Written by Angelos Delivorias.
Brazil took over the G20 presidency on 1 December 2023. In line with the motto ‘Building a just world and a sustainable planet’, the presidency’s priorities will be the fight against hunger, poverty and inequality, climate change and energy transition, and the reform of global governance. In presiding over the group of the world’s major economies, Brazil follows India, the holder of the 2023 presidency, and precedes South Africa, which will take over in 2025. Notably, this ‘trio’ of presidencies also constitutes the IBSA group (IBSA Dialogue Forum – India, Brazil, South Africa) – comprising three democracies which join with China and Russia to form the BRICS group.
To reflect on the role of the G20 as well as the implications of these three successive presidencies, which follow on from a fourth ‘global South’ country presidency (Indonesia in 2022), the EPRS, in collaboration with EPinASEAN, organised an online expert roundtable on 15 November 2023. The event, entitled the G20 in a time of geopolitical upheaval, brought together a multitude of views on the group and on its relevance and potential at a time of superpower rivalry and challenges to global governance.
Opening the event, Antoine Ripoll, Director responsible for Parliamentary relations with Southeast Asia, welcomed the participants and presented the G20 briefly, noting the addition of the African Union in 2023.
In her keynote speech, Nicola Beer, Vice-President of the European Parliament with competence for relations with Asia and Oceania, stressed the importance of the G20 and focused on its parliamentary arm, the P20. The European Parliament is a key member of the P20, along with the parliaments of France, Germany and Italy. Vice-President Beer noted the value of the P20 as a forum for debate and dialogue and the need to strengthen the EU representation in such a forum: parliaments not only have a crucial role as legislators, but also the EU’s presence protects the rules-based international order from others countries’ efforts to undermine it. She also argued in favour of the P20 taking place before the Leaders’ Summit (instead of afterwards), to contribute in shaping the latter’s agenda.
Following this keynote speech, Elena Lazarou, acting Head of Unit in the EPRS external policies unit, moderated a panel discussion among experts based in the four G20 presidency holders for 2022-2025 and in North America.
James Crabtree (former Executive Director of IISS-Asia) noted that while the G20 is still important, it has become less functional in the last decade, while other groups (G7) have become more dynamic, and others yet (AUKUS, Quad, BRICS, SCO) have risen in importance. The reason for the absence of dynamism on the part of the G20 is due to two divisions within the group, i.e. between the United States and China/Russia and between rich industrialised countries that belong to the G7 and rising middle powers. At the same time, the G20 is still useful, if only as a forum for leaders to meet. After all, the first and only Biden-Xi meeting (until recently) took place at the G20 last year. It is also an important forum at the ‘mini–multilateral level’: for instance, the G7 initiative Just Energy Transition Partnership (JETP) was signed during the Leaders’ Summit in Indonesia. Going forward, James Crabtree noted that the G20 could be used to achieve progress in less controversial issues, such as debt restructuring, or digital public infrastructure.
Anirban Sarma (deputy Director of the Observer Research Foundation – ORF) presented the Indian presidency’s G20 six priorities. These are: (i) accelerating progress on the SDGs; (ii) accelerating inclusive and resilient growth (getting SMEs into global trade, labour); (iii) reforming multilateralism for the 21st century (United Nations, International Monetary Fund, World Bank need to be fit for the future); (iv) realise the digital transformation and public infrastructure; (v) green development; and (vi) women-led development. He explained that the priorities were chosen given the delayed progress in delivery of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and trade and supply chain disruption from the COVID‑19 pandemic and the Russian invasion of Ukraine. He elaborated further on the digital public infrastructure, which aims to enable essential society-wide functions and services such as identification, payments, and data exchange. He added that the members of the task force on DPI explored ways to make technology affordable and accessible, create an interoperable system for payments, lending, and entrepreneurship and supporting the broader SDGs. As a result of the talks, a shared understanding of DPA has emerged in the G20. In addition, the high-level G20 framework has led to a concrete roadmap. Lastly, there was agreement on the need for more funding for DPA in lower- and middle-income countries.
Oliver Della Costa Stuenkel (associate Professor at the School of International Relations of the Getulio Vargas Foundation) noted that Brazil begins its G20 presidency in a time of increased tensions around the globe and domestic and international volatility. Brazilian foreign policy has undergone a great shift following the recent change in government, from a period of anti-globalism to a period of activism. He also noted several elections around the globe in 2024, which could shift G20 priorities. He reminded the audience that in 2025, Brasilia will also organise the BRICS summit and the COP30. During its G20 presidency, Brazil will focus on social inclusion, energy transition and reform of global governance institutions. These are seen as priorities and areas where Brazil expects to strengthen its strategy of projecting itself and the ‘Brazil is back’ narrative.
Elizabeth Sidiropoulos (Chief Executive of the South African Institute of International Affairs)noted thatnext year is an important election year for South Africa, following nine ‘lost’ years due to state capture, the COVID‑19 pandemic, and logistical and transportation shortcomings, which affected economic growth and employment. In addition, while South Africa still plays an important role on the African continent, other actors are rising (e.g. Kenya, which hosted the first Africa Climate Summit in 2023, or Senegal). South Africa welcomes the very recent addition of the African Union in the G20. It sees the G20 as an important forum, but not as a substitute for the UN. At the same time, it is of the view that the reform of multilateral structures is long overdue. While it is not yet a part of the ‘troika’, possible priorities for its presidency would be the just energy transition; climate financing; tackling illicit financial flows; inequality, as well as developing countries’ debt.
John Kirton (Professor Emeritus and Director of the G20 Research Group at the University of Toronto)noted thatthe G20 had two distinct missions – financial security and making globalisation work for the benefit of all. It succeeded in the first (tackling the 2007-2009 global financial crisis and partly the European sovereign debt crisis), but did not make globalisation work for all. While the Seoul Summit focused on SDGs and green growth, the G20 pivoted to focus on containing COVID‑19. Control of the crisis came at the price of progress on the SDGs, none of which are on track. Going forward, an important issue is to increase delivery of commitments taken in the context of the G20 and possibly increase its frequency, with specific deliverables.
In the dialogue that followed with the audience, the participants discussed the possible expansion of the G7 group (to Australia, Korea, India), ‘make it or break it’ issues for the functioning of multilateral groupings (e.g. multipolarity, digital inclusion, elections in major countries) and critical issues for the upcoming presidencies, with a general agreement that climate change features predominantly among them. They also provided insights on observable trends in global governance more widely, such as the transition from the post-cold war common language on universal rights, to different visions of the global order and a criticism of some of the existing institutions as predominantly ‘western’. In this context, the importance of recognising social and economic rights, as well as political and civic rights was seen by participants as a way to bridge the divide between North and South. The speakers also agreed that, beyond geopolitics, cooperation on non-traditional security threats, such as climate change, pandemics and debt crises, benefits greatly from the G20 format.
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