It was, is, a trying time for the Argentinian leadership. A striking and current economic crisis haunts the Macri government. The peso has depreciated dramatically; interest rates have been boosted to 60 percent; and the current efforts by the Macri government to return the Argentinian economy to health – a policy of gradualism – lies in tatters. The government valiantly has returned to the IMF – hated by so many Argentinians for the institution’s policy ‘support’ in the early aughts in a former debt crisis – for a major infusion of funds. And, oh yes, then there is the hosting of the G20. This is a government that appears to be distracted – and reasonably so – by the domestic economic crisis they face.
It is hard for this government to commit the ‘bandwidth’ required for hosting the G20. Hosting is not just the host’s efforts to prepare for the leaders’ summit: fashioning the agenda and reaching consensus over a number of policy initiatives. It requires examining past agendas and bringing forward those policy efforts that can be advanced in the current year. It is also the various officials’ meetings at the cabinet level and below. The host needs to advance task force reports from ministers and international institutions and it requires coordinating efforts and insights from today’s many engagement groups – B20, L20, W20, C20 and T20 to name some.
Where are we, then, in the continuing G20 and T20 efforts? Many hundreds of us have just recently attended in Buenos Aires for the final Argentinian T20. The Argentinians put on a fabulous meeting. Co-ordinated by co-hosts CARI (The Argentine Council for International Relations) and CIPPEC (Center for the Implementation of Public Policies Promoting Equity and Growth) these think tanks handed off a wide-ranging Communiqué to the Argentinian government – indeed a public presentation to President Macri. This Communiqué was a product of 10 Task Forces that generated 80 Policy Briefs with as the Communiqué states “with evidence-based policy recommendations to address global challenges such as climate change, food security, multilateral and global inequality, among others.” The hope for the T20, expressed in the Communiqué is that “The Think 20 (T20) works to help the G20 find solutions to global challenges by putting forward concrete proposals that eschew sector-specific interests and are rooted in evidence-based research.”
And I believe the T20 does seek to to find solutions to global challenges. For sure it needs to continue to work to provide solutions that can attract leaders and their officials to advance international collaboration in critical global issues: trade promotion without protectionism, climate change, financial resilience and reform, and the future of work, as only a few subjects requiring global leadership attention.
But there are necessary conditions for advancing these efforts. On the policy side there has to be greater recognition in the work we do and acknowledge that our policy efforts can be advanced – but there is no collective G20. The United States is not willing – at least for now – to move forward on climate change, or on multilateral trade promotion, or on a wide-ranging reform of the the major institutions including the WTO. There can be progress. It will be done, however, without U.S. participation. Large change is not likely; but pointed tailored reform proposals may advance the policy yardsticks. But the think tanks have to take this international policy configuration into account. Otherwise, the proposals are disconnected from the reality of current G20 leadership.
And we have to be realistic over the current Argentinian G20 leadership. This is a government that is struggling to contain an economic crisis. Officials are evidently distracted. President Macri was good enough to attend the T20, but it was perfunctory. His speech was, I suspect, less that ten minutes and it was general and offered little to the global participants that attended. The confident return of Argentina to the global economy is for now is muted. All of us who work in the context of the G20 and its many engagement efforts need be willing to ‘bide our time’. As I said in an earlier post here at Rising BRICSAM- we need to play ‘small ball’ for now. We need to wait our ‘global governance moment’.
I suspect it is not now, but we need to prepare. I believe it will come.
Image Credit: V20 Folder – ‘Visioning the Future’