The Group of Eight (G8) 

Introduction

The Group of Eight (G8) refers to the group of eight highly industrialized nations—France, Germany,
Italy, the United Kingdom, Japan, the United States, Canada, and Russia—that hold an annual meeting to
foster consensus on global issues like economic growth and crisis management, global security, energy,
and terrorism. The forum enables presidents and prime ministers, as well as their finance and foreign
ministers, to candidly discuss pressing international issues. Its small and static membership, however,
excludes emerging powers from important talks concerning the global economy and international
security, and as an informal grouping, states have little leverage over other members with which to
secure compliance on agreements beyond imposing reputational costs.

Membership

When the group was formed in 1975, it was known as the G6, comprising  France, West Germany, Italy,
Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The G6  was intended to provide major industrial
powers of the noncommunist world a venue in which to address economic concerns, which at the time
included inflation and the recession sparked by the oil crisis of the 1970s. Cold War politics invariably
entered the group’s agenda.

Currently, the G8 comprises its six charter members, in addition to Canada, which joined in 1976, and
Russia, which became a fully participating member by 1998. The EU is a "nonenumerated" ninth
member; represented by the presidents of the European Council and European Commission, the EU
participates as an equal. The aggregate GDP of G8 states makes up some 50 percent of the global
economy.

While there are no formal criteria for membership, member states are expected to be democracies and
have highly developed economies. The G8, unlike the United Nations, is not a formal institution, and
there is no charter or secretariat. The presidency, a position responsible for planning ministerial
meetings and the annual summit, rotates among the member states.

Policy proposals are hammered out at ministerial meetings that precede the annual summit. Finance
ministers and central bank governors continue to meet as the G7 to discuss matters of international
economics; this group comprises all the G8 states except Russia. All G8 states, however, participate in
the foreign ministers’ meetings.

Russia and the G8

Russia formally joined the group in 1998, after steps toward democratization and years of gradual
engagement with what was then the G7. With the Cold War over, several world leaders—particularly
U.S. president Bill Clinton—encouraged Russia’s inclusion as a gesture toward Russian president Boris
Yeltsin. Russia had neither a fully liberalized economy nor Western-style democracy, but G7 leaders
hoped Russia’s inclusion would safeguard its democratic progress. Russia held the G8 presidency for the
first time in 2006 and will once again assume the presidency in 2014, with the summit set to be held in
Sochi, a Black Sea resort city that was host to the 2014 Winter Olympics.
Russia’s membership remains contentious. Since the G8 was intended as a forum for like-minded
democracies, Russia’s backsliding toward authoritarianism has raised concerns among human rights
advocates. The issue took on added significance in 2013 as Russia continued to support Syrian president
Bashar al-Assad’s regime with arms, financing, and diplomatic clout at odds with the positions of other
G8 members.

Moscow faced renewed criticism in March 2014 on the heels of its invasion of neighboring Ukraine’s
Crimea region, the home of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet and many ethnic Russians, amid political transition
in the capital of Kiev. The seven other members of the G8, joined by the presidents of the European
Council and European Commission, released a joint statement  as the G7 condemning "the Russian
Federation’s clear violation of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine." Russia’s actions
"contravene the principles and values on which the G7 and the G8 operate," they said, announcing a
suspension of preparatory talks for the Sochi summit. U.S. secretary of state John Kerry went a step
further, saying that Russia "may not even remain in the G8 if this continues."

Russia’s agenda  for the 2014 summit includes "fighting the drug menace, combating terrorism and
extremism, settling regional conflicts, safeguarding people’s health, and establishing a global
management system to address risks associated with natural and man-made disasters."

The G8’s Efficacy and Influence

The G8’s exclusiveness is the focus of much criticism, but its small size and the relative like-mindedness
of its members is also the source of its efficacy. The value of the G8, says Harvard professor and former
chair of the National Intelligence Council Joseph Nye, is that it "gets the bureaucracies to focus."
Likewise, CFR’s Stewart Patrick has written that the G8 functions as a " steering group for the ’West.’ "

"The opportunity for unscripted, unfiltered, unmediated conversation amongst the world leaders at
summits is something that routinely is mentioned as absolutely essential for potential breakthroughs,
true understanding, and meeting of minds," Patrick says.

Member states’ failure to deliver on ambitious commitments has been the subject of much criticism, but
in recent years, external actors bringing attention to the problem of noncompliance have made
accountability a critical part of the G8 agenda. "The G8—the governments themselves—have become
increasingly aware of the cynicism that attends to G8 commitments and whether they’re actually
delivered upon," Patrick says, citing the importance of pressure from civil society. Cameron has made
accountability a key part of this year’s agenda, particularly with respect to development assistance, and
his office issued a report card in advance of the summit evaluating member states’ performance  on prior
commitments on international development.

Some have challenged the entire premise of the G8 on the basis of inefficacy—and irrelevance. " We are
now living in a G-Zero world ," political risk analyst Ian Bremmer and economist Nouriel Roubini have
written. With the United States, Europe, Japan, and various emerging markets all focused on domestic
issues, Bremmer and Roubini observe a world "in which no single country or bloc of countries has the
political and economic leverage—or the will—to drive a truly international agenda." Far from the policy
harmonization that is the ideal of the G8 and G20, they predict "intensified conflict on the international
stage over vitally important issues, such as international macroeconomic coordination, financial
regulatory reform, trade policy, and climate change."
Reflecting on the financial crisis of 2007–2008, CFR Senior Fellow Robert Kahn notes, "If you look back a
few years, that sense of urgency to act made it easier to find common cause, both at the G8 and the
G20. A lot of progress was made." As the sense of crisis has faded and governments continue to slash
budgets, however, ambition and consensus at both forums have also diminished.

Rather than a "G-Zero" world, Kahn and Patrick both foresee a " G-x world "—"multi-multilateralism," to
borrow Francis Fukuyama’s terminology. States work in smaller or larger groupings, depending on where
the will and capacity might be, with various groupings ideally working in parallel and reinforcing one
another.

Criticism of the G8

Criticism of the G8 extends well beyond Russia’s membership. With the G8’s persistent focus on trade
liberalization, summits are reliably targets of antiglobalization protests. Other critics argue that the
exclusivity of the group results in a focus on the needs of industrial at the expense of developing
countries.

Brookings’ Bruce D. Jones, Richard Gowan, and Emily O’Brien observe: "The persistence of the G8 has
been cited as a stimulus for the BRICS  (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) countries to form an
alternative caucus of their own." However, CFR’s Patrick argues, " It’s not self-evident  that the West’s
decision to wind up the G8 would somehow persuade emerging powers to give up their own flexible
coalitions of interest."

The forum is seen by many as an anachronism that, by failing to reflect the views of vast emerging
economies such as India, Brazil, China, South Korea, and Mexico, some of which have surpassed G8
members in GDP, has rendered itself irrelevant. Neither Africa nor Latin America is represented in the
body, and Brazilian president Lula da Silva said in 2009 that the G8 "doesn’t have any reason to exist."

"The G8 no longer accommodates the world’s biggest or most dynamic economies; the G8 no longer
accounts for all the world’s nuclear weapons; the G8 doesn’t speak for any particular identity or values
—with Russia in the fold, it’s hardly a champion of democracy ," Time’s Ishaan Tharoor wrote in 2011. He
is among the critics who believe that, like the UN Security Council , the G8 reflects an outdated, Western-
centric view of the global distribution of power.

Expanding the G8

The absence of emerging markets in the G8—particularly China and India, given their economic heft—is
notable. China and India belong to the G20 , a forum of finance ministers and central bank governors
focused on managing the global economy (heads of states began meeting during the financial crisis). The
G20 includes nineteen of the world’s largest economies in addition to the European Union. Compared to
such institutions as the G8 and the UN Security Council, the G20, which first met in 1999, is unique in
"bringing together the established and emerging powers as peers " (PDF).

The G20, a Brookings report notes, "has eclipsed [the G8] as the primary forum for financial diplomacy "
(PDF), a sentiment echoed by Obama, who called the G20 the " premier forum  for global economic
coordination." It remains to be seen, however, whether the G20 can achieve similar success in the realm
of security cooperation. Mexico hosted the first meeting of G20 foreign ministers in February 2012.
While the informal meeting may set the stage for future security-related talks among the larger group,
the United States is among the participants opposed to the G20 expanding its purview into diplomacy.

In 2005, British prime minister Tony Blair invited five leading emerging markets—Brazil, China, India,
Mexico, and South Africa—to participate in the summit, but the "G8+5," as it was called, was short-lived.
"It began to be seen as patronizing and insulting that they weren’t actually there full-time," Patrick says.
While the number of participants in the G20 has ballooned, making it "very difficult to have a
conversation, much less a meaningful, unscripted conversation," Patrick suggests that a G13 might still
be small enough to benefit from the intimacy that makes the G8 unique while bringing emerging
markets into all-important discussions of global governance.

GROUP OF 20
What is the G20?
The Group of Twenty (G20) is an international forum that brings together the world's leading
industrialised and emerging economies. The group accounts for 85 per cent of world GDP and two-thirds
of its population.
Much of the important business takes place on the sidelines and in informal meetings.
Initially attendance at G20 summits was limited to the finance ministers and central bank governors of
members, when it was established 17 years ago. 
But since an inaugural meeting between G20 leaders in Washington DC following the collapse of
Lehman Brothers in 2008, summits between G20 leaders themselves have become an annual event. 
The first G20 summit occurred in Berlin, in December 1999, and was hosted by the German and
Canadian finance ministers. 
Since then there have been 20 G20 meetings between finance ministers and central bank governors, and
11 summits between heads of state or government of G20 economies.

Which countries are members of the G20?

The G20 is made up of:
Argentina India Saudi Arabia

Australia Indonesia South Korea

Brazil Italy Turkey

Canada Japan United Kingdom

France Mexico United States of America

Germany Russia China

South Africa
The final member is the European Union, represented by the European Commission, rotating Council
presidency and the European Central Bank (ECB). Spain as a permanent non-member invitee also attends
leader summits.
Other countries also attend summits at the invitation of the host country, while it  has become customary
for the Chair of ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) and representatives of the African
Union and NEPAD (New Partnership for Africa’s Development) to be present at leader summits.
How often do they meet?
Meetings tend to occur on an annual basis; however leaders met twice a year in 2009 and 2010, when the
global economy was in crisis. The last meeting between finance ministers and central bank governors was
held in Chengdu, China, in July 2016.
But since an inaugural meeting between G20 leaders in Washington DC following the collapse of
Lehman Brothers in 2008, summits between G20 leaders themselves have become an annual event. 
The first G20 summit occurred in Berlin, in December 1999 and was hosted by the German and Canadian
finance ministers. 
Since then there have been 18 G20 meetings between finance ministers and central bank governors, and
10 summits between heads of state or government of G20 economies.
The next summit of G20 leaders is scheduled for Hangzhou, China, from 4-5 September 2016. It is the
first to be hosted by China, only the second in Asia, and has been hailed as a “milestone” in the country’s
development and symbolic of its growing importance as a major power.
Who chairs the G20 summit?
The G20 has no permanent staff of its own and its chairmanship rotates annually between nations divided
into regional groupings. 
China holds the chairmanship in 2016, with Germany to take over in 2017, and India the year
after. Hosting the summit is an opportunity to set the agenda and lead discussions.
In 2009, when the UK held a special spring summit, former Prime Minister Gordon Brown orchestrated a
deal in which world leaders agreed on a $1.1 trillion injection of financial aid into the global economy.
The “historic” deal was widely viewed as a success.
Do all member countries exert equal influence?
There are no formal votes or resolutions on the basis of fixed voting shares or economic
criteria. However, the lines of informal influence in the organisation trace those of major power politics.
US President Barack Obama dominated the 2014 Brisbane summit, placing climate change at the top of
the agenda, despite the reluctance of host nation Australia’s then Prime Minister Tony Abbott to allow the
issue such pride of place.
Why isn’t every country invited?
Fearing deadlock in a larger decision-making body, not all countries are invited to the G20.
How does the G20 differ from the G8?
The Group of Eight (G8), established as the G7 in 1976 but renamed after the admission of Russia in
1998, is an international forum for the eight major industrial economies. It comprises: Canada, France,
Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States.
However since 2014 Russian membership has been suspended following the country’s annexation of
Crimea.
The G8 seeks cooperation on economic issues facing the major industrial economies, while the G20
reflects the wider interests of both developed and emerging economies.
When is the next summit?
The next summit of G20 leaders is scheduled for Hamburg, Germany,on July 7-8 2017.
After the last summit in China, Germany assumed the G20 presidency in December 2016. Although
Berlin hosted ministerial-level G20 meetings in 1999 and 2004, the Hamburg event will be the first time
Germany has hosted G20 heads of government.
It's expected to be dominated by climate change discussions and it will also be Donald Trump's first
meeting with Russian president Vladimir Putin since his election as US president.
Theresa May, France’s Emmanuel Macron and Canada’s Justin Trudeau will also be in attendance.
Where? Hamburg is the second largest city in Germany (pop. 1.7 million), a major hub situated on the
River Elbe, nestled between the states of Schleswig-Holstein and Lower Saxony. Although a major port,
it lies 130km inland from the North Sea.
Why? As an outward-looking city, Hamburg is an ideal location, says Angela Merkel. It has maintained
trading links around the world for centuries, and today is home to the headquarters of industrial
heavyweights Airbus and Unilever, among others. It can also boast at being ranked 18th among world
cities for its livability.
Famous for? A city of bridges (around 2,500), Hamburg boasts what was once the world’s tallest
building, the 122-metre Church of St Nicholas. Bombed heavily by Allied forces in WW2, the city
recovered to become once again an economic and cultural powerhouse, where the Beatles served their
apprenticeship, and where museums and opera go hand in hand with sport and radical politics. And
there’s the Reeperbahn.
Security? Some 20,000 officers have been drafted in from around Germany and beyondto address the
twin challenges of potential terror attack and political protest. Temporary courtrooms and cells have been
built alongside a mass holding facility for as many as 400 detainees at a time - at a cost of €750,000. A
planned mass protest camp in the city’s main park has been banned.