together. Ah, yes, say the Canadians, but we have nicer rules than they do. Yes, we do, and talking to ourselves about those rules will impact their policies exactly how? If we controlled the gates to the world of development, keeping them out of our club might be effective, but we don’t have that control. That horse has already bolted, and all of the sophisticated barn-door-closing we can come up with doesn’t change that reality.

The substance of Canada’s initiative on maternal health is being excoriated elsewhere, so I won’t pile on. One bright spot in the Canadian initiative, though, was the inclusion of reference to the many other countries and foundations that had endorsed and contributed to the initiative. All the more poignancy then to former Prime Minister Paul Martin’s comment that the initiative properly belonged to the G20, not the G8.

Canada’s effort to sell the G8’s comparative advantage in peace and security issues was somewhat more credible: the G8 has been an engine of innovation in collective action against transnational threats. There is a case to be made, though, that a big goal of international policy in the next several years should be about getting the new powers to do more, not less on this agenda. When it comes to transnational threats, we have important shared interests with the emerging powers: time to start capitalizing on them.

On the toughest security challenges, both our interests and our perceptions still diverge – as graphically demonstrated by Brazil and Turkey’s dalliance with Iran and no votes at the U.N. Security Council. The G8 communique focuses on two such hard security challenges – North Korea and Iran. On Iran, the G8 could do little more than offer pious support for initiatives already taken by the Security Council. Its statement on North Korea was more important: having the G8 wrap its arms around South Korea following the Chenoan incident matters. Buried in Annex II of the communiqué was a further useful initiative, on Maritime Security Capacity.

So where were the silver linings? Odd thought it might be to say, the fact that the real disagreement in Canada was not within the G20 but within the G8 should be reassuring. There will be enough fights between the west and the rest, as Iran has already shown. In the world of international finance, the alignment is different. In Muskoka, Obama’s call for caution in a shift away from stimulus was supported by China, India and Brazil; it was Europe that was on the other side of the argument, and erstwhile allies Germany and Britain specifically. While it may be perverse to see this as a silver lining, think about the consequences if it was the other way around. If we witness a deep rupture between the west and the rising powers, we’re in deep trouble. For now, U.S. and BRIC alignment on global financial questions is keeping that rift in check. U.S.-Europe squabbles matter less because the ties that bind are deeper.

In fact, this U.S.-Europe clash is the real reason for the continued existence of the G8. The claim for primacy in development is nonsensical and the claim for continued primacy in peace and security is defensible but shortsighted. The real reasons the U.S. administration supported the Canadian notion to continue a G8 process alongside the G20 is it wanted a smaller forum in which to fight with the Europeans. When bickering within the family, best not to have an audience.

There was a second, important silver lining in Canada’s other signature initiative, the Muskoka Accountability Report, which examined the G8’s track record on fulfilling past pledges. There was a small amount of fudging in the report, especially on whether past or present dollar rates were used to calculate rates of progress. However, an annex that provides detailed information on each G8 government is a first for the G8, and a strong precedent in international affairs. In the days when the world was run by four or five countries with deep ties of alliance, formal transparency did not matter very much. That won’t cut it in the world that lies ahead. When 20+ countries control the levers of international policy, and mistrust is as abundant as cooperation, transparency and accountability will matter a great deal. Finding common ground with the emerging powers on international finance questions helps; creating a precedent for states holding themselves to account for their pledges and commitments helps even more. If the Muskoka Accountability Report is the G8’s last hurrah, it is a good one.

Authors

Bruce Jones

Web Chat: Previewing the G-20 Summit

Colin I. Bradford — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 00:00:00 -0400

This week, President Obama travels to Toronto for the G-20 Summit where world leaders are expected to focus on recovery from the global financial crisis, specifically restoring financial stability, global financial regulation and reform of international financial institutions.

On Wednesday, June 23, Colin Bradford previewed the G-20 Summit in a live web chat moderated by David Mark, senior editor at POLITICO.

The transcript of this chat follows.

12:29 David Mark: As the American economy seems to improve in fits and starts President Obama on Friday travels to Toronto for the G-20 Summit, where world leaders will focus on fostering a global recovery from the financial crisis. Welcome to the chat.

12:30 [Comment From Zengxin Li: ] Do you see the G-20 summit eventually taking on the responsibilities of climate change, security and other global issues and replacing G8 or G7, or is the G-20 merely a crisis call which will diminish after the crisis ends?

12:30 Colin Bradford: Short answer is "yes".

12:31 Colin Bradford: The global challenges today are urgent and multiple. There is no such thing as the world being out of crises in the short term.

12:34 Colin Bradford: These global challenges need a focal point for global leadership and strategic guidance. The G-20 seems to be showing itself capable of generating significant coordinated responses to the financial crisis which set the stage for taking on other issues, like financing climate change mitigation and adaptation in developing countries, development, energy security, water, health, the oceans, and so on.

12:35 Colin Bradford: It would be appalling for the G-20 leaders or the world as a whole to think that if and as the G-20 steers our way out of the current economic crisis that somehow its job is done, and it can close up shop.

12:36 [Comment From Zengxin Li: ] How has China's exchange rate announcement changed the atmosphere of the summit? By doing this, what does China want in return, and what can other countries offer?

12:37 Colin Bradford: What this announcement show is the dynamics of G-20 summitry at work.

12:39 Colin Bradford: Rather than have the Chinese exchange rate rivet attention of leaders at the G-20 Toronto Summit, the Chinese acted ahead of it to take the issue off the table and have it be one of many factors not THE factor.

Smart move; but also a good example of how holding leaders level summits can be forcing events, moving the global agenda forward not just AT summit but in the run-up to them.

Excellent. Very healthy and positive sign.

12:40 [Comment From Lane: ] Do you think that North Korea's recent bouts of aggression will be addressed?

12:42 Colin Bradford: I think the tensions on the Korean peninsula will be addressed by leaders in the G8 Summit in Huntsville on Friday, more informally than in the communique, and that this will be corridor talk among leaders and senior officials from the broader G-20 membership in Toronto on Saturday and Sunday. I would not expect communique language on this issue from either summit.

12:42 [Comment From Mona Pinchis: ] Mr. Bradford, do you believe that it will be necessary than to retain both a G8 and G-20?

12:43 Colin Bradford: For the time being , "yes", I think both will continue.

12:44 Colin Bradford: But the G-20 has the momentum, the lead on the financial crisis, with linkages through economics to most of the other major global challenges. So, the trend is clear; the G-20 is ascendent and the G8 is moving to a more subordinate role.

12:47 Colin Bradford: But, Canada, Japan, the U.S. and probably Italy, at the least, want to see the G8 continue. It will be up to them to shape an agenda which is suitable for what is in the end a "transatlantic " grouping plus Japan, of advanced industrial countries which have limited reach on the major issues, if they try to act in isolation.

On the North Korea threats, for example, China must be involved. It is hard to imagine a serious global problem that the G8 by itself can deal with alone.

12:49 [Comment From Mary: ] I haven't heard anything lately about the special issues of the developing world. Is that just off of the world leaders' radar screen for now?

12:49 Colin Bradford: No; the development issue is not off the radar screen.

12:51 Colin Bradford: To the contrary, fortunately. Good you asked, because it is important.

Korea is chairing the G-20 for 2010. The next G-20 Summit will be in Seoul on November 11-12.

The Korean leadership has for several months now been floating the idea of putting developing countries on the G-20 agenda.

12:52 Colin Bradford: There was resistance to the whole idea at first. Gradually, this turned around and there is enough support among enough of the G-20 member countries, so that the Koreans have put it on the agenda for Seoul in November.

12:54 Colin Bradford: The question now is what content a G2-0 role in development would have. There are various versions and possibilities, including some specific Korean ideas.

But what is clear is that a G-20 role will be different from the G8 role in development which became excessively aid-centric.

12:54 [Comment From Sisi Pan: ] Mr. Bradford, regarding the Millennium Development Goals, have you any concerns that this G-20 ascendency will allow for less accountability on the part of the G8 and their previous commitments? Moreover, to what extent will G-20 ascendency affect international development and traditional donor-partner relationships?

12:56 Colin Bradford: Good question. The Canadians are putting a lot of attention in the G-20 Toronto Summit on "accountability" or "implementation of previous G-20 commitments".

Presumably, they will apply the same metric to the G8 summits , especially on the Gleneagle commitments and so on.

12:58 Colin Bradford: I think the MDGs are alive and well, I am happy to say.

There are still five years to go before the 2015 deadline for them. And they seem to be center stage in the donor community, among civil society globally, in the United Nations, and most importantly in many developing countries.

And there is thought already being generated about the sequel to the MDGs after 2015.

1:00 Colin Bradford: I think what you may see in Korea in November is a greater focus on the economic growth dimensions of development.

But this approach will be laid out as a complement to, not a substitute for, the MDGs.

So it will provide an emphasis on the economic growth underpinnings for the social and environmental goals in the MDGs.

Korea chairs the G2-0 now and has the secretary general of the UN position, so Korea is uniquely able to pull these two streams together.

1:01 [Comment From Mike: ] Is there any significance to the summit being held in Canada?

1:03 Colin Bradford: Yes; for sure.

Canada is the G-20 country, par excellence. Paul Martin, former finance minister and then later prime minister of Canada was the crucial architect of the formation of the G-20 at finance minister level, as an excellent in depth article in the Toronto Globe and Mail revealed this week. He chaired the first three years of the G-20 finance ministers meetings in the wake of the Asian financial crisis in the late 1990s.

1:04 Colin Bradford: Later, as prime minister, Paul Martin proposed that the G-20 countries move to leaders level summits.

Finally, that has happened, thanks, unfortunately, to the financial crisis.

So, Canada has an opportunity to take ownership of this new summit grouping.

1:08 Colin Bradford: But like several other G8 countries, as indicated above, prime minister Harper is one the the G8 leaders that wants to see the G8 continue. Some think he prefers it, because it smaller and more "like-minded."

But smaller and "like-minded" are not assets that compare with larger and more diverse which makes the G-20 massively more powerful than the G8.

So, Canada embodies the ambivalence of many leaders about the G8/7-G20 tradeoff and the ambivalence of many citizens in advanced countries who now face a transformed world order in which the non-Western world is on the scene, involved, and contributing to global approaches in significant ways which make their inclusion imperative.

1:09 [Comment From Amy Lebichuck: ] If the G8 concept is becoming outdated, will the G-20 not become quickly outdated as well? If inclusion is an objective, will the end result be another United Nations General Assembly?

1:09 Colin Bradford: Short answer here is..."no" !

1:11 Colin Bradford: You have hit the nail on the head.

No matter that the G-20 embodies 70 per cent of the world's population and 80 percent of the world's economy, it is still seen as not inclusive enough by those 173 countries that are not in the G20.

1:12 Colin Bradford: If the G8 with 10% of the world's population was the embodiment of "the West against the Rest," the G-20 could be construed to be "the Rich and powerful against the Rest."

1:13 Colin Bradford: But there is a huge leap forward between the G8 and the G-20 in representativeness legitimacy, just because of the leap from 10% to 70% of the world's population.

1:17 Colin Bradford: Fortunately, there is a qualitative difference as well.

Under Korean leadership , there is a move to generate innovations in G-20 Summit processes, modalities and procedures so that countries outside the G-20 will have input into the G-20 preparations, summits and follow up, through time, even if they do not have a seat at the table for the summit meetings themselves, which are only the pinnacle moment of the process.

The G-20 process through time is what is important. The G-20 will be more porous than the G8; if you want to influence it , you can. Civil society, business and NGO leaders will be involved. There is not just "outreach" which implies telling others what is going on, there is will be "inreach" or input into the G-20 process itself.

1:20 Colin Bradford: We all learned from Copenhagen in December that involving everyone has the downside of reducing effectiveness to near zero.

So, the G-20 summit size of 20 leaders is a good number to stick to; bigger than 8; smaller than 193.

The question is not the number of seats at the G-20 table but how responsive those who sit in them are to the different interests, ideas and perspectives of those who are not at the table.

There is serious progress on this front.

1:20 [Comment From Adam Kuerbitz: ] How do you think the G-20 will work to reform global financial regulations to prevent future crises? What kind of measures will be proposed?

1:22 Colin Bradford: This will be a major issue in Toronto this weekend. The leaders will review and report on progress over the last nine months, since Pittsburgh, in G20 countries, by parliaments and through cooperative efforts at the Financial Stability Board in Basle and the IMF to push forward oversight, supervision and regulatory reform of financial markets and institutions.

1:24 Colin Bradford: A lot has been done in each of these venues over the last nine months.

The challenge for leaders is multiple. First, they have to be vigilant in searching out remaining weaknesses in national efforts. There will be some. This work is not over, not by a long shot.

1:26 Colin Bradford: Second, they will have to figure out how to convey to the public what is going on here, and that is not made easy by the variety of fronts on which there has been action or on which action is underway.

Third, countries are different. Some countries, like Canada, have fairly solid regulatory frameworks and institutions in place. They have relatively few investment banks, reducing systemic risk. They have higher capital requirements than many. So their opposition to the bank tax or bank levy is due to the fact that they don't have the same level of risk as the U.S. for example.

1:29 Colin Bradford: So, leaders will have to report on progress collectively and eclectically that nonetheless reflects the considerable progress that has been made in laying the foundations for much greater collaboration, information sharing, and vigilance than before the crisis, and much greater movement toward institutional innovations and reform which will strengthen the ability of governments to assert public responsibility for the public interest in financial stability, than was there before the crisis.

1:30 David Mark: That's about all the time we have for today. Thanks everyone for your great questions.

1:31 Colin Bradford: Thanks to everyone for great questions. I would have liked to have addressed more of your questions, since there are so many good ones. Will try to increase my typing speed for the next round. Thank you.

Authors

Colin I. Bradford

Image Source: © Dylan Martinez / Reuters

Recovery or Relapse: The Role of the G-20 in the Global Economy

Fri, 18 Jun 2010 13:48:00 -0400

On June 26, heads of state and government of the Group of 20 (G-20) will meet in Toronto, which is the fourth time they will convene since the start of the global economic crisis. At last September’s G-20 Summit in Pittsburgh, leaders seemed cautious yet fairly optimistic and confident that the worst of the crisis was behind them and that the world economy was on the path toward recovery. During Pittsburgh, leaders focused on the global coordinated actions needed to ensure a full economic recovery that would deliver sustainable, long-term and balanced global growth.

However, before the economic recovery could be fully entrenched, the global economy was hit with yet another setback in the form of the European debt crisis. Therefore, almost a year later, the question still remains: is the world economy really recovering? Or are we beginning to see a relapse?

Experts from the Brookings Global Economy and Development program examine this question, analyze the current economic climate, and provide recommendations on how the G-20 should continue to serve as the “premier forum for international economic cooperation.”

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Articles

Back From the Brink, but a Tough Road Still Ahead for the G-20 » (PDF)
Eswar Prasad takes the pulse of the world economy and tracks the recovery in G-20 economies by looking at a set of real economy, financial and confidence indicators. He discusses the critical policies and reforms that G-20 leaders must take into consideration in Toronto in order to put the world economy back on track toward balanced, robust and sustainable growth.

The G-20 Summit Assesses the European Crisis: Finding the Way From Toronto » (PDF)
Domenico Lombardi assesses how the ongoing European debt crisis will impact the agenda and discussions in Toronto. He argues that the European Union—the largest economy in the world—lacks the institutional framework needed to manage the first serious crisis since its post-World War II establishment. Lombardi also discusses what the G-20 can and cannot do to help Europe deal with its debt crisis.

It’s Time to Drop the G8 » (PDF)
Colin Bradford and Johannes Linn analyze the changing role of the G8 with the rise of the G-20. They argue that the G8 has lost its legitimacy and effectiveness due to its reduced relative weight in the world economy and the growing set of complex global challenges that require greater coordination from a diverse group of countries. They advise allowing the G-20 to break the pre-formed, traditional alliances in order to engage in a more fluid and flexible process of discussion, negotiation and bargaining.

Passing the Development Football From the G8 to the G-20 » (PDF)
Homi Kharas examines what role the G-20 should play in international development vis-à-vis the G8. He argues that while the G8 deserves credit for achieving some positive impacts on development aid and debt relief, the G-20 can and should provide a more comprehensive view of development; one that includes issues like growth, employment, investment and private sector development and that affects a more diverse group of emerging and developing economies.

It’s Time for Africa’s Voice in the G-20 » (PDF)
Ezra Suruma discusses Africa’s lack of representation in the G-20 despite having Ethiopian and South African leaders participate in the meetings in Toronto. Suruma urges the G-20 and other international forums and institutions to respond to Africa’s quest for inclusion and to increase Africa’s voice of nearly one billion people in the global discussions of world economic affairs, which certainly impact the future of Africa’s growth and development.

G-20 Leadership Lacking on the Doha Round » (PDF)
Paul Blustein evaluates how the G-20 has delivered so far on the Doha Round of global trade negotiations. He argues that although G-20 leaders have continued to pledge to refrain from using protectionist measures such as raising new barriers to international trade and investment, they have done little to seek an ambitious and balanced conclusion to the Doha Development Round in 2010.

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Europe's Governance Stalemate Causes Gridlock for Global Governance Reform

Amar Bhattacharya, Colin I. Bradford and Johannes F. Linn — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 00:00:00 -0400

Over the last six decades, European countries have moved in what often seemed like a slow and convoluted path toward closer cooperation. Yet, after a history of war and colonialism Europe’s transformation into a peaceful continent, a constructive neighbor and a generous international donor is a great benefit to the world.

However, at the upcoming IMF and World Bank spring meetings, Greece’s ongoing financial crisis will illustrate the challenges that Europe still faces in creating a strong and cohesive union, as well as the risks of global financial instability should Europe fail to manage threats of a Greek default. Moreover, the ongoing debates about IMF and World Bank governance reform are a reminder of Europe’s continual inability to create a coherent geopolitical presence, which is now becoming a major obstacle to effective global governance. To put it bluntly, the stalemate of Europe’s internal governance reform is creating gridlock for reform of global governance.

It is clear that the global institutions created after World War II do not reflect the economic and political realities of the 21^st century. The end of colonialism, the rise of large emerging markets, the growing interconnectedness of world economies and the threats of global financial instability and climate change require inclusive, representative and effective global institutions. This has put a spotlight on existing international organizations, including the G8, UN Security Council, IMF and World Bank, and their governance structures. All of them reflect the past dominance of Europe and the United States and must be reformed to represent the new balance of world economic and political influence.

Europeans tend to think of the U.S. as the superpower promoting its own values through unilateralism, exceptionalism and hard power, unwilling to give up its privileges in international institutions. They see Europe as a harmonious community of diverse nations with a preference for compromise and soft power. In fact, Europe often aggressively projects “European values” in foreign relations, touts its experience of multinational integration as an example for others and insists on representation in international institutions far beyond its actual size or strength.

Excluding Russia, Europe occupies four seats at the G8 and two of the five permanent seats on the UN Security Council. It occupies eight to nine of the 24 seats at the IMF and World Bank and represents about 30% of their voting share. This compares with Europe’s share of 7.5% in the world’s population and 23% in the global economy. The Europeans also have traditionally nominated the head of the IMF. In the newly created G-20 summit, Europe occupies five of the 20 seats, a more reasonable share than the 50% in the G8. However, the addition of the Netherlands and Spain raises the de facto representation of Europe at G-20 summits. European requests for an additional “Nordic chair” and a seat for the political head of the Eurozone at the G-20 further reflect the sense of entitlement to an extraordinary role in international forums.

There have been calls for a reduced representation of Europe in the major global institutions and a reallocation of its voting shares and governance arrangements that is more closely aligned with its current global economic and political weight. In the World Trade Organization, the European Union is already represented as a single entity, but this remains the exception. With only limited EU constitutional reforms agreed under the Lisbon Treaty, stalemate prevails in EU reform of its foreign policy process. This perpetuates the EU’s inability to speak with one voice, to cast a singular vote, and to occupy one or at least fewer chairs in international organizations. This has become a major stumbling block for global governance reform. Since the Europeans are unwilling to give up on excessive individual country representation and voting shares in the governing boards of the international organizations, they keep out other key players and prevent a recalibration of voting structures that reflect today’s changing global realities.

The consequence of this is four-fold: First, global governance reform faces gridlock. Second, international institutions lose effectiveness and legitimacy. Third, formal European dominance in these institutions is rendered meaningless by the cacophony of European voices and lack of cohesion in votes. Fourth, Europe over time is increasingly marginalized in global decision making. This outcome serves neither global nor European interests. It may be counter-intuitive, but if the Europeans give up votes and chairs in the international institutions, they will wield more influence in more effective global institutions.

Until the Europeans are ready to address their own governance challenge, there is little hope for effective reform of global governance structures. But we sense a growing impatience in the rest of the world with European exceptionalism. Furthermore, the global financial crisis, followed now by the Greek financial upheavals, has put the Europeans on notice that business as usual will not work for them. We hope that the European political leadership will grasp this opportunity to change the way in which Europe acts on the global stage.

Authors

The Path Toward Universal Education in 2010

David Gartner — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 15:52:00 -0400

This month, political leaders worldwide are emphasizing the stark divide between the world’s commitment to achieving universal primary education by 2015 and the reality that 72 million primary-age children remain out of school. Underlying the education gap is a significant financial resource deficit, underscored by recently released data by the OECD on donor financing and the G8’s development commitments for 2010.

Despite increasing high-level attention to universal education, the OECD found that there is an $18 billion shortfall in the commitments made by the G8 at Gleneagles and that Africa is likely to receive only $11 billion of the promised $25 billion increase in assistance from the G8 donors. While this financing gap will impact many sectors, it particularly diminishes the chances of achieving universal primary education by 2015.

Over the last decade, the share of overall development assistance going to education has remained relatively flat at 11 percent, and many of the gains in external education support have reflected the expansion of the overall aid envelope. The overall financing gap for education has been estimated by UNESCO’s Education for All Global Monitoring Report to be as high as $16 billion.

Despite these challenges, new momentum is building toward expanded investment in global education. In South Africa, President Zuma announced last week that because “education is the key to genuine freedom,” he will host a major universal education summit in June in connection with the FIFA-World Cup. In the United States, Congresswoman Nita Lowey introduced the Education for All Act that seeks to make U.S. investment in global education a top priority. Last week, First Lady Michelle Obama launched her new international focus on education by saying that “We have to confront the wrong and outdated ideas and assumptions that only certain young people deserve to be educated. . . .”

Upcoming global summits in June may be the last chance to set the world on the right path to achieving the Millennium Development Goal of universal primary education by 2015. When Canada hosted the G8 in 2002, the country played a central role in catalyzing a new financing instrument, the Education for All-Fast Track Initiative (FTI). As part of its agenda of promoting accountability for past G8 commitments, the Canadians would be well placed to encourage the G8 to support important governance reforms to strengthen the Fast Track Initiative.

With the G-20 emerging as the leading forum for economic policymaking, it should take on a larger role in shaping and delivering these global commitments, such as universal education. The current G-20 chair, South Korea, has indicated that development issues will be included in its agenda. Emerging donors within the G-20 can become a leading force with their global education investments as well as lead by example and share lessons from their own experience moving toward universal education.

Closing the global education gap will require President Obama and the G8 to deliver on their specific commitments on development assistance and financing universal education, and the G-20 to assert its leadership in catalyzing universal education as a fundamental building block of economic growth. While recent events offer new signs of hope for global action around universal education, the coming months will demonstrate whether that hope is justified.

Authors

David Gartner

Making Multilateralism Work: How the G-20 Can Help the United Nations

Bruce Jones — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 16:45:00 -0400

The moves in 2008-09, prompted by the global financial crisis, to convene the G-20 at the level of heads of state constituted the first major adaptation of global arrangements to better fit with the fact of the emerging powers. Clearly it will not be the last. G-20 negotiations have already given a critical impetus to governance reforms at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and The World Bank.

Predictably, if somewhat ironically, the expansion of the G-8 to include a wider range of countries including from the “Global South” drew angry cries of exclusion, illegitimacy, and preemption at the United Nations. Early G-20 decisions also provoked a new bout of tensions between the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and the international financial institutions.

Criticisms of the G-20 from within the UN focus on its illegitimacy (defined in UN-centric terms) and its potential usurpation of functions formally tasked to UN bodies by the Charter. The fundamental problem with the nascent rivalry between the G-bodies and the UN bodies is an underlying misconception of their comparative advantages and of the potential relationship between them.

Rather than viewing the G-20 as a threatened usurper of the United Nations, this paper takes a different starting point. It regards the universality of the United Nations, apart from certain operational weaknesses, as an enduring political strength of the organization. It also assumes that the G-20 (like the G-8 before it) will have minimal operational or actionable roles and will depend on the formal institutions to implement most, if not all, of its major initiatives. Given their nature, then, there is a necessary relationship between the G-20 and similar bodies and formal, inclusive institutions. An important factor for the G-20/UN relationship, in particular, is the struggle to maintain UN legitimacy and effectiveness, given the world body’s recent overstretch and underperformance, as well as stalled reforms. A better way to think about the relationship between the two entities is to ask if the G-20 helps the United Nations perform and reform.

Taking the idea even further, this paper asks whether the G-20 could play useful roles in broader institutional reform. The contemporary international system confronts a wide range of transnational and global problems. It also has a broad panoply of international and regional institutions—technical, political, and operational—geared to solving these problems. Yet these two realities don’t add up. Gaps, overlaps, incoherence and underperformance are chronic to the world of multilateral institutions. Can the G-20 help drive improved performance?

Read the full paper at StanleyFoundation.org »

Authors

Bruce Jones

Publication: The Stanley Foundation

The G-20 Governments Should Look at Their Own Governance

Daniel Kaufmann — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 12:00:00 -0400

The G-20 just finished their third meeting, and there is a lot of buzz surrounding the demise of the G8 and it being replaced by the broader G-20. Accolades are also given to this Summit on the progress of IMF and World Bank governance reforms and on climate change.

But, no uncorking of the champagne yet.

For starters, during the G-20 London Summit last April, was obvious that the G-8 was effectively displaced. While the G-20 was grappling with the gravest phase of the financial crisis, the Italian prime minister announced that he would host the forthcoming G8 summit in a ship. Thus, Pittsburgh may have merely formalized what long ago was already inevitable, given the changed geopolitical and economic reality.

While broadening the “voice”of emerging economies in these elite clubs is obviously welcomed, there is less than meets the eye. First, let us keep in mind that while more “voice” is being given, some of those very governments are not particularly adept at giving “voice” to their own people. It is still an elite club of governments, representing 19 countries and the EU.

Aabout 1.5 billion citizens living in three of these countries are severely “voice deprived,” while another 400 million living in another three countries have it only a tad better, living in a “voice challenged” environment. This “people-friendly voice” (and not merely government-focused) perspective is also important in looking at the “voice reforms” at the IMF and the World Bank. So far, these reforms are marginal, and again, focused on government representation. Many of these governments are not necessarily fully representative of their own people. Other country governments, such as Belgium, are representative of their citizenry, but are tiny, and yet are holding on to their executive chairs in these organizations.

Further, a larger group may enhance voice and participation, but important decision-making is unlikely. The Pittsburgh communiqué is illustrative with “encouragements,”exhortations and principles, and even a bit of “peer review.” But there are no sanctions or other clear incentives or enforcement mechanisms to engage in concrete collective action for the public global good.

Witness for instance the bit on trade in the communiqué. It is last, an afterthought, and simply reiterating what was already exhorted in the London Summit in April, including the customary “commitment to Doha.” In reality, the world continues to move further into protectionism. U.S. duties on Chinese tires illustrate just this. Likewise, the outcome of the G-20 meeting is rather weak on the expected revamp of financial regulations. Granted, there was so much focus on compensation reform. But this is neither the crux of the matter, nor best resolved by 20 governments.

To give credit where it is due, the London Summit did further convergence among key players toward the need for stimulus plans in their economies. But this is an exception, which was forced by the dire magnitude of the crisis. And during Pittsburgh, an emerging consensus to phase out inefficient energy subsidies may turn out to be a non-trivial achievement as well. And there was again a long list of calls to help the vulnerable and poor. While laudable, they were mostly exhortations for voluntarism, again.

Finally, consider a very different “Group-of-8:” Botswana, Chile, Mauritius, Uruguay, New Zealand, Norway, Singapore and Switzerland. Do they have any relevance for the G-20? Little, at first. None of them were invited to the previously G-20 summits since neither their economic size nor their population are large enough, and they lack the global “systemic significance” of most G-20 members. This particular “Group-of-8” does not even really exist as a formal body.

But there is a rationale for G-20 leaders to pay attention to this particular set of uninvited countries. Like the G-20, they comprise a rather diverse group of developing and developed countries from different regions of the world. But, unlike most of the G-20, this particular group of eight countries exhibits high quality of national governance. In fact, their levels of governance, on average, exceed the now defunct G8. This good governance group is not perfect either, but their experiences and lessons ought not be ignored. In a previous article, I emphasized the need to look for good practices outside of the G-20.

We need to keep in mind that it is rare for any organization to be better than the sum of its parts. Too often we assess global governance institutions without first having a serious look at the governance (and set of incentives) of each individual country member—in this case governments.

The Pittsburgh Summit was very weak on national governance and integrity issues, even though they are critical to solving other global challenges. Perhaps the G-20 may focus better on governance in Seoul, while also drawing from lessons from outside the G-20.

Authors

Daniel Kaufmann

Replacing the G-7, Not Enlarging It, is a Historic Shift toward Global Inclusion

Colin I. Bradford — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 12:00:00 -0400

President Obama’s announcement today that the G-20 Summit will “permanently replace” the G-7 is a historic event. The G-20 communique today reportedly will state: “We designate the G-20 to be the premier forum for our international economic cooperation.”

What this means is that the G-7 finance minister forum will be replaced by the G-20 leaders summit. The next G-20 summits will be in Korea as chair of the G20 next spring and Canada as chair of the G-8 next June. The G-8 Summit will still meet on international security and foreign policy issues but its status as the global steering committee for global issues will be superseded now by the G-20. International economic cooperation was the founding keystone of the G-7 Summits in 1975 by Helmut Schmidt and Valery Giscard D’Estaing, heads of state who had both been finance ministers.

The ascendence of the G20 is a major turning point in the form, style and function of global leadership, shifting the focus from the G7 which represents the West and a minority of less than one billion people to the G20 which includes ten non-Western, emerging nations which represent the global majority.

The president obviously consulted all the G20 leaders before announcing this today, not least because French president, Nicolas Sarkozy only a few weeks ago announced that when it would be his turn to host the G-8 in 2011, he would convene a permanent forum at G-14, a G-8 plus 5 plus 1. That would have excluded the three Muslim nations in the G-20---Indonesia, Turkey and Saudi Arabia--- as well as removed Australia and Korea, all valuable, weighty contributors to meeting global challenges.

The president is acting on his own strong perception that no nation can address global challenges alone and implicitly is recognizing that the West can not presume dominance in a world of rising non-Western powers like China, India, and Brazil. These rising super-powers themselves want other non-Western nations at the global table, not just be included informally, as they have been for some time, in the G-7/8 summits.

This is a symbolic act of inclusion of immense importance to international politics. It establishes a new framework for international economic cooperation, multilateral decision making, and global coordination. As a result, it is a step toward greater effectiveness in global leadership by filling the void created by the pretense of the G-7/8 being a global forum when it was really only a forum of Western nations.

There is tremendous significance to the history being made today that this decision does not enlarge the G-7 but replaces it. No one calls the G20, the G8 plus 12 ! The G-20 Summit rests on a history of ten years of interactions by finance ministers, central bank governors and deputies that has occurred since the Asia financial crisis in 1998. This dialogue already has grown to include foreign ministries and other senior officials from G-20 countries who will now engage with each other to take concerted and coordinated actions to move the world forward on the crucial global agenda.

The new global leadership manifested by the G-20 is a fresh start for addressing the challenges of the 21^st century by a group of countries that are broadly representative of the world, which can devise ways to include still more diverse country perspectives in its deliberations, and which as a result can be effective in guiding and steering the international community toward cooperative outcomes which are in the interest of all people.

Authors

Colin I. Bradford

Hillary Clinton's Passage to India

T.P. Sreenivasan — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 12:00:00 -0400

India adored Edmund Hillary, a New Zealander who conquered Mount Everest in 1953 long before Hillary Clinton came on the scene. That name recognition may have contributed to Hillary Clinton being referred to as "(D-Punjab)" in a memo from Barack Obama's campaign during their fight for the nomination. As she sets out on her journey to India today in her new capacity as secretary of state, she has as much a hazardous climb ahead of her as Sir Hillary had in the previous century.

The recent elections in India and the United States will have a profound impact on the ties between the two countries. The Bush Administration was ready for a tight embrace of India, but India shied away because of the hesitation of the leftists, who were part of the ruling coalition. But today, when India is ready to move forward with a popular mandate, it appears that it is the turn of the U.S. to backtrack. Priorities seem to have changed on the Potomac. Short-term concerns may well have overtaken the logic for building a long term relationship.

Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton have set the right tone with India, but it is on policy that trouble may arise. The contours of the nuclear agreement with India, in particular, do not fit neatly into the policy framework of the Democrats. In the eyes of some Obama advisers, the nuclear deal was a sellout to India and, given a choice, they would retrieve much of what was negotiated by Bush. But the Obama Administration is committed to the implementation of the deal in a way that it does not hurt the nonproliferation objectives of the U.S. India, on the other hand, wishes to consolidate the gains of the Bush era and build on them.

Read the full opinion »

Authors

T.P. Sreenivasan

Publication: Wall Street Journal Asia

G8: The Run-up to L'Aquila

Federiga Bindi — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 12:00:00 -0400

A distinguishing feature of the Italian G8 presidency has been the intensive preparatory work involved. The idea was to go beyond the immediate and try to take a longer-term view of the various issues under examination in the G8, especially those for which the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is competent. That was done by bringing together some of the best minds in the world. Key among the issues discussed were nuclear non-proliferation, Afghanistan (and the surrounding region) and the future of global governance. In these preparations, the ministry worked in close cooperation with the most prestigious think tanks in the world, such as the Brooking Institution – which has been working on the future of global governance for some time – the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI).

This is a fairly common approach in the Anglo-Saxon countries, one which Minister Frattini also wished to launch in Italy, thus introducing a new perspective in a country that in the past sometimes took a rather Italian-centric approach to global issues.

The collaboration between the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Brookings culminated in a seminar in “Chatham House” style. Entitled “The G8 and Beyond: The Economic and Politics of a Global Century”, this took place on 22 June in Villa Madama. The conference was held in partnership with Aspen Italia, the Club de Madrid, ENEL and others. It gathered around the discussion table former Presidents (Ricardo Lagos) and Prime Ministers (Kim Campbell, Giuliano Amato, Romano Prodi); current and prospective Nobel Prize-winners (Edmund Phelps, Jeffrey Sachs, Dominick Salvatore); diplomats, leading academics and journalists; and, of course, Foreign Minister Franco Frattini, Secretary of State Vincenzo Scotti and the Italian Sherpa, Giampiero Massolo.

The seminar, naturally, did not resist the temptation of suggesting to the G8 how to resolve the economic crisis, most notably by insisting on the need to relaunch Doha and the fact that state intervention in the economy should end as soon as the emergency is over. But the key question to emerge was climate. As we know, at the end of the year the post-Kyoto negotiations will be taking place in Copenhagen. The stakes are very high: the planet has six years to go before the warming process becomes irreversible. And just 1.1 percent of global GDP could save us. A small number, certainly, at a table of experts and former government leaders, but a large number when seated at the dinner table are heads of state. However, the numbers should also be weighed against the importance of the question – and this one is undoubtedly of fundamental importance.

The group in Villa Madama therefore called to give the utmost importance to the question of climate change in the final communiqués both at L’Aquila and at Pittsburgh. In addition, naturally, to acting consistently and coherently in Copenhagen. This question is not just of the utmost importance for the future of the planet but also in enabling us to understand what we can expect in concrete terms from the American President, Barack Obama. The president has strong views on climate and renewable energy issues. One of the issues causing the widest gap between Obama and John McCain during the election campaign was the fact that – while McCain wanted to focus on a return to nuclear power in grand style – Obama maintained that the right strategy was to focus on renewable energy, both for the good of the planet and as a lever of economic recovery.

And, in effect, the nuclear option would appear to be only a partial answer to the demand for increased energy supplies. The creation of hundreds of new nuclear power stations in the near future – there is talk of 150 in China alone – is somewhat problematic. We need only consider the potential uranium supply problem (it is no coincidence that China has made strong inroads into Africa), the question of waste disposal, and the risk of a spillover into military proliferation, as the Iranian question shows most clearly.

Villa Madama therefore suggested that a sort of Marshal Plan be drawn up for renewable energy, with means and resources being pooled to speed up research – for example we need to solve the question of energy storage – and fiscal (and other) incentives being established to encourage energy savings and the use of renewables, from household level upwards. And finally, great emphasis was placed on the potential of projects like the Middle East “Sun Belt”.

From the response at L’Aquila to climate and similar questions we will therefore see what the heads of state really think. As mentioned earlier, the stakes are particularly high where Barack Obama is concerned. The Kyoto Treaty has never been ratified by the United States, and the risk is that Copenhagen could meet the same fate. On 28 June 2009, the U.S. Congress approved the “American Clean Energy and Security Act”. Following similar lines to the European 20-20-20 Directive, the new law envisages that by 2020, 20 percent of energy will come from renewable sources and by the same year CO2 emissions will be reduced by 17 percent (80 percent by 2050). The united front presented by the Democrats and the favorable vote by 6 Republicans give us grounds for hope. However, to ratify international treaties neither Congress nor the president are enough in themselves: 70 out of 100 votes in the Senate are required. And the sad fact is that the numbers just don’t add up (at present, democrat senators are 59 in number). So what will the U.S. president do at L’Aquila? Will he sign up to a commitment in the hope of bringing the Senate round to his way of thinking, or will he try to lower the bar to the lowest denominator so as not to create new frictions after the domestic tensions over Iran?

Climate change also acts as an excellent lead-in to another subject that generated lively debate at Villa Madama: the future of global governance – or rather, the “best” format for it. The delicate balance is always between inclusiveness and representativeness on the one hand and efficiency and effectiveness on the other. The group proposed a “variable geometry” system as the best solution, with the G8 (or G13) as the central core and different formats coming into play depending on the subject on the agenda. Essentially, Villa Madama stated that the thematic approach proposed by the Italian Presidency – “it is the subject on the agenda that should decide the format and not vice-versa” – appears to be the most pragmatic and effective.

But the participants underscored – and here is the link with climate change – that this is not just a question of having a seat at the table. To quote Spider Man, “with great powers come great responsibilities”. The seat at the table for the emerging economies must therefore be backed up by a very real and effective commitment: reducing CO2 emissions is an excellent example. In other words, there is a price to pay to become fully-fledged members of the global governance community and it is first and foremost in the hands of the G5 to decide whether or not they want to pay it.

Last but not least, it is to be hoped that the high-level meetings leading up to the summit return to their original spirit: fairly informal fora where participants could speak freely, throw out innovative ideas, and resolve otherwise difficult political and policy problems. They should not be fora to discuss technical details; nor should they sow a temptation to take the place of the existing international institutions. These certainly need, at least in part, to be reformed – but should not be thrown away with the bath water. In any case, the international organizations could themselves help increase the effectiveness of the G8 and related meetings – as was suggested at Villa Madama – for example by providing a small, permanent secretariat for the summits.

Finally, global issues concern the future of the world, and therefore all citizens. National leaders need to make an effort to construct a domestic agenda that supports the actions to be taken at the global level. This can sometimes be unpopular. But it would certainly help narrow the gap between political leadership and citizenship, a gap that has come to characterize the global scenario. In the long run, therefore, the political gains would certainly be higher than the costs.

Authors

Federiga Bindi