BOMBSHELL – ‘THE GLORY YEARS OF G20 ARE OVER’ – G20 CRASHES WITHOUT CHINA & RUSSIA – IN 5 TO 10 YEARS, THE WORLD SKYLINE WILL SEE DRAMATIC CHANGES. IN 20 YEARS, THE WORLD WILL BE UNRECOGNISABLE – THE U.S. & WEST WILL BE WIPED OUT BY THEIR OWN ARROGANCE & GREED – EVEN THOUGH TODAY, THEIR ‘NOSE IN THE AIR’ MEDIA STILL DARES TO SCORN HOST INDIA AS A ‘DIRTY COLONY’
But this time around Russia and China are not attending. Russia sees no benefit from sitting in a room with the US, Britain and the European countries who are now sending bombs, guns, weapons to kill Russian soldiers in Ukraine. What is the purpose of sitting with people who want to kill you? Plus they have imposed so many sanctions against Russia.
China is not attending because the US, Britain and the West have imposed so many economic sanctions against Chinese products. President Xi Xinpin sees no benefit from attending the G20 either.
Without China and Russia the G20 becomes a typical white man’s club with India and Indonesia playing the role of the token brown skinned participants along with the camel jockeys from Saudi Arabia.
India has no real influence on the world stage. After landing the moon probe on the lunar surface there is now growing debate to officially change the name of ‘India’ to Bharat. So Indians all over the world will now be known as Bharatis? Bharatians?
But of a certainty Western exclusivity and overbearance in outfits like the G20 is coming to an end. Not their own overbearance but the usefulness of the G20 itself. The G20 will become increasingly hollow. The rising star in the sky are the BRICS.
China has just imposed their own sanctions against the US. Some Ministries in China are barred from using Apple’s I-phones. The Chinese Ministry of Transport alone employs over FOUR MILLION very hardworking staff. (But the I-phones are all still Made-in-China).
The next 5 – 10 years will see dramatic changes to the world’s skyline. In 20 more years today’s world will not be recognisable.
Never bet on the horses but if you are still going to the races, pick a winning horse. – http://syedsoutsidethebox.blogspot.com/2023/
The glory years of the G20 are over
As both Xi and Putin skip this year’s summit in India, it’s clear the status of the forum has diminished. It will not disappear, but the veneer of ‘world government’ attached to the group will dissipate
The annual G20 summit is taking place in India this weekend. Any gathering of leaders of this caliber (and the 20 largest economies are the ones that really run the world) is a major event. All the more so because, in the context of the apparent weakening of traditional institutions in recent decades, the G20 has been seen as the prototype for a new structure of international governance. Without detracting from the importance of the forthcoming forum, it can be suggested that the group has already passed its peak and that the further evolution of the world system will contribute to the strengthening of other structures.
The G20 is the product of the economic setbacks of the advanced globalization era of the late 20th and early 21st centuries. It emerged at the level of finance ministers and central bank governors in response to the Asian financial crisis of 1997-1998. But it really took off ten years later, when member states came together in emergency mode to quell the panic caused by the collapse of US financial institutions and the ensuing global financial crisis. Since then, the G20 has been at the center of the international political-economic architecture.
The reasons for this are compelling. First, the official focus is on finance, trade, and economic concerns, which has so far allowed the growing political tensions between the largest participants to be circumvented. Second, the criterion by which the group is composed is the closest to what can be considered objective – the size of their economies. However, these two factors suffered most when the international situation deteriorated sharply.
The upheaval that occurred in 2022, but had been brewing for some time, has changed the international hierarchy. Politics has finally overtaken economics. The expediency embedded in the concept of liberal globalization (above all, it must be cost-effective) has given way to considerations of strategic confrontation. The main issue now is the West versus Russia, although a US-China showdown is also on the way. In general, the institutions that ensured relative compliance with general economic rules are clearly not in the best shape, as the political needs of the largest countries outweigh any written order.
We can add specific personal reasons why, for example, Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping will not travel to the G20 summit, but that is not the point. Globalization in the form it existed for the last three decades or so is over. As a result, attitudes to the structures that were previously in demand are bound to change. This does not mean that the G20 as such will disappear – the meeting of the world’s largest economies is valuable in itself, and there will always be some benefit. But the veneer of ‘world government’ will disappear. Again, it is not about the confrontation of one country against another, but about the approach itself – grandees getting together to agree on something that affects everyone. From now on, agreements will be much more substantive and will involve a narrower circle of countries – those directly affected by a particular issue.
Are there associations that are strengthened under these conditions? There are. First of all, there is the group of states now commonly referred to as the ‘collective West’. The last two years have shown that the potential for the political consolidation of the US and its allies is quite sufficient for unity, even against the economic interests of the participants. It is impossible to say how long this will last, but for the moment the cementing of the alliance is evident. The more problematic the economic consequences appear, the more rigid the value-ideological discipline will have to be. The pile on against one adversary, Russia, deliberately reduces flexibility towards another potential enemy, China. At the very least, Western European attempts to pursue an independent, economically motivated course in the direction of Beijing will not meet with US understanding. If such efforts continue, there will be direct opposition.
However, there is another community that is not as consolidated as the West, but which has begun to find ways of uniting interests. It goes by various names – from the World Majority to the Global South – but the meaning is clear: it comprises those who are not part of the system of binding relations with Washington. By definition, there can be no value-ideological unity in this group of states – it is extremely heterogeneous. However, the formation of a blurred but nonetheless common identity, not in opposition to the West but parallel to it, is already taking place. In this sense, the outcome of the recent BRICS summit, which opted for widening membership rather than deepening existing links, is significant. It will not be possible to structure this majority anyway, but the creation of an expanding space of interaction beyond the West is in the interests of all. The alternative means an additional opportunity, and there is every reason to believe that this trend will gain momentum rather quickly.
Could the G20 be a meeting place for these two communities? In theory, yes. But why? Both ‘collectives’ are primarily concerned with self-development. As for interests that overlap with those of the West, they will be dealt with at the level of the countries concerned, each of which has a different set of priorities.
This state of affairs will not last forever, but for the time being the G20 will be more symbolic than practical. – By Fyodor Lukyanov – RT.COM
In the eyes of Western media, G20 host India is still a dirty colony
As with all of the Global South, conceited reports single out the same problems that are ignored at home
How prophetic was Alexis de Tocqueville – in a figurative sense – when he wrote in Democracy in America (1835): “Sometimes man advances so quickly that the wilderness reappears behind him.”
What the privileged among homo sapiens talk about in the secrecy of their homes is no one else’s business (that falls in the P&L accounts of tech giants, the de facto spymasters). But when serious professions like journalism internalise stereotyping, it is a matter of grave concern. We need not look far: That the Western media is hardwired to view countries in the Global South as familiar strangers is conspicuous in their coverage of the two-day G20 meet in India that starts on September 9. The trope of India being a land of millions of poor and an elite superrich is ironic, because that is the default setting of most countries in the West, too. Income inequality in the West is at record highs. Does typecasting fetch more clicks or is it by design thanks to a colonial mindset? It is natural for a former coloniser like Britain to make that mistake, but what about the US, which had fought off British colonialism? Interestingly, the Americans celebrate 200 years of the Monroe Doctrine this year, a policy aimed at keeping the colonial masters of Europe at bay.
While it is par for the course for journalists to focus on the poor and the destitute and therefore report on how Indian authorities went on a ‘beautification’ drive to clear slums ahead of the G-20 summit, restricting the coverage to such negative stories alone is proof of how easy writing about non-West countries has been or still is. Indian journalists, too, have given enough space for how the organisers have faltered in handling slum dwellers and stray dogs – which was done using bow-and-arrow methods – but they have also reported on the extensive arrangements done for the Summit and how it ensured the showcasing of everything Indian, including traditional Indian art. The central government in India has even won praise for G20 summit preparations from an unlikely rival, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), which is in power in the state of Delhi.
Under India’s presidency this year and before it hands over the mantle to Brazil in December, 220 G-20 meetings will have taken place across 60 Indian cities in all its 28 states and eight union territories, making it a grand inclusive exercise. Of course, the event has had its share of flaws, as most of them do, but it has also earned appreciation for being human-centric and enlisting participation from large groups of people who would have otherwise never received an opportunity to be part of such global gatherings.
In fact, from the viewpoint of western nations alone, their media groups should have focused on the timing of this summit. Western economic supremacy is under threat, and there is a growing tendency among more countries than ever before following the end of the Cold War to move away from a US-centric world order. Whimsical sanctions by the West have also angered others who want to stay cohesive to take on the might of advanced countries and their agencies. G20 members do currently account for more than 80% of world GDP, 75% of global trade, and 60% of the global population, and the so-called developed countries need more cooperation from non-Western members of the forum now than they did when it was formed in 1999 following an economic crisis.
The Washington Post, for its part, has run a story on how Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has used the global event as a re-branding exercise. The article says, “The prime minister’s face has been plastered on billboards around the country. The message is simple: By hosting the world’s top leaders, India has arrived as a world power, with Modi as the person who took the country there. (The truth is a tad less impressive: The G20 has a year-long rotating presidency; Indonesia was last year’s host.)”
One could argue that politicians the world over use such events and occasions to hard-sell themselves to leaders of other countries and endear themselves to their voters. India has had its successful Incredible India! campaign running since the early 2000s. That’s as global as Indian campaigns get. Politicians universally are a breed of people who invariably rise to the occasion, be it a global conclave or a natural tragedy. Pomp and show come with the job description. So why begrudge it?
Just as India has a problem of poverty amidst plenty, videos highlighting homelessness in the Silicon Valley area and elsewhere and rampant drug addiction across American cities show graver problems at hand in the advanced world. Most cities in Europe are grappling with immigration and job losses. Cost of living crises in the continent have led to the growth of majoritarian politics and concomitant difficulties.
To be sure, India isn’t new to any of this. In 1927, when American historian and researcher Katherine Mayo published a book titled Mother India after travelling across India, meeting the rich and the poor alike, it created an uproar in the India of the time. Even now when one reads it, the contempt the writer displays for India and its culture would make any Indian shiver in revulsion. It was a time when India was going through extraordinary political upheavals amidst resistance against British rule. Which was why Mahatma Gandhi commented, “It (Mayo’s book) is the report of a drain inspector sent out with the one purpose of opening and examining the drains of the country to be reported upon, or to give a graphic description of the stench exuded by the opened drains.”
India has changed drastically since then, as has the geopolitical landscape. What the world expects from reporters and researchers is certainly not underreporting of hardships, but a bit of fairness. Pigeonholing societies as either good or bad is easier, but it is a lazy man’s way to professional glory. At a time when the working classes of the West – from medical workers to Hollywood writers – are complaining of exploitative working conditions and low pay, focusing condescendingly only on the poverty and political ambitions of leaders of the developing world is hardcore duplicity. – By Ullekh N.P., a writer, journalist, and political commentator based in New Delhi. – RT.COM
