G20 try to honor their commitments
By John Kirton , Alessandra Cicci and Jiyoon Han |
chinawatch.cn |
Updated: 2019-07-31 10:43
At the end of their G20 Osaka Summit on June 29, 2019, the leaders of the world's major economies issued a communique and accompanying statement that contained 143 precise, future-oriented, political obligatory commitments to address a broad range of the biggest challenges in today's complex world.
There were 24 commitments on development, 14 on health, 13 on climate change, 12 on gender equality, 12 on crime and corruption, and 10 on financial regulation, followed by 9 on macroeconomic policy, 9 on labor and employment, 7 on the environment, 6 on trade, 6 on digitalization, and 5 each on terrorism and human rights. Osaka was thus a successful, full-strength summit, advancing global governance across the economic, social, ecological and security domains.
But many G20 citizens and others, increasingly skeptical of the work of such governing elites, will doubt that these commitments will make any difference to their daily lives. After all, why should politicians who do not always keep all their promises at home do any better when they go abroad to govern the world as a whole? However, the evidence shows that they do.
Since the first G20 summit in 2008, the G20 Research Group has found that G20 leaders have made over 2,500 precise, future-oriented, politically binding, collective commitments and complied with the 255 assessed ones at an average of 71 percent. The G20 Research Group bases its assessments of compliance using publicly available announcements of policies, budget allocations, legislation and so on that indicate a G20 member's intention to meet its commitment. Researchers assign a score of+1 to indicate full compliance, 0 to indicate a work in progress or partial compliance, and -1 to indicate no compliance, and then these scores are converted to percentages and averages.
Moreover, compliance has been slowly, if not steadily, rising, reaching a high of 87 percent compliance with the priority commitments assessed from the 2017 Hamburg Summit. G20 leaders have done best with regards their commitments on tax at 85 percent, macroeconomic policy at 80 percent, financial regulation at 78 percent, and labor and employment at 75 percent.
The commitments made at Hamburg in 2017 had compliance of 87 percent, the highest of any of the 12 summits to that time. Was this the start of a rising tide, repeated at Buenos Aires in Argentina in December 2018? With only seven months to comply before the 2019 Osaka commitments arrived to supersede them, it would be surprising if it was.
Yet it was. Compliance with the 20 priority commitments at the 2018 Buenos Aires Summit, as assessed by the G20 Research Group and its partners at the Russian Academy of National Economy and Public Administration averaged 78 percent.
The commitments on universal health coverage, the digital economy and energy security had compliance of 90 percent or more. Those on clean energy, malnutrition, the Paris Agreement on climate change, employment, gender equality, macroeconomic policy, infrastructure and reform of the World Trade Organization had compliance of 80 percent or more. Also above the all-time 71 percent average were tax, sustainable agriculture, early childhood development, and financial regulation.
Thus, G20 summit commitments count. G20 members' compliance is solid, recently rising to significant. This provides promising momentum for compliance with the commitments made at the Osaka Summit. The global community now looks to China and Japan to lead the rest of the G20 to keep the promises made at Osaka, to inspire the slumping United States to do better, or to build a better world without it should the United States remain apart.
To improve their compliance, G20 leaders can use several low-cost accountability measures that are directly under their control, that they have used before, and that have caused compliance to rise or fall. First, they can ask their ministers responsible for delivering a commitment to meet, especially before a summit, in order to help prepare and implement the leaders' commitments on it. Second, they can make more commitments on the subjects they want high compliance with.
Third, they can refer in their commitment to their ministers. Fourth, they can avoid references to a multiyear time table, self-monitoring, international organizations other than the core one in the field, regional organizations, and specific geographic regions or countries, for these tend to lower the compliance that comes.
John Kirton is director of the G20 Research Group, and Alessandra Cicci and Jiyoon Han are the co-chairs of summit studies of the G20 Research Group. The G20 Research Group is based at the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy at Trinity College in the University of Toronto.
The authors contributed this article to China Watch exclusively. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of China Watch.
All rights reserved. Copying or sharing of any content for other than personal use is prohibited without prior written permission.
At the end of their G20 Osaka Summit on June 29, 2019, the leaders of the world's major economies issued a communique and accompanying statement that contained 143 precise, future-oriented, political obligatory commitments to address a broad range of the biggest challenges in today's complex world.
There were 24 commitments on development, 14 on health, 13 on climate change, 12 on gender equality, 12 on crime and corruption, and 10 on financial regulation, followed by 9 on macroeconomic policy, 9 on labor and employment, 7 on the environment, 6 on trade, 6 on digitalization, and 5 each on terrorism and human rights. Osaka was thus a successful, full-strength summit, advancing global governance across the economic, social, ecological and security domains.
But many G20 citizens and others, increasingly skeptical of the work of such governing elites, will doubt that these commitments will make any difference to their daily lives. After all, why should politicians who do not always keep all their promises at home do any better when they go abroad to govern the world as a whole? However, the evidence shows that they do.
Since the first G20 summit in 2008, the G20 Research Group has found that G20 leaders have made over 2,500 precise, future-oriented, politically binding, collective commitments and complied with the 255 assessed ones at an average of 71 percent. The G20 Research Group bases its assessments of compliance using publicly available announcements of policies, budget allocations, legislation and so on that indicate a G20 member's intention to meet its commitment. Researchers assign a score of+1 to indicate full compliance, 0 to indicate a work in progress or partial compliance, and -1 to indicate no compliance, and then these scores are converted to percentages and averages.
Moreover, compliance has been slowly, if not steadily, rising, reaching a high of 87 percent compliance with the priority commitments assessed from the 2017 Hamburg Summit. G20 leaders have done best with regards their commitments on tax at 85 percent, macroeconomic policy at 80 percent, financial regulation at 78 percent, and labor and employment at 75 percent.
The commitments made at Hamburg in 2017 had compliance of 87 percent, the highest of any of the 12 summits to that time. Was this the start of a rising tide, repeated at Buenos Aires in Argentina in December 2018? With only seven months to comply before the 2019 Osaka commitments arrived to supersede them, it would be surprising if it was.
Yet it was. Compliance with the 20 priority commitments at the 2018 Buenos Aires Summit, as assessed by the G20 Research Group and its partners at the Russian Academy of National Economy and Public Administration averaged 78 percent.
The commitments on universal health coverage, the digital economy and energy security had compliance of 90 percent or more. Those on clean energy, malnutrition, the Paris Agreement on climate change, employment, gender equality, macroeconomic policy, infrastructure and reform of the World Trade Organization had compliance of 80 percent or more. Also above the all-time 71 percent average were tax, sustainable agriculture, early childhood development, and financial regulation.
Thus, G20 summit commitments count. G20 members' compliance is solid, recently rising to significant. This provides promising momentum for compliance with the commitments made at the Osaka Summit. The global community now looks to China and Japan to lead the rest of the G20 to keep the promises made at Osaka, to inspire the slumping United States to do better, or to build a better world without it should the United States remain apart.
To improve their compliance, G20 leaders can use several low-cost accountability measures that are directly under their control, that they have used before, and that have caused compliance to rise or fall. First, they can ask their ministers responsible for delivering a commitment to meet, especially before a summit, in order to help prepare and implement the leaders' commitments on it. Second, they can make more commitments on the subjects they want high compliance with.
Third, they can refer in their commitment to their ministers. Fourth, they can avoid references to a multiyear time table, self-monitoring, international organizations other than the core one in the field, regional organizations, and specific geographic regions or countries, for these tend to lower the compliance that comes.
John Kirton is director of the G20 Research Group, and Alessandra Cicci and Jiyoon Han are the co-chairs of summit studies of the G20 Research Group. The G20 Research Group is based at the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy at Trinity College in the University of Toronto.
The authors contributed this article to China Watch exclusively. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of China Watch.
All rights reserved. Copying or sharing of any content for other than personal use is prohibited without prior written permission.
