Sagar Khandelwal
University of Delhi
What is G7?
G7 is a group of seven of the world’s wealthiest and most advanced economies that includes Canada, USA, Germany, France, Italy, Japan, and UK who have a combined world GDP of more than 40%. Earlier it used to be G8 with Russia being a member, but after the Crimean invasion in 2014, G8 became G7. This group meets every year to foresee economic policies at a macroeconomic level that directly or indirectly affect the entire world.
Highlights of the 2021 Meet
This year, other than the G7, invitations were also sent for participation to India, South Korea, Australia, and South Africa. The most important development was the concept of B3W– ‘Build Back Better World,’ coined by the Biden administration. This will be an initiative to a transparent infrastructure partnership in order to fulfill the 40-trillion-dollar-need of developing countries by 2035. Indian PM Narendra Modi also coined the idea of One Earth One Health to fight situations like COVID-19 in the future, relaxation of patents and IPRs related to the COVID-19 vaccines. PM Modi also pushed for open supply chains for raw materials of vaccines, faster availability, and manufacturing which was openly supported by Germany and Australia.
The China Factor
There was no mention of China in the entire summary of the G7 summit held in 2018, but suddenly this year’s meeting had quite a lot of China-centric discussions and statements. The very first was the staunch criticism towards the situation of Uighur Muslims and China’s human rights violations in the province of Xinjiang. The summit continued with the curtailment of the degree of autonomy promised to Hong Kong under the ‘one country, two systems’ approach where two systems of governance can co-exist within a country, which China brutally suppressed in the crackdown.
The G7 countries were also concerned about the unfair trade practices in the Chinese economy with ambiguous state funding and support to the domestic enterprises distorting fair competition. Biden also asked China to be more responsible and comply with international norms with respect to open and free movement in the Indo-Pacific, maintain peace and security in the East and South China Sea, while criticizing China’s aggressive and dominant actions in the region. The summit also mentioned Taiwan and asked both China and Taiwan to resolve their issues peacefully.
In response, China considers this as an undemocratic exercise as only a few and powerful should not decide the fate of the world. According to the Chinese government, China in its foreign policy has always considered all the countries whether big or small as equals on any discussion or agreement, therefore calls G7 as ‘pseudo multilateral’ and ‘imperialist’. China considers the Taiwan issue as an internal affair, a question of China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, and hence, it refrains the interference of other countries.
Opinion
Only a handful of countries were invited to the Summit. Firstly, India has intense border issues unresolved since independence, not to forget the border clashes in which India lost 40 soldiers in the Galwan Valley. India also has an advantage of the increasing importance of the Indo-pacific, a region where China has recently started to show its presence after doing so in the South China Sea. Indian proximity to the Indian Ocean and its membership in the QUAD both have the potential of countering or containing China. Secondly, Australia was the pioneering country to initiate proper investigations in the origins of Coronavirus after which China retaliated with economic sanctions that gave way to a mini trade war. The third country is South Korea, which is threatened by North Korea’s possession of nuclear weapons and the fear of an invasion. North Korea clearly has China’s support since the Korean War. It is clearly visible as to why these three countries were invited, the reason being a straightforward opposition to China.
Conclusion
China was the main focus of the meet with multiple counter initiatives. The announcement of B3W; which, apart from being a developmental project, is also an alternative to counter China’s massive BRI project. India’s response is still awaited on B3W, but we can see India being in clear opposition to China’s BRI project, especially in PoK, and will surely support it. The donation of millions of vaccines by India to developing countries to contain the pandemic seems to be countering China’s vaccine diplomacy. Thus, we can see the Summit had the element of both development and diplomacy.
