Is the Failure of the G-7 Meeting About More Than Trump?
For the first time in its decades-long history, a G7 conference failed to agree on a closing communique. But is the problem simply that President Trump didn’t sign on to the joint statement – or does it go much deeper than that? If indeed, what we are seeing is not merely a disagreement over words, but over global outlooks, then the G7 simply cannot act any longer on the basis of a shared approach. Trump didn’t just blow up one meeting – he has blown up a global consensus.
While most critics aimed their fire at Trump for an act of peevishness, some have criticized the conference host, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, for re-stating at his closing news conference his government’s resistance to U.S. protectionism. Some feel that Trudeau should have dodged the reporter’s question, as the press conference was intended to deal with issues on the G7 meeting’s agenda. But in fact, was it really Trudeau’s statement that eliminated the consensus around the communique? For that matter, was it even Trump’s temperamental response? Or is it the fact that for the first time in its history, the G7 is now home to two world views – views that are polar opposites of each other?
Obviously the G7 has been the scene of differences of opinion in the past. The U.S. military action in Iraq is an obvious example of a rift. Indeed, every time the G7 meets, crafting of the final communique is a laborious process, requiring constant revision to meet different countries’ concerns. But in the past, virtually all G7 leaders shared a common view about the world economy. They believed in globalization (while recognizing the need to address some of its negative effects.) They supported free trade, and a rules-based trading system. They believed strongly in liberal democracy, even while sometimes having to deal with authoritarian leaders of other countries.
Now, the situation has changed. For the first time, one of the member countries – the historic leader in fact – is pursuing policies that are not just particular to its own needs, but diametrically counter to the views of the rest of the governments of the leading industrialized nations. Basically, the governments of six G7 nations recognize the importance and the common benefits of trade – while the one outlier insists not on free trade, but on managed trade. (Which by definition can never be truly free.) What we are seeing is an ideological conflict – between 21st century free trade, and a throwback to 18th century mercantilism.
That is the reason there was no communique at this year’s G7 – there is no consensus. It’s true that a statement had been written, and agreed to, only to fall victim to last-minute churlishness. But even that statement represented not a consensus, but a deeply flawed attempt at it. Some of the wording differences that had to be ironed out may seem minor. But in fact they reflect starkly different views of the world. A sentence expressing support for “the” rules-based system of trade, for example, was altered merely to support “a” rules-based system. The change from “the” to “a” may seem unimportant, even picuane, but it reflects an attempt to compromise on a principle that has always been embraced unanimously at previous G7s: That the current WTO system, while it can always be improved and made more efficient, is a major bulwark of the global economy. Instead, left open is the argument that it should be entirely overhauled, perhaps rendered totally toothless.
The differences could have been papered over; indeed, they were papered over in the communique that the U.S. refused to sign on to at the last minute – in fact, after the last minute, as Trump had already left the summit and was in the air at the time. But is the root problem really that there was no communique expressing a consensus, or is the root problem that there is no consensus to express? In the past, there were crevices among the G7 countries that had to be papered over. Now, there is a deep chasm – and that cannot simply be papered over.
Some argue that simply issuing a joint statement was still vital, regardless of how watered down it may have been. That made sense when the differences were relatively minor, such as haggling about Canadian supply management policies for its dairy industry versus U.S. protection of its sugar industry. But when the differences are so stark, is it not better to simply acknowledge that fact, and open a broader debate?
Veteran diplomats and old G7 hands may cling to the traditions of G7s past, but do those traditions – such as the issuance of a unanimously endorsed communique – make any sense in an era when the leading industrialized countries are divided by a deep philosophic difference?
