A new global outlook for the G20

While India has taken a clear view of the role of the G20, there are concerns that the agenda, themes and focus areas that India will set for 2023 lack vision.

The G20 plays an important role in shaping and strengthening global architecture and governance on all major international economic issues. It recognizes that global prosperity is interdependent and that economic opportunities and challenges are intertwined. The challenge is to devise new approaches to resolve acute global discord.

However, according to the Ministry of External Affairs, in 190 meetings, India will strengthen international support for priorities of vital importance to developing countries in diverse social and economic sectors ranging from energy, agriculture, trade, digital economy, health and environment to employment. . , tourism, anti-corruption and women empowerment, including focus areas that affect the most vulnerable and disadvantaged. Without exclusivity, India has lost an opportunity to push the G20 and regional organizations towards its focus areas.

cooperation not commitments

A fractured world makes trade-offs, the essence of current multilateralism, difficult and suggests a new model of international cooperation.

First, multilateral commitments on aid and trade are faltering. Governance in a world that is increasingly equitable is in need of institutional innovation. This is because the role of the United Nations and the WTO in securing cooperation between donor and recipient country groups is losing centrality. There are now three socio-economic systems – the G7, China-Russia, and India and others – and they will jointly set the global agenda.

Second, Ukraine’s protracted shadow, rival finances, the expanding influence of US and China-dominated trade and value chains, and the reluctance of developing countries to take sides in strategic competition as they have a real choice, require fresh thinking on nature and Form of cooperation from the G20.

Third, the primary role of the G20, which accounts for 95% of the world’s patents, 85% of global GDP, 75% of international trade and 65% of the world’s population, needs to be reoriented to prevent conflicts of opinion. Is. Loss of global good. The solution lies in a new conceptual model, which seeks to settle on an agenda limited to principles rather than the long negotiated anodyne text. The Rio Declaration of 1992 is a fitting model. For example, the inclusion of each group’s three key priorities as part of the global agenda would inform smaller groups of countries that have issue-based relationships and struggle for meaningful agreement on the single concerns of those groups. Instead of doing there are overlaps between them, which are not even. talking to each other.

general concerns

India should seek cooperation on limited focus areas around science and technology, building on the resolutions of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) and other multilateral bodies.

A new conceptual framework is needed. First, the perceived equality that we are all in the same boat, recognized in terms of climate change, needs to be extended to other regions with a global impact redefining ‘common concerns’. Second, emerging economies should no longer be viewed as a source of problems requiring external solutions, but as a source of solutions to shared problems. Third, BRICS provides a suitable model for institutions of governance appropriate for the 21st century where a narrow group of states dominated by one power will not shape the agenda.

Starting point The Vienna Declaration on Human Rights in 1993 must build upon a global consensus reaffirming the indivisibility of all human rights. There is a growing recognition of economic and social rights – for example, in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Ensuring adequate food, housing, education, health, water and sanitation and work for all should guide international cooperation. The principles of common but distinct responsibilities for improving the quality of life of all families can guide discussions in other fora on problems that seem distasteful to multilateralism based on trade and aid.

Second, the global agenda is skewed toward investment, while science and technology are driving economic diversification, sustainable urbanization of the world, and the introduction of hydrogen economy and new crop varieties as an answer to both human well-being and global climate change. have power. , Innovation supports dematerializing production and consumption and moving towards renewable sources of energy. Lifestyle changes in the post-war period created urban jobs in services and retail that made up for the damages of high-productivity manufacturing and climate change. A platform for exchange of experiences on social benefits and development as complementary goals will promote new thinking on employment and environment.

Third, harnessing the potential of the digital-information-technology revolution requires redefining digital access as a “universal service” that goes beyond physical connectivity to share the unique opportunities available. For global society to reap the fruits of the new set of network technologies, open access software must be offered for more cost-effective service delivery options, good governance and sustainable development.

Fourth, space is the next frontier for finding solutions to natural resource management problems, from natural disasters related to climate change to supporting agricultural innovation for urban and infrastructure planning. Analyzing Earth observation data will require regional and international collaboration through existing centers that have massive computing capabilities, machine learning and artificial intelligence. Geospatial data, open access to data products and services and low cost of geospatial information technology facilities do not require huge financial resources.

Fifth, public health needs to learn from the COVID-19 crisis with infectious diseases representing a market failure. A major global challenge is the rapidly increasing antimicrobial resistance that requires collaboration between new antibiotics and existing biotechnological facilities.

strategic thinking

Sixth, the overriding priority of development suggests the avoidance of strategic competition. Countries in the region would support the creation of the 1971 UNGA Declaration, designating the Indian Ocean as a zone of everlasting peace and non-expansion of areas of rivalry and conflicts that are foreign to it.

Finally, a global financial transaction tax, considered by the G20 in 2011, needs to be revived for least developed countries to pay in the Green Technology Fund.

Mukul Sanwal is a former United Nations diplomat