by David Shorr and Thomas Wright
Survival: Global Politics and Strategy, vol. 52, no. 2, April–May 2010, pp. 181–198
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Editor’s note
The Group of Twenty (G20) advanced and emerging economies was established in 1999, in the wake of the 1997 Asian financial crisis, to promote global financial stability. It was only in response to the global financial crisis of 2008, however, that the G20 emerged as a major player on the world stage. With the potential to alter the international order almost by stealth, the role of the G20 in multilateral diplomacy merits deeper examination than it appears to be receiving. Survival invited David Shorr, a program officer at the Stanley Foundation, and Thomas Wright,executive director of studies at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, to explore these issues in an exhange of letters, which we present here.
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Dear David,
A couple of years ago, experts in multilateralism were engaged in a vigorous debate about the Concert of Democracies. Many people, you included, raised thoughtful objections to the concert, primarily on the basis that it would represent forum shopping and an end-run around the United Nations and it would alienate Beijing at a time when the United States needed China as a partner to tackle global problems.
Since then, the concert has been almost forgotten, and meanwhile we have seen the most significant transformation of the international order in decades with the emergence of the G20. The trigger, of course, was the international financial crisis of 2008. Unlike proposals for the Concert of Democracies, Western experts have welcomed the rise of the G20 and treated it relatively uncritically.
The G20 has been formally assigned duties for the management of the global economy, although there are those who would like to see it venture into other issues, such as international security. I write this letter chiefly because I think we are on the verge of ushering in a transformation of the architecture of the international order without having subjected this institution to any sort of rigorous vetting. In particular, I am concerned that continuing along this path will accentuate, rather than ease, the crisis of multilateralism, whereby the institutions available to us are unable to generate the levels of international cooperation required to effectively tackle international threats and challenges. I would like to highlight three potential problems for your consideration.
Legitimacy
Traditionally, the United States has supported two types of international organisations. The first is open to all countries (either universally or regionally) to join if they fulfil certain requirements. The United Nations is the most obvious example, but others include the World Trade Organisation, the World Bank, the IMF, the OSCE, and the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The second type is based on values, of which NATO and the original G7 are the leading examples.
The G20 is the first organisation created with the backing of the United States that divides the world into countries that matter and those that don’t. Membership is arbitrary – there are no criteria, for example, by which Canada or Argentina qualify for membership, while Spain, the world’s ninth largest economy, is ...
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David Shorr is a Program Officer at the Stanley Foundation. Thomas Wright is Executive Director of Studies at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs.
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