Different from the previous G20 summits, the Osaka Summit was held against the background of rising strategic competition among major countries, which has seen two remarkable changes in global governance.

First, the focus of the G20 summits has shifted from results to processes. In previous years when cooperation between major powers prevailed, the G20 summits focused on results, most notably the launch of the $1.1 trillion stimulus plan for the global economy in 2009 in the wake of the financial crisis.

Currently, the summits attach more importance to agenda setting and management to inject political impetus into significant issues of global governance such as the digital economy, economic and multilateral trade negotiations under the World Trade Organization framework and climate change negotiations under the United Nations framework.

Second, global leadership previously dominated by the United States and its Western allies has become decentralized and diversified amid the rising strategic competition among major countries. In terms of the agendas for the digital economy, trade and climate change, countries and global organizations that play a leading role hold different views.

The two new features were prominent on the agenda at the G20 Osaka Summit. In particular the digital economy was a priority for the Abe administration, which proposed its Data Free Flow with Trust initiative.

The digital economy was discussed at the summit on June 28.Chinese President Xi Jinping, the European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, US President Donald Trump and WTO Director-General Roberto Azevedo each gave speeches reflecting the say and power distribution of the countries and organizations on the issue and the decentralized leadership of global governance.

The views of the four differed greatly. In his speech, President Xi said that data flows need to be based on national security and it is necessary to ensure the safe and orderly use of data, all countries should retain the right to store data independently, the digital rights of developing countries should be protected and the digital gap between the North and South should be prevented from widening.

In his speech, Juncker proposed promoting the free flow of data while protecting privacy, while Trump stressed that the success of the digital economy is based on free flow of data as well as strong protection of privacy and intellectual property rights. He said that the US will promote the free flow of data with other countries and joint efforts are needed to ensure the safety and stability of 5G networks and to oppose the localization of data storage. In his speech, Azevedo highlighted the importance of the free flow of data and said that data fragmentation is unfavorable for global economic growth, especially for small and medium-sized enterprises.

The Osaka Declaration on the Digital Economy was issued in a special session during the summit, and the launch of the Osaka Track for global digital economic governance was announced. In all, 27 countries participated in the discussions leading up to the declaration. India declined to participate in the discussions and South Africa, Indonesia and Egypt refused to sign the declaration. Saudi Arabia signed the declaration under peer pressure as it will host next year's G20 Summit and needs to ensure the continuity of the agenda.

As India and South Africa suggest, discussions on digital economy need to be conducted under WTO framework and the interests of non-G20 members should not be ignored. In effect, drawing up rules for the digital economy is unfavorable for India where nearly 900 million people have no access to the internet.

In the next few years, the country will see a large number of internet users, which is expected to generate much data and make it a data power. Therefore, India hopes to discuss the issue at a later date.

However, the Osaka Track on the digital economy is not about the free flow of data but e-commerce. It proposes to achieve initial success on negotiations at the 12th WTO Ministerial Conference to be held in Astana, Kazakhstan, in June 2020 on the basis of the Joint Statement on E-Commerce reached at the World Economic Forum in Davos on January 25, 2019.

The statement released by 78 WTO members initiated trade-related e-commerce negotiations based on existing WTO agreements and frameworks. Brazil, China, the European Union, Japan, Singapore and the United States have submitted first-round proposals for e-commerce negotiations to the WTO.

China highlights that the negotiations need to focus on the development of e-commerce by promoting the online cross-border trade in goods and improving relevant services such as logistics and payments and developing standardized, convenient and safe e-commerce transactions and market environment. The right to supervision of WTO members and reasonable demands of developing countries should also be respected.

The digital economy will continue to be discussed at the G7 Summit to be held in August and the BRICS Summit and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation CEO Summit to be held in November with a view to drawing up new rules on data flows and e-commerce at the Astana conference.

Some believe that the G20 has failed to achieve results on core issues and bilateral conferences are becoming more important than multilateral ones, but while the Osaka Summit can be viewed from multiple perspectives, it showed that as cooperation between major countries turns into competition in the current global landscape the value of G20 in promoting global governance has become more prominent.

However, the strategic competition between major countries and global issues relating to digital economy, trade frictions and global climate change cannot be addressed by the G20 in a short space of time and call for long-term negotiations.

Therefore, viewing and analyzing the G20 summits from the perspective of process management and decentralized leadership can lead to more objective and fair judgment.

The author is associate professor with School of International Relations and Public Affairs at Fudan University.

The author contributed this article to China Watch exclusively. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of China Watch.

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