EL G7 DEBE ACEPTAR QUE NO PUEDE DIRIGIR EL MUNDO (MARTIN WOLF)

The #G7 must accept that it cannot run the world https://t.co/SQ99kLcB0c #martinwolf

— Guillermo Ruiz Zapatero (@ruiz_zapatero) May 24, 2023

  “Goodbye G7, hello G20.” That was the headline on an article in The Economist on the first summit of the Group of 20 in Washington in 2008 which argued that this represented “a decisive shift in the old order”. Today, hopes of a co-operative global economic order, which reached their zenith at the G20’s London summit of April 2009, have evaporated. Yet it is hardly a case of “Goodbye G20, hello G7”. The earlier world of G7 domination is even more remote than that of G20 co-operation. Neither global co-operation nor western domination look feasible. What might follow? Alas, “division” might be one answer and “anarchy” another.

 
At 19,000 words, this reads like a manifesto for a world government. In contrast, the communiqué of the London G20 summit in April 2009 was just over 3,000 words. This comparison is unfair, given the focus at that time on the economic crisis. But an unfocused wish list cannot be useful: when everything is a priority, nothing is.

Moreover, both the “unipolar” moment of the US and the economic dominance of the G7 are history. True, the latter is still the most powerful and cohesive economic bloc in the world. It continues, for example, to produce all the world’s leading reserve currencies. Yet, between 2000 and 2023, its share in global output (at purchasing power) will have fallen from 44 to 30 per cent, while that of all high-income countries will have fallen from 57 to 41 per cent. Meanwhile, China’s share will have risen from 7 to 19 per cent. China is now an economic superpower. Via its Belt and Road Initiative it has become a huge investor in (and creditor of) developing countries, though, predictably, it is having to deal with the consequent bad debts so familiar to G7 countries. For some emerging and developing countries, China is a more important economic partner than the G7: Brazil is one example. President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva may have attended the G7, but he cannot sensibly ignore China’s heft.

 

 

Yes, the G7 must defend its values and its interests. But it cannot run the world, even though the world’s fate will also be that of its members. A path to co-operation must be found, once again

 

martin.wolf@ft.com

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