G20: a step forward or the legitimacy of the same?

no day 2 Last April, representatives of 20 the world's largest economic powers met in London to discuss the current economic and financial crisis, as well as possible actions to be taken to end the same. This meeting signifies a qualitative change in the international system, which will have their questions addressed by large dialogues, or is it just a sign of a world that is as lost as was the end of the Cold War?

One can not deny the amazing ability of economic coordination that was achieved at the meeting, especially in the face of seemingly irreconcilable positions that the main actors announced before the meeting. This was especially the case for liberalizing US and UK regulators against Germany and France.

The deal closed in US $ 1,1 trillion in funds allocated to multilateral organizations can be considered a great success. However, This success is not too impressed about to hide other important dynamics with respect to what happened. This large joint was not able, at least for now, changing international reality.

The agendas that each participant took were as varied and dispersed that had little convergence, except rhetorically by the need to resolve the crisis as soon as possible. in the, what we saw was the clash of the great economic and political actors of the international system discussing the main outputs. The most peripheral countries gained much space in public appearance and were able to stand against the global crisis, but managed little return.

Although much is spoken, the truth is that the G20 meeting did not bring major structural change. The international system is still based on the same dynamics before, the difference that there is now a greater concern in achieving greater coordination between the various actions of the United. governance, what it appeared to be the main objective of the meeting, not imposed and the issue of referral of shares in the same direction became the great and, when not, only goal.

When you look at the numbers that result from the meeting, it has:

– US$ 750 billion: IMF recapitalization;

– US$ 250 billion: injected into the world trade 2009 e 2010; e

– US$ 6 billion: Gold retraining in support for poor countries.

These figures show that, in essence, the big (although insufficient) financial effort to address the crisis comes down to strengthening the old world structures. Ideas such as the free market and the need for credit expansion in order to stimulate economic growth remain as valid as before. No one is here to wonder if it is not the time for a deeper change, instead, the question is how to resume the pre-crisis as the condition before.

In this sense, is appropriate to ask why the meeting be the G20, not the G7, as it did before. I leave two hypotheses so that it remains open to discussion.

Hypothesis 1

Effectively G7 countries, they had a decision-making importance in any international issue, no longer can send global issues and have to increase the number of countries involved, as could be seen in the case of G20 meeting, In London.

Hypothesis 2

The issue of expansion of the G7 decisions for the G20 is more closely linked to a question of legitimacy than strictly necessary in terms of ability to implement an agenda. To a large extent the issue is linked to the need to show the various non-state actors the ability of central powers to forge coordination scenarios with various actors.

Originally published in Journal Author

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