G20 Information Centre provided by the G20 Research Group
	@g20rg G20 Summits |  G20 Ministerials |  G20 Analysis |  Search |  About the G20 Research Group [English]  [Français]  [Deutsch]  [Italiano]  [Portuguesa]  [Japanese]  [Chinese]  [Korean]  [Indonesian]

Analysis

Prospects for the G20 Rio Summit’s Substantial Performance

John Kirton, Director, G20 Research Group
November 10, 2024
[PDF]

Introduction

Significance

On November 18–19, 2024, Brazil will host the G20’s 19th regular annual summit at the Museum of Modern Art in Rio de Janeiro. It comes right after the annual Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) leaders’ meeting on November 15 in Lima, Peru. It will be the first time Brazil hosts the G20 summit. It will almost complete the G20’s first cycle of every country member hosting, with South Africa scheduled to follow Brazil in 2025 (see Appendix A). It will thus continue the four-year sequence of G20 summits being hosted by countries from the Global South: since Indonesia in 2022 has come a trio of members from the India, Brazil, South Africa (IBSA) group, and most of the core ones of the BRICS of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. Above all, these hosts are all democracies, with Brazil and South Africa following Indonesia in 2022 and India in 2023. And Brazil’s Rio Summit starts a trio of summits it will host, adding in 2025 the expanded BRICS summit and the 30th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP30) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) on climate change in the Amazonian city of Belém.

Participants

Brazil’s G20 summit will be hosted by the highly experienced Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who served as Brazil’s president from October 2002 to 2006, was re-elected for a second term from 2006 to 2010, and returned as president for a third term starting on January 1, 2023. Lula bragged during his election campaign for his third term that he was a founding father of the G20. He had left the G20 summit in November 2010 as the most well-loved G20 leader ever among his colleagues in the group.

At Rio, Lula will be joined by 13 G20 veterans. They are led by last year’s chair, Indian prime minister Narendra Modi, at his 11th regular annual summit, since coming to Brisbane in 2014. The other veterans are Canada’s Justin Trudeau coming since 2015, Saudi Arabia’s Mohammed bin Salman, France’s Emmanuel Macron, South Africa’s Cyril Ramaphosa, the European Union’s Ursula von der Leyen, the EU Council’s Charles Michel, and Türkiye’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan after his third presidential election victory in May 2023. The relative newcomers will be the United States’ president Joe Biden at his fourth, and Germany’s chancellor Olaf Scholz, Italy’s prime minister Giorgia Meloni, Korea’s president Yoon Suk-yeol and Australia’s prime minister Anthony Albanese at their second. On October 18, Russia’s Vladimir Putin told the media he would send a senior official to Rio for the summit, and thus would not attend for the third year in a row (Kremlin 2024).

Attending their first G20 summit will be eight newcomers: Japan’s Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, taking office on October 1, 2024, and returned with a minority government after a general election four weeks later, the United Kingdom’s Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Indonesia’s President Prabowo Subianto who was sworn in on October 17, Argentina’s President Javier Milei, Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum who took office on October 1, and Mauritania’s President Ould Al-Ghazouani representing the African Union (AU).

The 19 invited country guest leaders include the two regular guests of Spain’s Pedro Sánchez and newly elected Prime Minister Lawrence Wong of Singapore, along with the Egypt’s Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, Norway’s Jonas Støre, Portugal’s Luis Montenegro and the leaders of Angola, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, the Holy See, Malaysia, Mozambique, Nigeria, Paraguay, Qatar, Tanzania, the United Arab Emirates, Uruguay and Vietnam.

Also invited are the executive heads of 12 multilateral organizations beyond the International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank and the Financial Stability Board (FSB). Those are the African Development Bank (AfDB); Development Bank of Latin America and the Caribbean (CAF); Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO); Inter-American Development Bank (IDB); International Labour Organization (ILO); League of Arab States (LAS); New Development Bank (NDB); United Nations; United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO); United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD); World Health Organization (WHO) and World Trade Organization (WTO).

Priorities

These leaders will focus first on the Brazilian host’s chosen theme of “Building a Just World and a Sustainable Planet” with its three top priorities of social inclusion and the fight against hunger, the energy transition and sustainable development (in its economic, social, and environmental dimensions), and the reform of global governance institutions. Another priority, added later, is artificial intelligence (AI).

The Debate

The prospects for the Rio Summit’s performance have inspired a debate among several competing schools of thought.

The first school saw deadlock, due to deep divisions over the war in the Middle East. Lula’s public remarks comparing Israel’s actions in Gaza to the Holocaust created a diplomatic row that “overshadowed a G20 foreign ministers meeting chaired by Brazil in Rio de Janeiro … with Anthony Blinken, US secretary of state, saying he had ‘a frank exchange’ with Lula on the matter” (FT Reporters 2024).

The second school saw poor progress on the core development agenda and its key components of the G20’s Common Framework for comprehensive, speedy debt relief for poor countries. “The scheme has not delivered on either count: only a handful of countries have participated and progress has been at a glacial pace. Meanwhile, the most heavily indebted countries are spending more on debt payments than they are on poverty and hunger programmes” (Elliot 2024). This was despite the support of Lula, World Bank president Ajay Banga and, more broadly, of the ODI for Lula’s plan for a global alliance against poverty and hunger.

The third school saw “high stakes, high drama” as Brazil played up its hosting to symbolize its high status and to legitimize Lula’s priorities (Wade 2024; Cooper 2023). Robert Wade (2024) noted that Lula would host the G20 in 2024, the BRICS in 2025 and the COP30 on climate change in 2025. Yet the G20’s southernization in hosting and image of a multipolar world are discrepant from its members’ declining cooperation over Covid-19, climate change, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, China’s rise and the resulting increasingly empty communiqués. There were doubts about Putin’s attendance until mid October, and divisions between a conflicting China and India, climate finance, and reform of the international financial institutions (IFIs). However, there was a reasonable prospect that G20 leaders would support a tax on the very rich (Schulze et al. 2024).

The fourth school highlighted Brazil’s sensible priorities, competent players and preparatory process, greater role on climate change and reducing tensions between the North and South, due to Brazil’s economic and environmental progress, but performance limited by Lula’s pro-autocratic rhetoric amid growing geopolitical tensions (Stunkel 2024).

The fifth school saw potential progress for the interests of the Global South on Lula’s priorities of social inclusion, hunger, “phasing out fossil fuels in favour of renewable energy and reforming global economic governance” (Kozul-Wright 2023). This was despite the G20’s bitter internal divisions, two ongoing wars and a slowing global economy. It was due to Lula, whose pragmatism made him “the ideal candidate to try and restore a measure of stability to today’s fractious world order” (Jayati Ghosh, quoted in Kozul-Wright 2023). He would push for a lasting solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict, for both Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping to attend the summit in person, for an end to world hunger by 2023 through a global task force against hunger, for a global minimum tax of 15%, for funding more renewable energy and nature conservation projects, for reinforcing the UN, for reforming representation at the IMF and World Bank, and for raising their country quotas and reducing conditionality for emergency lending.

The sixth school saw benefits for Brazil and Germany. Luiz Ramalho (2023) argued that Lula hoped “to make the G20 presidency a foreign-policy milestone that will cement Brazil’s return to the international stage following the isolationist government of his right-wing extremist predecessor, Jair Bolsonaro.” He concluded that “Brazil’s priorities align with the principles of a just transition, which guide German development cooperation,” thus giving Germany an opportunity to promote them.

The seventh school, arising after the US elections on November 5, saw the possibility of severely reduced performance due to Donald Trump becoming president. Eric Reguly (2024) wrote that Trump “could pay scant attention to, or outright disdain for, G7 and G20 summits, and other international events, as he did in his first presidency.”

The eighth school saw disarray and even the risk of a “car crash” at Rio, due to Trump’s election (Foy, Russel and Stott 2024). Its multilateral agenda would be undercut by Trump’s “disinterest in, if not disdain for, the type of multilateral gatherings that the US, as the world’s pre-eminent power, has by and large presided over for three decades.” Especially at risk would be Lula’s green ambitions for Rio and as host of COP30 next year.

The ninth school argued that Trump’s election would spur a shoring up of existing international institutions at Rio, before Trump arrived in the White House to withdraw from them or tear them down (Foy, Russel and Stott 2024). This was especially so on climate action, where it was, Brazilian diplomats argued, Trump’s US against the rest of the world.

The 10th school saw the BRICS replacing the G20, G7 and UN with what Putin called “a new, just world order” due to Trump’s re-election and his prospective, then immediate, moves to implement his public and campaign promises to leave or destroy the international institutions at the core of the US-led international order (Foy, Russell and Stott 2024).

The 11th school said just “wait and see” and judge Trump by his deeds and not his words (Foy, Russell and Stott 2024). The World Bank’s Banga noted that the World Bank had secured its latest capital increase, in 2017, during the Trump administration.

Prospects

As of November 9, the prospects for the Rio Summit are promising. It is on track to produce a substantial performance and possibly even a significant one (Kirton undated). Although it will do little to reduce the members’ major miliary conflicts and geopolitical tensions, it will advance the summit’s established priorities of reducing poverty and hunger; improving gender equality, Indigenous peoples’ lives and health; climate action; clean energy; and artificial intelligence. However, progress here will come more on institutional process than on policy product. It will feature the creation of new global alliances and institutions and procedural reforms at international institutions, rather than major new money mobilized or ambitious agreements on climate change, food security, the economy, development and debt.

This substantial performance will be propelled by very high levels of shock-activated vulnerability, high levels of multilateral organizational failure and significant levels of members’ predominant equalizing capability. But the summit will be prevented from producing higher performance by members’ small levels of common principles and practices, leaders’ low domestic political control and the uncertain value they place on the G20 as the club at the hub of a growing network of global summit governance.

Shock-activated vulnerabilities are led by war in Ukraine and the Middle East, military expansion by China, soaring extreme weather events from climate change, growing energy, food and debt shocks, and financial fragilities. Multilateral organizational failure in responding adequately to these shocks has come from the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) in ending the wars, the IMF and World Bank at their spring and autumn ministerial meetings, the WTO at its latest ministerial conference, and the WHO in producing a robust pandemic accord and fund. Predominant equalizing capability is still significant, enabling the G20 summit to fill the gap. G20 members together contain 80% of the global economy and most other specialized capabilities. But there is now internally less equalizing in the value of their currencies, with the US dollar rising, and those of China, Korea, Japan and other G7 members falling, immediately after November 5.

Converging principles and practices are low, due to increasing authoritarianism in Russia and China and right-wing populist pressures in Europe exceeding small steps toward democracy in Argentina and Türkiye, while Brazil and the US are internally among the most economically unequal large countries in the world. Leaders’ domestic political control is largely low, outside authoritarian Russia and China and Italy (alone among G7 members). The limited value leaders place on the G20 as their personal club at the hub of a growing network of summit level global governance is revealed by the absence of Putin and the lack of any actual or planned special G20 summit before or after the regular November 18–19 one. G7 members have thus turned to rely more on their own summit process – which held two ad hoc summits before its regularly scheduled one in June and by October 3 had issued an additional four statements – and to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization summit in Washington in July. The November 5 election of Trump and his Republican Party with a majority in the Senate and prospectively the House of Representatives in the United States is now a largely unknown preventer or propellor of higher performance at the Rio Summit.

Preliminary Plans and Preparations

Brazil’s plans and preparations for Rio were underway in the spring of 2023, when it was already a member of the G20’s governing troika, as the incoming presidency.

Assembling the Sherpa Team

With the change of government after Lula’s election, Brazil had had to recreate its sherpa team. Its new sherpa was Ambassador Mauricio Lyrio, the head of the Secretariat of Economic and Financial Affairs, who had been previously posted to the UN, Australia, Mexico and China. He had a very good relationship with Brazil’s current administration. The sous sherpa was Felipe Hees, who had twice served at the WTO.

Policy Priorities and Agenda

By early May 2023, the sherpa team had produced an early first draft of Brazil’s summit priorities. The top-line priorities were social inclusion, sustainable development and social protection in the workplace.

Social inclusion was the first priority. Racial inequality is an inescapable issue for Brazil, which has the largest Black population after Nigeria. Gender equality, especially for Black women, was also a key concern. Lula appointed a diversity ministry, with a record number of women and the country’s first ministry for Indigenous peoples. After considering whether the issue of inclusion should be the focus of a new working group or be treated as a cross-cutting issue, the G20 secretariat concluded that a dedicated working group would meet too much resistance from other members. Moreover, some of these issues are the responsibility of the sub-federal state level in Brazil.

Sustainable development, the second priority, began with the legacy of the historic summit-level UN Conference on Environment and Development in Rio in 1992, which produced the landmark conventions on climate change, biodiversity and desertification. It was shaped by Brazil’s bid to host the UNFCCC’s COP30 in 2025.

Social protection, the third priority, focused on labour and employment. The focus was how to support the new labour relationships with new technology and the digitalization of the labour market, especially in the service sector, given the move from industry to service sectors, particularly in tech-intensive and communications-intensive services. One question was how to create legislation to assure that this workforce had access to social protection from employers and the state

Other priorities included food and agriculture, with Lula having declared that ending hunger was an objective for his new presidency. Health was not likely to be an umbrella issue, although the Health Working Group had an ambitious agenda and would be very active. The issue was raised by the Women 20 engagement group, with regards to the care economy. The issues of Ukraine and political tensions would remain present.

The sherpa team consulted the relevant ministries on their priorities, which fed into the revised drafts of issue notes in June. The plan was for Lula to present the main themes for the Rio Summit to his fellow leaders at the New Delhi Summit in September.

The Summit Date, Length and Site

The summit would be a two-day event in November just after the APEC leaders meeting in neighbouring Peru. Brazil did not want to ask several key G20 leaders to travel to South America twice in the fall. The summit would thus come just after the US presidential and congressional elections on November 5, and take place when all knew who the US president was, and which party would control Congress.

In early May 2023 the summit’s location was still to be confirmed, but there were limited options, given the availability of the needed airports, hotels and other infrastructure.

Ministerial Meetings

When planning began for its 2024 G20 presidency, Brazil saw a need to scale back the number of guest leaders, working groups and ministerial meetings, especially after the 2022 Indonesian and 2023 Indian presidencies. There was no need to replace the UN. India had densely scheduled the meetings, with little time for managing things or holding bilateral meetings, and a heavy travel schedule for officials who had to visit India frequently during the six months leading up to the New Delhi Summit. It was tiring. Brazil wanted fewer meetings that were more focused, and would allow for private corridor conversations to take place easily.

But the summit planners recognized various constraints. With municipal mayoral elections in 2024, many mayors might want to host a ministerial. Each Brazilian minister would want to host their own ministerial. It was hard to uninvite people once they had been coming for several years.

Brazil started with fewer than 15 ministerial meetings, starting in late August. Planners considered grouping some of the ministerial and working group meetings together.

Working Groups

Brazil inherited at least 13 working groups, plus one on gender proposed by the US. There was also a research initiative that would likely become a working group. The Development Working Group would try to have a tight focus, on sustainable development, as conceived at Rio in 1992.

India had set up a working group on disaster resilience, which posed a challenge for Brazil as well as Germany, where it was handled at the sub-federal level.

Preparatory Schedule

Brazil’s plan was to distribute the issue notes for the Rio Summit to G20 members in September 2023, before assuming the presidency on December 1. In December the sherpas would meet, as would the finance deputies.

There would be a foreign ministers’ meeting in early January 2024, to try, as the Indians tried to do in 2023, to clear contentious issues out early, recognizing that India was not particularly successful in doing so.

During the first trimester of 2024, technical meetings would be held virtually. In the second trimester, there would be more technical meetings, but some would start being held in person.

In May 2023, the G20 was not yet a big issue in Brazil. A more inward-looking country, it saw itself as the US of South America. It was western but at the same time also Latin American and South American, firmly in the Global South.

Subsequent Hosting

In early May 2023, there were rumours that the US would host the 2026 summit, after South Africa in 2025, but no one had come forward. In 2025 the US might have a new government. So the 2026 host could be one of the first three hosts in the first cycle – starting with the United States and the United Kingdom.

In the sequence of developing countries or emerging economies hosting summits, there were now IBSA members hosting in 2023, 2024 and 2025. Among the BRICS, Brazil switched places with Russia, so that Russia hosted the Kazan Summit in 2024. A similar switch within the G20 had occurred when India switched places with Indonesia, which had switched places with Italy.

Brazil’s Rio Summit Priorities

At the G20 New Delhi Summit’s closing session on September 10, 2023, Lula announced the theme, priorities and approach of the summit he would host in Rio de Janeiro in November 2024.

He began by saying “nature continues to demonstrate that we need to take much more care of it. This week, three days ago, in Brazil, a cyclone in the state of Rio Grande do Sul – there had never been a cyclone before – killed forty-six people and almost fifty people are missing. This catches our attention because phenomena like this have happened in the most different places on our planet” (Lula 2023b). This showed that like India, Lula put the environment first but now started with the shock-activated vulnerability from climate change and its intensified extreme weather events.

Lula announced that the theme for the Rio Summit would be “Building a Just World and a Sustainable Planet.” It would follow, and follow up on, India’s achievements. Its three priorities would be social inclusion and the fight against hunger, the energy transition and sustainable development, and the reform of global governance institutions.

More specifically, Rio would focus on reducing inequality as the main priority, including gender inequality, race inequality, education inequality, health inequality and food inequality. These social issues had a firm foundation in the many commitments made by the New Delhi Summit on most of them (Kirton 2024b, 2024c) (see Appendix B). On hunger, the aim was to end it by 2030.

On climate change, resources and technology transfer were needed. Lula highlighted clean energy, with 90% of Brazil’s electricity and 50% of its energy being clean, compared to 15% of clean energy for the rest of the world. Brazil had adopted ethanol almost 50 years earlier, promoted biofuels as an alternative to oil, and at New Delhi launched the Global Biofuels Alliance with Argentina, the US and India, and would promote ethanol for transport.

On international governance reform, Lula called for greater representation for emerging countries in the World Bank and the IMF, and for addressing the unsustainable external debt of the poorest countries, in which developing countries should have more participation or even run. He had been calling for such reform since the G20’s first summit in Washington in 2008. He also called for the UNSC to include new developing countries among its permanent and non-permanent members, and for reforming the WTO and restoring dispute settlement system.

Lula (2023b) said the world needs “peace and cooperation instead of conflict.”

To strengthen the summit process, Brazil would create two G20 task forces: The Global Alliance Against Hunger and Poverty and the Global Mobilization Against Climate Change. It would make the G20’s political and finance tracks work in more integrated ways and allocate the necessary resources for the implementation of G20 policy decisions. It would listen to society and ensure that the engagement groups could report their recommendations to the government. It would not let geopolitical issues hijack the agenda. And it would hold events in several cities in all of Brazil’s five regions.

At the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) on September 19, 2023, Lula reaffirmed and elaborated on these priorities. He began by recalling his first address to UNGA 20 years earlier when “the world had not yet realized the severity of the climate crisis. Today, it knocks on our doors, destroys our homes, our cities, our countries, kills and imposes losses and suffering on our brothers, especially the poorest. Hunger, the central theme of my speech at this World Parliament 20 years ago, today affects 735 million human beings, who go to sleep tonight without knowing if they will have anything to eat tomorrow” (Lula 2023c). On his priorities for his G20 summit specifically, he said once Brazil assumed the G20 presidency on December 1, “we will spare no effort to place the fight against inequalities, in all its dimensions, at the core of the international agenda. Under the motto ‘Building a Just World and a Sustainable Planet’ the Brazilian chair will coordinate social inclusion and fight against hunger; sustainable development and reform of global governance institutions.”

On November 22, 2023, at the virtual G20 summit hosted by Indian prime minister Modi, Lula (2023a) indicated his intention to push implementation of New Delhi’s commitments, including throughout the 2024 Brazilian presidency. Lula repeated his presidency’s theme, priorities and approach.

As of February 1, 2024, Brazil’s G20 priorities remained first, social inclusion and the fight against hunger. This was Lula’s oldest priority, defended by him since his first time as Brazil’s president. It offered consistency and could be a channel through which a large array of themes and issues were channelled. The second priority was the energy transition and sustainable development, in its economic, social and environmental dimensions. The third priority was the reform of global governance institutions, a priority for the Brazilian government. AI had now been added to the larger list of priorities.

On September 24, 2024, in his address to UNGA, Lula’s single reference to the G20 dealt with global governance reform. He stated “We need to contemplate a comprehensive review of the [UN] Charter. Its reform should include the following goals: the transformation of the Economic and Social Council into the main forum for addressing sustainable development and combating climate change, with a real capacity to inspire financial institutions; the revitalization of the role of the General Assembly, including in matters of international peace and security; the strengthening of the Peacebuilding Commission; the reform of the Security Council, focusing on its composition, working methods, and veto rights, in order to make it more effective and representative of contemporary realities. The exclusion of Latin America and Africa from permanent seats on the Security Council is an unacceptable echo of domination from the colonial past. We will promote this discussion in a transparent manner in consultations at the G77, G20, BRICS, CELAC [Community of Latin American and Caribbean States], and CARICOM [Caribbean Community], among many other spaces” (Lula 2024).

Elsewhere in his speech, he focused on many of Rio’s priorities, starting with the conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza, then moving to emphasize climate change, the environment, energy, democracy, artificial intelligence, debt, taxation and hunger.

Brazil’s Rio Summit Preparations

The sherpa track, coordinated by Brazil’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, led on international trade and investment, agriculture, the digital economy, energy, climate change, the environment, employment, health, education, sustainable development and combating corruption.

The finance track, coordinated by the Ministry of Finance and the Central Bank of Brazil, led on the global economy, international financial system, infrastructure, tax in the digital economy, financial inclusion and sustainable finance.

Sherpa Meetings

At the third sherpa meeting, held in early July 2024, the sherpas agreed, after very intense conversations, to avoid discussing difficult geopolitical issues during the forthcoming ministerial meetings, given that the finance ministers meeting in Brazil in February had produced no joint statement due to members’ divisions over the wars in Gaza and Ukraine (Romani 2024). Mauricio Lyrio, Brazil’s G20 sherpa, said this new consensus would allow these meetings to advance agreements on subjects “such as climate change, reducing hunger in the world, trade and investment.” This suggested progress would come when the finance ministers and central bank governors met in Rio de Janeiro in late July. However, this consensus applied only to the ministerial meetings, and not to the Rio Summit itself, where leaders would be free to push for public commitments on Russia, as the G7 members wished, and on China, Iran, North Korea and Israel-Palestine too.

G20 Ministerial Meetings

On December 11, 2023, Brazil released its first schedule of G20 meetings (see Appendix C). It listed 26 ministerial meetings for 18 different portfolio meetings, from February 22 to October 31, all coming before the summit on November 18–19. This was more than India’s 19 ministerial meetings for 16 different ministerial portfolios in 2023, which was similar to Indonesia’s slate in 2022.

By November 9, 2024, Brazil had hosted a record 24 ministerial meetings for 18 different portfolios, led by those for finance ministers and central bank governors with four plus a joint meeting with health ministers and another with climate ministers. They were followed by foreign ministers with two, and one each for ministers of development, hunger and poverty, employment, agriculture, digital economy, research and science, tourism, energy transition, climate and environmental sustainability, disaster risk, women’s empowerment, culture, anticorruption, trade and investment, education, and health alone.

The first ministerial meeting was for foreign ministers in Rio de Janeiro on February 21-22. A press statement by Brazil’s foreign minister Mauro Vieira (2024) on February 22 listed seven commitments (see Appendix D). They pointed to some progress on all of Brazil’s three priorities, including the addition of a meeting of G20 members and any others at UNGA in September. The absence of a collectively agreed communiqué may have resulted from the divisions between Lula and the US over Israel’s actions in Palestine (FT Reporters 2024).

The second ministerial meeting was for G20 finance ministers and central bank governors in São Paolo. It did not even try to adopt a consensus communiqué, due to the geopolitical divisions over Ukraine and Gaza (Jiji Press 2024). The Brazilian chair’s concluding annexes, issued on February 29, 2024, contained 26 commitments covering 11 subjects (see Appendix E). By subject, they were led by development with six, followed by macroeconomics, financial regulation, IFI reform and trade with three each, Africa and tax with two each, and, with one each, infrastructure, climate change, food and agriculture, and health. Although they focused on G20 finance ministers’ traditional economic, finance and development agenda, they included other issues that reflected Lula’s social and equality priorities. At the meeting Brazilian finance minister Fernando Haddad suggested taxing the super-rich (Brazil’s G20 Presidency 2024c).

The third ministerial meeting, for finance ministers and central bank governors, came on April 18 in Washington DC at the spring meetings of the IMF and World Bank. There was no attempt to adopt any outcome document, due to the geopolitical divisions at its previous meeting (Jiji Press 2024).

At the meeting Brazil as chair emphasized climate change finance and reform of the multilateral development banks (MDBs). Six weeks after G20 work had started on ways to raise revenue by taxing the super-rich, there was growing enthusiasm among G20 members for doing so, including from a supportive France. Haddad said the G20 could reach agreement on the tax by November, with a political communiqué produced in June agreeing that the proposal should be examined over the next three to four years (Máximo 2024). He said it could help the world on the brink of a debt crisis, and to combat poverty, hunger and finance the green transition.

Haddad further proposed increasing the share of developing countries in, and the capitalization of, the MDBs. Brazil was working on a roadmap to do so, for the fourth meeting of G20 finance ministers and central bank governors in October (CE Noticias Financieras 2024; Brazil’s G20 Presidency 2024b).

By April 22, Brazil was also emphasizing financing for sustainable development, eliminating ineffective and obsolete global governance institutions, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and inequalities in accordance with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the bioeconomy concept, net zero deforestation, Indigenous peoples and their traditional knowledge, and intellectual property.

On July 22–23, G20 development ministers met in Rio. In their outcome document they made 32 commitments.

On July 25–26, G20 labour and employment ministers met in Fortaleza. They issued a communiqué, a “Chair’s Statement of the Brazilian G20 Presidency” and two annexes. The communiqué contained 54 commitments, of which 23 were highly binding and 31 were low binding. By subject, gender equality came first with 26, labour and employment itself had 19, digitalization including AI six, climate change three and health two.

On July 25–26 in Rio, G20 finance ministers and central bank governors met for their third meeting. At the end of the meeting they issued a consensus communiqué, which contained 56 commitments, seven of which were highly binding and 49 were low binding. By subject, financial regulation led with 10. The economy and IFI reform had eight each, development seven, climate and digitalization five each, tax four, trade three, the environment and health two each, and terrorism and crime one each. Its “Chair’s Statement of the Brazilian G20 Presidency” contained the standard text on Russia, Ukraine and Gaza.

There was also “The Rio de Janeiro G20 Ministerial Declaration on International Tax Cooperation.” It contained 21 commitments, with one highly binding and 20 low binding ones. All were on tax.

On September 12–13, G20 agriculture ministers met in Chapada dos Guimarães. Their declaration contained 29 commitments. One was a highly binding one and 28 were low binding ones. There were four commitments on climate change, four on health, two on trade and four on fisheries. The meeting also issued a “Chair’s Statement of the Brazilian Presidency” that again noted members’ divisions over Russia, Ukraine and Gaza and said the Brazilian presidency would “conduct the discussion on these issues among Sherpas in the coming months” (Brazil’s G20 Presidency 2024a).

On September 13, G20 ministers responsible for the digital economy met and produced “The G20 Maceio Ministerial Declaration on Digital Inclusion for All.” It contained 19 commitments. Three were highly binding and 16 were low binding ones. Nine of the commitments, or almost half of them, addressed artificial intelligence directly. The declaration also had four Annexes, one of which was on AI.

On September 19, G20 research and innovation ministers issued their Manus Declaration at the end of their meeting. It contained 11 commitments, with one highly binding and 10 low binding ones. Science, technology and innovation had five commitments, climate change two, and the environment, energy, health and the economy one each. Three of the commitments endorsed three of the appendices from the Research and Innovation Working Group.

On September 21, G20 tourism ministers met in Belém. They issued the Belém declaration, a report of the G20 Tourism Working Group on “Implemented Actions by G20 Members, 2010–2023,” a second Tourism Work Group report on “Qualification Actions and Technical Training in Tourism” and a chair’s statement from the presidency. The declaration contained six commitments, with one highly binding and five low binding ones. Three addressed sustainability and one the UN’s 2030 Agenda.

The first report was a 47-page effort to measure implementation of the Tourism Working Group’s efforts since its start in 2010. It did so by giving 36 categories one of three scores: “highest rate of full implementation,” “highest rate of partial implementation” and “lowest rate of non-implementation” (G20 Tourism Working Group 2024). The executive summary highlighted “significant progress in promoting environmental and cultural protection in tourism” and “persistent challenges.” The report did not indicate what and how much each G20 member had implemented in which categories.

On September 25, G20 foreign ministers and any UN colleagues who wished to attend met during UNGA for the first time. They produced a “Call to Action on Global Governance Reform,” which contained 38 commitments, with 13 highly binding ones and 25 low binding ones. By subjects, they covered UN reform with 16, IFI reform 15, multilateral trade system reform six, and G20 reform one.

On September 27, G20 finance and health ministers issued a “G20 Joint Finance and Health Ministers’ Statement on Mpox Response.” It contained eight commitments, with two highly binding ones and six low binding ones. All were on mpox.

On October 3, G20 climate and environmental sustainability ministers met in Rio. Their ministerial declaration contained 43 commitments. By subject they were led by waste and the circular economy with 11, followed by climate finance and the oceans with eight each, climate change with six, ecosystems services five, general four and biodiversity one.

On October 4 G20 ministers responsible for the energy transition met in Foz do Ignaçu and issued a ministerial outcome document, “Principles for Just and Inclusive Energy Transitions” and a “Chair’s Statement of the Brazilian G20 presidency. The outcome document contained eight commitments, with three highly binding ones and five low binding ones. All were explicitly related to climate change, clean energy or the environment.

On October 10, the G20 ministers for gender equality and women’s empowerment met in Brasilía. Their chair’s statement contained 45 commitments, with 29 highly binding and 16 low binding ones. There were many on labour, on violence and nine on health and care, and three on climate change.

On October 24, in Washington DC, G20 finance ministers and central bankers held their fourth meeting. Their communiqué contained 100 commitments, but only four were highly binding. They also produced an “Annex I: List of Documents” and the standard “Chair’s Statement of the Brazilian G20 Presidency,” which now took a more pleading tone.

On October 24, G20 ministers responsible for trade and investment met in Brasilía. They issued a “Trade and Investment Track: Annex to the G20 Leaders’ Declaration” and “G20 Principles on Trade and Sustainable Development 2024.” Their declaration started, unusually, by stating “We submit to G20 leaders, as our contribution to the Rio Declaration to be adopted in November, the following summary of outcomes” (G20 trade and investment ministers 2024). The declaration contained nine commitments, only one of which was highly binding.

On October 24, in Natal, G20 ministers responsible for combatting corruption met. They issued a “Ministerial Declaration: Contributing to a Just World and a Sustainable Planet through Anti-corruption and Integrity Promotion,” a “G20 Anti-Corruption Working Group Action Plan 2025-2027,” the “G20 High-Level Principles on Incentives for the Private Sector to Adopt Comprehensive and Consistent Integrity Measures to Prevent and Combat Corruption,” and the enhanced “Chair’s Statement of the Brazilian G20 Presidency.” Their ministerial declaration contained 30 commitments, with nine highly binding and 21 low binding ones.

On October 26, in Washington DC, the finance ministers of the G20 troika (India, Brazil and South Africa) met with their G7 counterparts. The meeting produces the “G7-Africa Ministerial Roundtable: Chair’s Summary,” which made only one, low-binding commitment offering support to an IMF/World Bank proposal.

On October 31, in Rio, G20 health ministers met. Their declaration contained 36 commitments, including five highly binding ones. The 36 commitments included four on digital health, of which one was on AI. The health ministers also issued a separate “G20 Health Ministerial Declaration on Climate change, Health and Equity and on One Health.” It contained 37 commitments, with 22 highly binding and 15 low binding ones. Of the 37, 15 were on climate change, with 13 highly-binding and two low binding ones. The 22 on antimicrobial resistance had nine highly binding and 13 low binding ones.

Also on October 31 in Rio, health and finance ministers met. They produced the “G20 Joint Finance and Health Ministerial Meeting: Chair’s Statement,” containing three highly binding and seven low binding ones, for a total of 10.

On November 1, in Belém, G20 ministers responsible for disaster risk reduction met. Their “G20 Disaster Risk Reduction Ministerial Declaration: Reducing Vulnerabilities and Addressing Inequalities” contained 29 commitments.

On November 8, in Salvador da Bahia, G20 culture ministers met and issued the 10-page “Salvador da Bahia Declaration of the G20 Ministers of Culture.” It contained 36 commitments, with seven highly binding and 29 low binding ones. AI was the subject of six and climate change five, showing substantial synergistic support for the priority subjects of the Rio Summit itself.

By November 9, the many ministerial meetings had produced a total of 673 commitments. The most influential finance ministers and central bank governors, in their four meetings alone, had generated 183 for 27% of the total. Health ministers, alone and with finance ministers, had generated 95 for 14%. Foreign ministers, alone and with others, in their two meetings, had generated 38 for 7%.

Yet, with just 10 days before the leaders would gather, the time had come for the sherpas to find a solution to the critical questions of what the Rio Summit declaration would say about Russia’s war against Ukraine, so that the Rio Summit would – as all G20 summits had done before – produce a fully agreed communiqué.

Members’ Priorities

By November 9, the priorities for the Rio Summit of most of the G20 leaders were quite clear, although being reconsidered, revised but largely reconfirmed due to the results of the US election on November 5.

Those priorities were set forth, as offered before that election, in the G20 Brazil: The 2024 Rio Summit, the background book produced by the G20 Research Group for release on November 11 (Kirton and Koch 2014). For a summary of those of the key members from the Americas, see Appendix F.

For an indication of how the Rio Summit’s commitments will be shaped by those that earlier summits have made, especially those that leaders have promised to deliver by 2025, see Appendix G and Appendix H.

Propellors of Performance

The prospective significant performance of the Rio Summit will likely be propelled by the prevailing condition of the six forces that have driven G20 summit performance since the start. Shock-activated vulnerability is very high, multilateral organizational failure high, and G20 members’ globally predominant and internally equalizing capabilities significant, across the economic, social, ecological and political-security spheres. However, their common or converging political characteristics are only solid and their leaders’ domestic political control is small, especially as Joe Biden’s Democratic Party lost the US elections on November 5. The G20’s position as its leaders’ valued club at the hub of an expanding network of global summit governance remains significant. It is led by Lula as a charter member of the G20, BRICS and IBSA, and Brazil as a member of the Summit of the Americas and increasingly a guest in the G7. While Russia’s Putin will again skip the G20 summit, for the third consecutive year, Mexico’s leader would finally come (unlike former president Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who never attended), and China’s Xi Jinping would too. All three had skipped the G20’s New Delhi Summit in 2023.

Shock-Activated Vulnerability

By the eve of the Rio Summit, the first and most potent propeller of performance was the very strong shock-activated vulnerability of G20 members to surprising, deadly events created by acts of aggression in Ukraine from Russia, Israel from Hamas and Iran, military expansion by China in the South China Sea, extreme weather events intensified by climate change, and the energy, debt, health, food and other crises they enlarge, and also, for most members, the election of Donald Trump as the next president of the United States.

Communiqué-Reported Shocks

Communiqué-reported shocks from the initial G20 ministerial meetings started with the foreign ministers’ statement on February 22. It had two, one on the “war in Ukraine” and the other on “the conflict in Palestine” (Vieira 2024). The chair’s summary from the finance ministers’ meeting on February 29 added two shocks, one on Ukraine and one on Gaza. It also noted five vulnerabilities, with four on poor people and countries and one from artificial intelligence.

Elite-Estimated Shocks

Elite-estimated shock-activated vulnerabilities were high. The World Economic Forum’s Global Risk Report 2024, published on January 10, 2024, identified extreme weather as “top risk most likely to present a material crisis on a global scale in 2024” (from 66% of respondents), followed in turn by AI-generated misinformation and disinformation (53%), societal and/or political polarization (46%), cost-of-living crisis 42%) and cyberattacks (39%). The most severe risks over the next two years were, in order, misinformation and disinformation, extreme weather events, societal polarization, cyber security, and interstate armed conflict. All but the first five risks for 2024 were contributing causes of the success of Trump and his fellow Republicans in the US elections on November 5.

Media-Highlighted Shocks

Media-highlighted newsworthy shocks to the economy and democracy were also high, and those to climate and energy security substantial. The world’s elite daily financial newspaper, the Financial Times, in the 19 available days it published between June 5 and 29, distributed its front-page stories as follows: democracy (including war against democratic countries) on 100%, the economy 47%, climate and energy 37%, and health 16% and digital 37% each. The number of front-page stories saw democracy with 56%, economy 17%, digital 10%, climate 8% and health 4%.

In July, the 26 available days’ front-page stories had health on 16%, the economy 62%, climate 35%, digital 42% and democracy 88%. In August, on the 27 available days health dropped to 7%, the economy rise to 93%, climate and energy at 30%, digital at $8% and democracy fall to 78%. By number of stories, July had democracy at 50%, economy 20%, digital 14%, climate 13% and health 5%.

In these two months, democracy always led, followed by the economy a distant second, digitalization and climate-energy third and fourth respectively, and health a very distant fifth. This made it difficult for Rio to transcend the geopolitical issues that divided them, but suggested they could converge to act on the G20’s economic ones.

In August, on the 27 available days, the economy now came first at 38%, democracy second at 32%, digitalization third at 7%, climate and energy fourth at 13% and health fifth at 7%. By number of stories, economy had 38%, democracy 32%, digital 17%, climate 11% and health 2%.

In September, on the 25 available days, democracy appeared on 88%, economy on 80%, climate change and energy on 52%, digitalization on 28% and health on 20%. By number of stories, democracy regained its lead at 37%, followed by economy at 35%, now climate at 4%, digital 11% and health 5%. The geopolitical constraints thus rose, while the potentially unifying climate shocks soared to over half the days.

In October, on the 27 available days, democracy came first on 96%, economy on 89%, climate change and energy a new peak of 59%, digital 33% and health 11%. By number of stories, the economy and democracy had 42% each, climate and energy a new peak of 19%, digital 13% and health 5%.

Together they suggested a strong performance on the economy and then climate-energy, but stronger constraints from the geopolitical divisions contained under democracy.

Scientific Shocks

Scientific shocks were high. In early January the Copernicus Climate Change Service (2024) reported that 2023 had been the hottest year in recorded history, and that the heat, reinforced by the El Niño Southern Oscillation effect, would get worse through to, and after the summer of 2024. In early November, it and other trusted scientific organizations said that 2024 would almost certainly be the warmest year for the earth in the past 125,000 years (Bryan 2024).

Physical Shocks

Physical shocks were high, especially those from climate change’s extreme weather events and the food insecurity they produced. By April, São Paulo, Brazil’s financial capital, faced the collapse of its electrical grid, as South America and much of Asia and southern Europe suffered from historic heat (Harris 2024). In late September Hurricane Helene struck the eastern United States and in early November massive rainfall killed hundreds of people in Spain. In the Middle East, Iran’s missile attack on Israel and Israel’s response erupted, joining the war in Gaza and in Lebanon to have a diversionary impact on Brazil’s summit priorities, and create greater divisions between the G20’s G7 members and most of its non-G7 ones.

Democratic Shocks

Democratic shock-activated vulnerabilities were fuelled by the unprecedented number of elections in 2024 and the surprising results they brought. The first such election outside the G20 came in Taiwan on January 13. It was won democratically by the candidate opposed to autocratic China. The most recent democratic shock, composed of a high threat and short time to respond but less of a surprise for some, was the victory and strength of Trump’s Republicans in the US elections of November 5.

Multilateral Organizational Failure

By November, the multilateral organizational failure to respond effectively to these shock-activated vulnerabilities was high.

On security, the veto of the Permanent Five members of the UNSC, used by Russia and China, prevented UN security action to assist Ukraine and often to get involved with Israel under arrack by Hamas. The US veto constrained support for the Palestinians suffering from their control by Hamas and Israeli actions to counter it.

On climate change, biodiversity, the environment and energy, COP28 in Dubai in December 2023 had left much undone, and no global energy or comprehensive environmental organization had emerged. There were few signs that COP29 in oil-rich Baku, Azerbaijan, in November 2024 would do better. The COP16 on biodiversity in Colombia in October 2024 made little progress. Lula’s G20 would thus produce a boost for the COP30 that Lula would chair in Belém in 2025.

On development, debt, Africa and emerging economies, the World Bank and IMF struggled at, and after, their semi-annual ministerial meetings in April and October, but fell far short.

On food, the FAO, International Fund for Agricultural Development and the World Food Programme failed to stem the growing hunger and famine in several places in the world, with Gaza now added to the list.

On health, the WHO struggled to produce an ambitious Pandemic Accord with strong provisions for sharing intellectual property and accountability. It and the World Bank had not hit their target for funding the new Pandemic Fund.

On trade, the WTO did nothing to stem the rising protectionism from G20 members at its ministerial conference.

On artificial intelligence, the ITU, UN, G7 and EU offered competing regimes of principles and prospective regulations, while China instituted a very restrictive, state-controlled set.

Predominant Equalizing Capability

The globally predominant and internally equalizing capability of G20 members on key components was significant as the Rio Summit began.

On overall capabilities, measured by gross domestic product (GDP) at current exchange rates, G20 members controlled about 80% of global GDP, led by the high and increasing levels and thus equalizing growth rates of China and now India.

The US dollar index, the best overall measure of relative capability, rose to a one-month high of almost 104 on January 16, 2024, after falling strongly from its peak of 107 in the summer of 2023 (Financial Times 2024). By April 19 it had surged as the Japanese yen, Chinese renminbi and Korean won fell to new lows. However, the official China Foreign Exchange Trade System, measuring the renminbi against 24 peers, had “climbed 2.7% since last year and rallied to the highest in a year this week” (Cotterill, Leng and Lewis 2024). Immediately after November 5, the value of the US dollar soared, and the currencies of most other G20 members fell, but largely not beyond their peaks earlier in the year.

On the underlying size and growth of the real economy, in late October 2023, the IMF had estimated that real GDP growth in the G7 from 2019 Q4 to 2023 Q2 had been strongly led by the US at just over 6%, followed far behind with Canada at 3.5%, Italy with 3.3%, the Eurozone 3%, Japan 3% and the UK 1.8% (Chazan 2023). By April 2024, the US still led the G7, with Canada second. But China’s annualized first quarter GDP was higher than estimated at over 5%. By November, while China’s GDP growth fell below its 5% target for 2024, it still surpassed that of the US, while India’s was higher than them both.

On the military capabilities, key for prevailing in Ukraine, the Middle East, Taiwan, Korea, the Indo-Pacific and elsewhere, the G7’s global predominance was strong, due primarily to the commanding lead of the US. However, the G20’s internal equality was increasing, due to the rise in the military expenditures of Russia, China, Japan, Germany and other members.

Common Political Characteristics

Leading up to the Rio Summit, the common and converging political characteristics of G20 members was small, with the rise of authoritarianism in China and Russia, and the rising populist threat to democracy in G20 members.

All G7 members of the G20 ranked above 80% on their electoral democracy index score for free and fair elections, free media, rights of association guarantees, as compiled by the University of Gothenburg’s V-Dem Institute, even if they had all dipped a bit in the most recent years and faced challenges from anti-democratic forces within several, led by the US (Nord et al. 2024). Among other G20 members, democratic Australia, Korea and Argentina also had over 80%.

They all ranked well above the BRICS members: democratic South Africa with 70%, Brazil with under 70%, and India 40%. Beyond the BRICS, Mexico had 60%, Indonesia just under 60% and Türkiye 30%.

But powerful, highly and increasingly authoritarian Russia had 20% and China under 10%. In the US, democracy was challenged by former president Trump, who, while winning a free and fair election conducted within the established electoral system, did so while awaiting the judicial systems’ final judgement on whether he had violated these rules before.

The level of economic commonality and convergence was small, especially on the members’ domestic income and wealth equality that Lula emphasized. The share of wealth held by the top one percent was led by Brazil at 48.1%, followed by India at 41%, the Unites States 34.3%, China 31.1%, Korea 23.1%, Italy 23.1%, Australia 21.7%, France 21.2%, UK 20.7% and Japan 18.8% (Global Wealth Report 2023).

Domestic Political Control

Going into the Rio Summit, the domestic political control of the G20 leaders was low, especially among most G7 ones.

To be sure, the G20 summit experience of Lula, as the host, was strong. That of G7 leaders was significant, as Biden, Scholz, Macron, Meloni, Trudeau, von der Leyen and Michel were veterans, while Ishiba and Starmer were new. From the BRICS, G20 experience was strong for Xi, Modi and Ramaphosa. From the MIKTA members of Mexico, Indonesia, Korea, Türkiye and Australia, only the experience of the Turkish leader was strong but that of the other leaders was low. Beyond these G20 component clubs, Saudi Arabia’s was high but Argentina’s low.

But back at home, the legislative control of many leaders was low (see Appendix I). None of the G7 leaders’ parties had singular control of their legislatures, save for the UK. While Xi and the absent Putin did, Lula, Modi and Ramaphosa did.

The next elections for several leaders were approaching soon (see Appendix J). Trudeau’s deadline was October 2025, Scholz’s mid March and Shigeru for the Upper Chamber in 2025. Macron would wait until April 2027 and Meloni that December. Biden was now a lame duck leader, who would be gone for good in two months, after Trump’s inauguration on January 20, 2025.

The domestic political popularity of most G20 leaders and their parties was low. Among G7 ones, only Meloni was popular at home (see Appendix K). Within the BRICS, Lula’s was solid but Ramaphosa’s was low.

Club at the Hub

The value leaders placed on the G20 as their personal club at the hub of a growing network of global summit government was significant at best. To be sure, all the leaders other than Russia’s were likely to come to Rio, although three had skipped the summit the two years before. However, in 2024, there were no actual or planned special G20 summits before or after the regular late November one, unlike the special one Modi had called in November 2023, two months after the regular one.

Extending outward from the G20 hub to the other plurilateral summit spokes, the G7, had held two special summits by mid April, and added other democratic leaders to them (see Appendix Ls). G7 leaders met again at the NATO summit in Washington in July. The BRICS leaders waited until the BRICS summit hosted by Russia in Kazan in October 22–24. Several G20 leaders would skip COP29 starting on November 11 in Baku.

[back to top]

References

Brazil’s G20 Presidency (2024a). “Chair’s Statement of the Brazilian G20 Presidency,” G20 agriculture ministers meeting, Chapada dos Guimarães, September 13. https://www.g20.utoronto.ca/2024/240913-agriculture-chair-statement.html.

Brazil’s G20 Presidency (2024b), “Minister Haddad Announces the Creation of a G20 Roadmap for Multilateral Bank Reforms,” April 19. https://www.g20.org/en/news/minister-haddad-announces-the-creation-of-a-g20-roadmap-for-multilateral-bank-reforms.

Brazil’s G20 Presidency (2024c), “Haddad: ‘World’s Super-Rich Need to Contribute More Fairly and Proportionally’,” February 29. https://www.g20.org/en/news/haddad-worlds-super-rich-need-to-contribute-more-fairly-and-proportionally.

Bryan, Kenza (2024), “World on Track to Exceed Warming of 1.5C This Year, EU Agency Says,” Financial Times, November 8. https://www.ft.com/content/ab1a51fa-a27f-4b19-b125-545b643a2ff1.

CE Noticias Financieras (2024), “At G20 Meeting, Haddad Defends Capitalizing Multilateral Banks and Increasing the Weight of Emerging Countries,” CE Noticias Financieras, April 18.

Chazan, Guy (2023). “A Difficult Adjustment,” Financial Times, October 25, p. 15.

Cooper, Andrew (2023), “Brazil’s Hosting of the 2024 G20: Promise and Impediments in a High-Stakes, High-Drama Summit,” Brazilian Journal of International Affairs, 2(8):45–61. https://cebri.org/revista/en/artigo/126/brazil-hosting-of-the-2024-g20-promise-and-impediments-in-a-high-stakes-high-drama-summit.

Copernicus Climate Change Service (2024a). “Copernicus: 2023 Is the Hottest Year on Record, with Global Temperatures Close to the 1.5°C Limit,” January 9. https://climate.copernicus.eu/copernicus-2023-hottest-year-record.

Cotterill, Joseph, Cheng Leng and Leo Lewis (2024), “Asia’s Central Bankers Struggle to Contain Buoyant Dollar,” Financial Times, April 20–21, p. 13.

Elliot, Larry (2024), “At Last G20 is Showing How to Finance and Assault on Poverty,” Guardian, April 14. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/apr/14/at-last-g20-showing-how-finance-assault-poverty-lula.

Feller, Jennifer (2024), “The Importance and Future of the G20,” in The Challenge of the American Countries at the G20, edited by Jorge Argüello (Buenos Aires: Embajada Abierta Foundation), pp. 143–156. https://www.g20.utoronto.ca/biblio/EL_DESAFIO_G20INTERIOR_INGLES_simple.pdf.

Financial Times (2024a). “The Day in the Markets,” January 17, p. 11.

Foy, Henry, Alec Russell and Michael Stott (2024), “US-Led Postwar Order Thrown into Disarray by Trump Victory,” Financial Times, November 9–10, p. 3.

FT Reporters (2024), “Lula Spat Reveals Divide Over Israel Support,” Financial Times, February 23, p. 3.

G20 finance ministers and central bank governors (2024), “Chair’s Summary – 1st G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors Meeting,” São Paulo, February 29, https://www.g20.utoronto.ca/2024/240229-finance.html.

G20 Tourism Working Group (2024), “Report Delivery 1A: Implemented Actions by G20 Members 2010–2023.” https://www.g20.utoronto.ca/2024/Report_Delivery_1A_Approved_3rd_TWG.pdf.

G20 trade and investment ministers (2024), “Trade and Investment Track: Annex to the G20 Leaders’ Declaration,” Brasilía, October 24. https://www.g20.utoronto.ca/2024/241024-trade-annex-to-leaders.html.

Harris, Bryan (2024), “Blackouts Spark Fears of Grid ‘Collapse’ in Brazil’s Biggest City,” Financial Times, April 7, https://www.ft.com/content/6c1356e6-bd9e-45e0-95fd-7b083384f5da.

Jiji Press (2024), “G20 Finance Chiefs End 2-Day Talks with No Document Adopted,’ Arab News, April 19. https://arab.news/nq8q6.

Kirton, John (2024a), “Canada’s G20 Leadership,” in The Challenge of the American Countries at the G20, edited by Jorge Argüello (Buenos Aires: Embajada Abierta Foundation), pp. 101–113. https://www.g20.utoronto.ca/biblio/EL_DESAFIO_G20INTERIOR_INGLES_simple.pdf.

Kirton, John (2024b), “The G20 New Delhi Summit’s Significant Performance”, G20 Digest in press. https://ris.org.in/G20Digest/index.html.

Kirton, John (2024c), “The G20 New Delhi Summit’s Significant Performance,” G20 Research Group, September 14. https://www.g20.utoronto.ca/analysis/230914-kirton-performance.html.

Kirton, John (undated), “Kirton Scoring Scheme,” https://www.g20.utoronto.ca/analysis/scoring.html.

Kirton, John and Madeline Koch, eds. (2024), G20 Brazil: The 2024 Rio Summit (London: GT Media). https://bit.ly/G20Rio.

Kozul-Wright, Alexander (2023), “Lula Faces Numerous Challenges as Brazil Assumes G20 Presidency,” Al Jazeera English December 1. https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2023/12/1/lula-faces-numerous-challenges-as-brazil-assumes-g20-presidency.

Kremlin (2024). “Meeting with Media Representatives of BRICS Member Countries,” Moscow, October 18. http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/75349.

Lula da Silva, Luiz Inácio (2023a), “Speech by Brazil's President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva at the Virtual G20 Leaders’ Summit,” November 22. https://www.gov.br/planalto/en/follow-the-government/speeches-statements/2023/speech-by-brazils-president-luiz-inacio-lula-da-silva-at-the-virtual-g20-leaders2019-summit.

Lula da Silva, Luis Inácio (2023b), “Speech by President Lula at the closing of the G20 Summit,” New Delhi, September 10. https://www.gov.br/planalto/en/follow-the-government/speeches-statements/2023/speech-by-president-lula-at-the-closing-of-the-g20-summit.

Lula da Silva, Luiz Inácio (2023c), “Speech by President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva at the opening of the 78th UN General Assembly,” New York, September 19. https://www.gov.br/planalto/en/follow-the-government/speeches-statements/2023/speech-by-president-luiz-inacio-lula-da-silva-at-the-opening-of-the-78th-un-general-assembly.

Lula da Silva, Luiz Inácio (2024), “Speech by President Lula at the opening of the 79th UN General Assembly in New York,” New York, September 24. https://www.gov.br/planalto/en/follow-the-government/speeches-statements/2024/09-1/speech-by-president-lula-at-the-opening-of-the-79th-un-general-assembly-in-new-york.

Máximo, Wellton (2024), “Finance Minister Haddad Expects G20 Deal by Nov. to Tax Super-Rich,” Agência Brasil, April 18. https://agenciabrasil.ebc.com.br/en/economia/noticia/2024-04/finance-minister-haddad-expects-g20-deal-nov-tax-super-rich.

Nord, Marina, Martin Lundstedt, David Altman et al. (2024), “Democracy Report 2024: Democracy Winning and Losing at the Ballot,” University of Gothenburg: V-Dem Institute. https://v-dem.net/documents/43/v-dem_dr2024_lowres.pdf.

Pinedo, Federico (2024), in in The Challenge of the American Countries at the G20, edited by Jorge Argüello (Buenos Aires: Embajada Abierta Foundation), pp. 29-40. https://www.g20.utoronto.ca/biblio/EL_DESAFIO_G20INTERIOR_INGLES_simple.pdf.

Ramalho, Luiz (2023), “Social Presidency in Difficult Times,” D+C, November 23. https://www.dandc.eu/en/article/brazil-taking-over-g20-presidency-president-lula-da-silva-hoping-strengthen-brazils.

Reguly, Eric (2024), “Europe’s Export-Heavy, Mostly Open Economies Could Take the Biggest Hit from the Next U.S. Administration,” Globe and Mail, November 7, p. B1. https://www.pressreader.com/canada/the-globe-and-mail-ottawa-quebec-edition/20241107/281986088071812.

Romani, Andre (2024), “Brazil Says G20 Sherpas to Avoid Thorny Issues at Prep Meetings,” Reuters, July 6. https://www.reuters.com/world/brazil-says-g20-sherpas-agree-avoid-geopolitical-issues-2024-07-06/.

Schulze, Svenja, Fernando Haddad, Enoch Godongwana, María Jesús Montero and Carlos Cuerpo (2024), “Ministers of Germany, Brazil, South Africa and Spain: Why We Need a Global Tax on Billionaires,” Guardian April 25. https://www.theguardian.com/inequality/2024/apr/25/ministers-of-germany-brazil-south-africa-and-spain-why-we-need-a-global-tax-on-billionaires.

Singh, Daleep (2024), “The Pathway to Growth,” in The Challenge of the American Countries at the G20, edited by Jorge Argüello (Buenos Aires: Embajada Abierta Foundation), pp. 11–128. https://www.g20.utoronto.ca/biblio/EL_DESAFIO_G20INTERIOR_INGLES_simple.pdf.

Stunkel, Oliver (2024), “Lula’s False Starts Blur His Goal of Being a World Leader,” Pledge Times April 21.”Lula’s Unforced Errors Are Taking a Toll on the World’s Goodwill,” America’s Quarterly [blog], March 27. https://americasquarterly.org/article/lulas-unforced-errors-are-taking-a-toll-on-the-worlds-goodwill/.

Termorshuizen, Cynthia and Christopher MacLennan (2024), in in The Challenge of the American Countries at the G20, edited by Jorge Argüello (Buenos Aires: Embajada Abierta Foundation), pp. 89-100. https://www.g20.utoronto.ca/biblio/EL_DESAFIO_G20INTERIOR_INGLES_simple.pdf.

UBS (2023), “Global Wealth Report 2023: Exploring the Fall in Global Household Wealth,” Zurich, https://www.ubs.com/global/en/wealthmanagement/family-office-uhnw/reports/global-wealth-report-2023/exploring.html.

Vieira, Mauro (2024), “Press Statement by Minister Mauro Vieira at the G20 Foreign Ministers’ Meeting,” Rio de Janeiro, February 22. https://www.g20.utoronto.ca/2024/240222-foreign.html.

Wade, Robert (2024), “Brazil’s G20 Summit in November 2024: High Stakes, High Drama,” Global Governance May 9. https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/internationaldevelopment/2024/04/26/long-read-brazils-g20-summit-in-november-2024-high-stakes-high-drama/.

World Economic Forum (2024). “Global Risks Report 2024.” Geneva, January 10. https://www.weforum.org/publications/global-risks-report-2024/.

[back to top]

Appendix A: G20 Summit Performance, 2008–2024 ↩

Last updated by Brittaney Warren, 20 September 2023, and John Kirton, November 8, 2024.

Notes: a) London Summit, b) Pittsburgh Summit, c) Toronto Summit, d) Seoul Summit. N/A = not applicable.

Grade is based on a scoring scheme created by John Kirton as follows: A+ = extremely strong, A = very strong, A− = strong, B+ = significant, B = substantial, B− = solid, D = very small, F = failure (including making things worse). See https://www.g20.utoronto.ca/analysis/scoring.html.

Domestic political management: participation by G20 country members only and at least one representative from the European Union and excludes invited countries; compliments are references to full members in summit documents. Attendance includes virtual participation in 2020–2021. The 2023 summit lacked the leaders of Russia, China and Mexico (whose leader did not attended from 2019 to 2023). By October 18, 2024, Putin had said he would not attend the Rio Summit.

Deliberation: duration of the summit and the documents collectively released in the leaders’ name at the summit.

Direction setting: number of statements of fact, causation and rectitude relating directly to open democracy and individual liberty.

Decision making: number of commitments as identified by the G20 Research Group.

Delivery: scores are measured on a scale from −1 (no compliance) to +1 (full compliance, or fulfilment of goal set out in commitment). Figures are cumulative scores based on compliance reports. Average is calculated by the number of summits, not by the number of assessments.

Development of global governance: internal are references to G20 institutions in summit documents; external are references to institutions outside the G20. Spread indicates the number of different institutions mentioned.

[back to top]

Appendix B: G20 New Delhi Leaders’ Declaration Commitments ↩

Note: Identified and compiled by Brittaney Warren, 10 September 2023.

[back to top]

Appendix C: 2024 G20 Ministerial Meetings ↩

2024 G20 Ministerial Meetings, as published on December 11, 2023

Actual 2024 G20 Ministerial Meetings, as of November 10, 2024

[back to top]

Appendix D: Commitments Made at the G20 Foreign Ministers Meeting, February 22, 2024 ↩

Drawn from “Press Statement by Minister Mauro Vieira at the G20 Foreign Ministers’ Meeting,” Rio de Janeiro, February 22, 2024. https://www.g20.utoronto.ca/2024/240222-foreign.html.

Commitments = 7

1. The Brazilian presidency submitted the proposal, which was accepted, to hold a second meeting in September, on the sidelines of the opening session of the 79th United Nations General Assembly, in New York. It will be a meeting of the G20 members, but open to all UN members who wish to make remarks so that we can have an extensive debate on the themes that have been the main focus in this meeting yesterday and today.
2. Furthermore, there was virtually unanimous support for the two-State solution as the only possible solution to the conflict between Israel and Palestine
3. There was also, as I said before, unanimous support for the priorities that Brazil established for its G20 presidency, in particular regarding concrete actions to fight inequality and hunger.
4. Everyone agreed on the fact that the main multilateral institutions – UN, World Trade Organization, World Bank and International Monetary Fund, among others – need to be reformed so that they can adapt to the challenges of today’s world.
5. As for the UN, everyone mentioned the need to add momentum to the discussions on reforming the organization, especially its Security Council, with the inclusion of new permanent and non-permanent members, in particular from Latin America, the Caribbean and Africa.
6. With respect to multilateral development banks and the IMF, there was also great convergence of views on the need to facilitate financial support for the poorest countries, as well as on the urgent need to increase the representation of the developing world in the governance of the institution.
7. the Brazilian proposal to hold a second meeting of the G20 foreign ministers in September, on the sidelines of the opening session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, The G20 will convene inside the UN headquarters, in a session open to all members of the organization, in a “call for action” to promote global governance reform.

[back to top]

Appendix E: Commitments Made at the G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors Meeting, February 29, 2024 ↩

Drawn from “Chair’s Summary – 1st G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors Meeting,” São Paulo, February 29, 2024. https://www.g20.utoronto.ca/2024/240229-finance.html.

Commitments by Subject

Commitment Text

1. We reiterate our commitment to promote strong, sustainable, balanced, and inclusive growth (macroeconomics)
2. and to accelerate progress toward achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), in accordance with the ambitious mandate from the 2023 G20 New Delhi Leaders’ Declaration. (development)
3. To that end, in 2024, we will focus on mainstreaming inequality as a key policy concern; (development)
4. enhancing the representation and voice of developing countries in decision-making in global economic and financial institutions in order to deliver more effective, credible, accountable and legitimate institutions; (IFI reform)
5. working for better, bigger, and more effective Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs), building on the legacy of Italian, Indonesian and Indian G20 Presidencies; (IFI reform)
6. finalizing the two-pillar solution, including reaching a timely agreement on the Pillar 1 Multilateral Convention with a view to signing by end-June 2024 (tax) and
7. continue to foster global dialogue on fair and progressive taxation; (tax)
8. promoting sustained flows of scarce concessional resources to low- and middle-income countries in need, with clear allocation frameworks; (development)
9. addressing global debt vulnerabilities in an effective, comprehensive, and systematic manner, including stepping up the implementation of the Common Framework in a timely, orderly, predictable and coordinated manner, and enhancing debt transparency; (development)
10. fostering financial inclusion and (development)
11. discussing financial well-being; (financial regulation)
12. strengthening pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response; (health)
13. enhancing domestic revenue mobilization and private capital mobilization, (development) and
14. discussing appropriate risk-sharing mechanisms between public and private capital to support investment in infrastructure and just transitions along with the social, economic and environmental dimensions of sustainable development. (infrastructure)
15. We look forward to discussing the proposals by the Brazilian G20 Presidency to seek urgent solutions to some of these pressing challenges by enhancing cooperation through the Task Force for the Establishment of a Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty (food and agriculture)
16. and the Task Force for a Global Mobilization against Climate Change, in coordination with the work of other G20 workstreams. (climate)
17. We will continue to prioritize temporary and targeted fiscal measures to protect the poor and the most vulnerable, while maintaining medium-term fiscal sustainability. (macroeconomics)
18. We commit to resist protectionism (trade) and
19. encourage concerted efforts to support a rules-based, non-discriminatory, fair, open, inclusive, equitable, sustainable and transparent multilateral trading system with the WTO at its core (trade) and
20. support the reform efforts of the organization by its members at its Thirteenth Ministerial Conference. (trade)
21. We commit to prioritize a timely implementation of the 16th General Review of Quotas (GRQ) through our domestic processes and look forward to the work of the IMF Executive Board to develop, by June 2025, possible approaches as a guide for further quota realignment, including through a new quota formula, under the 17th GRQ. (IFI reform)
22. We reaffirm our April 2021 exchange rate commitment. (macroeconomics)
23. A focus on financial stability and financial sector issues remains vital and we continue to support the work program of the FSB and other standard setting bodies. (financial regulation)
24. We agree on the importance of … implementing the G20 Roadmap on Crypto Assets and the G20 Roadmap for Enhancing Cross-border Payments. (financial regulation)
25. We reiterate our strong support to Africa (Africa) and
26. will intensify our work with the continent, including through the G20 Initiative Compact with Africa. (Africa)

[back to top]

Appendix F: Selected G20 Members’ Priorities for the Rio Summit ↩

United States

Solving “the mounting debt burden and massive investment gap in the developing world” (Singh 2024).

Commit to the pathway to growth (Singh 2024):

1. Have international financial institutions shape ambitious reform and investment plans with ambitious financial support.
2. As bilateral official creditors, sustain net positive inflows of financing to developing countries, through eg debt service suspension, debt reprofiling or new budget support.
3. International Monetary Fund to reinforce net positive financing from official creditors, by applying its lending into official arrears policy.
4. Strengthen incentives for private sector inflows, through guarantees and support from credit rating agencies
5. More growth-enhancing investments, les fiscal restraint
6. Better Common Framework and debt relief.

Canada

1. Focus on “economic stability and growth – particularly through the promotion of effective macroeconomic tools and policies (Termorshuizen and MacLennan 2024; Kirton 2024a)
2. The “impact of wars and conflicts on the food and energy security, both in the short and longer term; in addition to MDB [multilateral development bank] reform, private capital mobilization, the sustainable finance roadmap, sovereign debt issues, and international taxation” including at the root, and prevention
3. “Call out Russia at the G20 table, as its aggression against Ukraine” harms global economy and food security
4. Emphasize “social inclusion and climate action”
5. “Achieve … the Brisbane goal of reducing the gap in labour force participation rates between men and women across the G20 by 25% by 2025” and “gender mainstreaming across the G20 agenda”
6. “Hold ourselves accountable to the commitments that we make”
7. Securing more biodiversity finance, to help fulfill the commitments made at the Kunming-Montreal Biodiversity conference to the parties.

Mexico

1. Claudia Sheinbaum … has already stressed the need to increase the presence of the country in international forums, among which she expressly included the G20” (Feller 2024)
2. Support national priorities of social justice, fight against inequality and a fairer, more inclusive and democratic world governance
3. Financial inclusion, sustainable development, reduce poverty, promote gender equality, transparency in fiscal systems
4. Recognize Covid-19 vaccines certified by the World Health Organization and foster international mobility
5. Include middle income countries in international financial mechanism during a financial crisis.

Specifically at Rio (Feller 2024):

1. Fully endorse launching of the Global Alliance against Hunger and Poverty
2. Discuss “an eventual tax to great fortunes” for Sustainable Development Goal (SDGs) 1 and 2
3. Break the cycle of intergenerational poverty through the Alliance
4. Include women and girls in all development and address through the “Economy of Cares” the unequal participation of women in domestic work and non-remunerated care work”
5. Protect and integrate migrants in labour markets, respond to labour supply and demand and address “the structural challenges that force irregular migration”
6. Promote full application of the 2030 Agenda and its SDGs
7. “Increase in the representation of developing countries in internation financial institutions.”
8. Adopt urgent and ambitious measures to confront climate change, the loss of biodiversity and desertification ... mobilize “at least USD 100 billion annually for actions of mitigation of the effects of climate change in developing countries”
9. “Accelerate the transition towards a clean and sustainable use of energy under the framework of COP 29 [29th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change]”
10. “In opposition to the opinion that the G20 does not have to discuss security issues, Mexico considers that it must be more assertive in the pursuance of its mandate to counteract the effects of geopolitical conflicts in the world economy and in our economic development.”

Argentina

1. Prevent the destruction of the planet (Pinedo 2024)
2. Peace
3. Development
4. No use of multilateral organizations for ideological purposes or “to create new protectionist barriers or unfair competition”
5. Respect human rights.

[back to top]

Appendix G: All G20 Summit Commitments by Subject 2008–2023 ↩

Note: IFI = international financial institution.

[back to top]

Appendix H: All G20 Summit Commitments Due between 2024 and 2029, 2008–2023 ↩

Commitments due by issue

[back to top]

Appendix I: G20 Leaders’ Legislative Control ↩

[back to top]

Appendix J: G20 Elections, 2024–2028 ↩

[back to top]

Appendix K: G7 Leaders’ Public Approval in 2024 ↩

[back to top]

Appendix L: Global Plurilateral Summits, 2024 ↩

[back to top]