Sundeep Waslekar, President of the Strategic Foresight Group, is in town and several of us from the LibDems’ International Relations Committee met up with him on the terrace of the National Liberal Club. I’d first encountered him at a meeting of the Liberal International Executive in the Philippines last year, since when he has been zooming round the word; his globetrotting makes my travel programme look like a suburban train ride. The motto of the Strategic Foresight Group is ‘anticipating and influencing Global Future’ — a matter of increasing importance and urgency, given the various conflict flashpoints round the world, not least in the Middle East, and the fact that powers such as Russia and Iran are flexing their muscles. So much for the post-Cold War ‘peace dividend’!
One thing Sundeep has been campaigning on recently is the need to create a global forum to replace the Group of Eight, the exclusive, informal gathering of the world’s seven leading industrialised countries plus Russia (with the President of the European Commission sitting in on the sidelines). The G8’s remit is to tackle global problems through both discussion and action, and we will get a good impression of how effective (or otherwise) it is, as its leaders meet at Heilingendamm in Germany over the next three days. The hot topic this time is climate change, so we’ll see whether Tony Blair really does have any influence with George Bush, after all he has done for him. Don’t bank on it.
Sundeep Waslekar argues persuasively that the G8 is no longer truly representative of the movers and shakers in an increasingly multi-polar world, in which new powers are beginning to demonstrate their economic and political might. Recently, the five largest emerging economies — Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa — have been invited along for dinners at these G8 events, but not to participate in the main discussions — a bit like the Victorian habit of having people in for coffee after the important guests had enjoyed a good meal (and the important conversation). As Sundeep rightly avers, ‘the time has come to find space for a group of eight emerging countries in central discussions on global governance.’ In my view, if the G8 had any sense, they would accommodate this change willingly, before it is forced upon them.
