PAUL MARTIN GETS THE LAST LAUGH – AND THE G20 CHANGES EVERYTHING
Jeffrey Simpson
Globe and Mail
Nov 18 2008
Canada
Somewhere, former prime minister Paul Martin must have smiled. A smile
for what might have been for him, a smile for what became of his idea,
mocked in its time, now considered conventional wisdom.
On the weekend, the leaders of 20 countries gathered at the behest of
U.S. President George Bush. It was, de facto, a kind of Group of 20,
convened to discuss the world economic crisis whose epicentre is the
U.S. under Mr. Bush’s catastrophic leadership.
Many years ago, as Canada’s finance minister, Mr. Martin began to
trumpet the need for a G20, or L20 (L for leadership, he called
it). The old G7 that became the G8 with the admission of Russia had
outworn its usefulness, he argued. Something larger was needed to
augment the old club by incorporating newer economic powers and some
developing countries into international economic meetings.
Mr. Martin pressed the point while prime minister, to little avail. He
got academics at the University of Victoria and the Centre for
International Governance Innovation at Waterloo to help him promote
the idea. But it received a chilly reception in the United States,
Britain, France, Germany and Japan.
The European countries liked the G7/8 because they, with Italy and
the European Union representative, dominated the organization, and
they did not want their influence diluted. With Old World scorn,
they politely but firmly squelched the idea. The Americans, cock of
the walk, dismissed the idea, too. The Japanese, transfixed as always
by China, did not want the Chinese included – just as China blocks
any Japanese attempt to secure permanent membership on the United
Nations Security Council.
Mr. Martin’s idea, of course, found favour outside the G8 and,
subsequently, began to gain grudging favour inside the club. Some
additional countries were invited to G8 summits, like guests for
dessert. They got to participate in some, but not all, of the meetings.
In Washington on the weekend, the G8 became the G20 in fact, and the
world’s political infrastructure for discussing, and perhaps some day
reforming, international economic architecture changed forever. The
little club has been broken open, just as Mr. Martin suggested in
the late 1990s when he was finance minister.
Where this leaves Canada, with its relative economic influence waning
and its political influence shrivelling, remains an open question.
At the table in Washington were the up-and-coming heavyweights: Brazil,
China and India, plus others such as Turkey, Spain and Indonesia. With
China, the Harper government has made relations cool; with Brazil,
relations are distant, despite this week’s trip there by International
Trade Minister Stockwell Day. With India, the government’s intentions
are good, the follow-up minimal. With Turkey, the Harper government
has done nothing but insult the country by meddling in the First
World War Armenian issue, which is no business of Canada’s.
These curious decisions of neglect and obduracy are among the
results of an inward-looking political culture that substitutes moral
superiority for spending more on diplomacy abroad, and that elects
a government that boasts about putting Canada "on the map" without
any evidence to support the boast, except in Afghanistan, from which
Canada has signalled its departure. Some day, this inwardness and
political neglect will catch up to Canada. For the moment, however,
we retain a seat at tables such as the one in Washington.
It is Canada’s fate at such tables to occasionally suggest ideas
that others take up, such as the very notion of a G20 or at least an
enlarged G7/8. Good ideas, in other words, can be a substitute for
economic or political heft. At least that was Canada’s entree in the
past – that and not being another European country.
It will be some time yet before this new international creature takes
rooted life, and longer still before any new international economic
architecture is arranged.
All came to Washington, invited/summoned by the U.S. President. The
countries that attended told the world’s new story, however – the
world’s economic balance is shifting away from the United States.
On the eve of the summit, Mr. Bush gave a rousing defence of Wall
Street, featuring the kind of intellectual denial and cognitive
dissonance that marked his presidency. No one, at home or abroad,
paid any attention, with reason.
From: Baghdasarian