Kozlowski: Don’t overlook G-20’s potential

The G-20 Summit is about the only thing people will be talking about for the next couple of… The G-20 Summit is about the only thing people will be talking about for the next couple of days, but most will say the same thing.

We will hear an awful lot about how the G-20 is bad and needs to do anything from the extremely abstract “help the poor” to the extremely direct “go screw itself.”

There is likely to be so much vitriol directed at the G-20 that I wouldn’t be surprised to see United Kingdom Prime Minister Gordon Brown waving a “Save Whales and the Welsh” sign or see that the Saudi king is protesting against himself.

Now, I don’t mind the G-20, and not just because my dark Republican soul reminds me that the Summit is an excuse for the police to rough up some hippies.

Economic cooperation in these trying times is vital to solve a host of problems, be they economic or social. Further, consider that the G-20, far from excluding the opinions of the world, actually represents a good portion of the world’s people.

First, let’s consider the question of democracy.

Take a turn through the CIA World Factbook and take out the calculator. Of the 19 nations represented, plus the EU, only four nations — Saudi Arabia, Australia, Canada and Argentina — are not among the 30 most populous nations of the world.

Account for those EU nations that have separate delegations, and you’ve got 4.33 billion people represented in the G-20, or two-third of the world’s population.

All of these nations, save three — China, Saudi Arabia, and Russia — have some system of democratic government.

In short, the elected representatives of half the world make up the G-20.

In fact, Freedom House estimates that there are four billion people living in either “free” or “partly free” nations.

Guess what. About three billion of the world’s free people are represented by the G-20. So most of the people who have any say at all have a say at the G-20.

What of the unrepresented, the “Third World third,” if you will?

The G-20 is not the United Nations. Nations don’t have a “right” to representation. The G-20 is, in essence, a group of countries that are talking to one another.

Saying that the G-20 is vile because not everybody has a say implies that any sort of conference between only some countries is also vile.

In short, it was wrong to accept Japan’s surrender because Paraguay didn’t do so. If people want to complain, they can complain at the UN.

But why do we need elected money-grubbing bastards? Because the world needs increased economic coordination.

Like it or not, globalization is happening. A small problem can cause ripple effects throughout the world.The need to spot, correct and adjust for these ripples grows increasingly important. The actions of the G-20 at the London Summit, opening credit lines and pledging increased foreign aid, show the G-20 has potential to correct world problems.

Further, uncoordinated thinking might lead to a prolonging of recession worldwide.

If countries were to enact protectionist barriers against one another, we might have a repeat of the aftermath of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff of 1930. After that Act, the world went through a spasm of protectionism that led to a shutdown of world trade and a worldwide depression.

If something similar were to happen today, it could prolong the recession, which would be bad for everyone, rich or poor.

The G-20 might be able to forestall this sort of World Trade War II.

Indeed, the G-20 has already extracted promises from member nations not to protect against one another, though enforcing these pledges might be difficult.

International coordination is also vital when solving problems of international import.

Consider a cause célèbre that protesters would likely celebrate: stopping global warming.

If the United States, Brazil or Japan were to unilaterally cut carbon emissions, the cut might be made irrelevant by carbon releases in other countries.

Furthermore, it’s fairly hard to get a country to reduce its carbon emissions — thereby causing some to lose their jobs — unless that nation has some guarantee that others will follow suit.

Sunday’s New York Times reported that without global commitments to reduce carbon emissions, many of these world leaders would be easily defeated in their next elections.

This is not to say that the G-20 is flawless or that the individual member nations haven’t done odious things.

Those who protest might have a point, and I would join with the “Free Tibet” crowd.

But what has so often been overlooked is that the G-20 has important functions as a democratic gathering of world leaders that has the potential to solve world problems.

This is only the third meeting of the G-20 on a heads-of-state level. Let’s at least give them a chance.

E-mail Mark at kozthought@gmail.com.