Friday, April 27, 2007

Guest Comment: Concert of great powers or democratic global governance?

By Thomas Fues and Sachin Joshi

More urgent than ever, the upcoming meeting of the most important industrialised countries in Heiligendamm is faced with the question on the future of the summit architecture. The phenomenal rise of the emerging powers, particularly China and India, has called into life a new geography of the global economy and international politics, which can no longer be dominated by the West. (The military hegemony of the US is a separate though connected issue.) Nobody has recognized this more clearly than the Bush Administration as meticulously analyzed by US political scientist Daniel Drezner in the current issue of Foreign Affairs. Mostly unnoticed by the international public, the US wants to integrate China and India into multilateral institutions (e.g. IMF, WTO) and install a new triad of great powers. It is the European countries which are disturbed since they deny their loss of influence in the „Asian century“ and cling to obsolete privileges.

What can Europe do to prevent a new concert of great powers and to support democratic global governance? In its attempt to prevent the ‘concert’ the worst answer would be if the EU itself were to strive for great power status by building up military capacities. This would tear the Union apart; a European torso could not master this task. The right approach, however, would be if the EU would become the leading force for an equitable world order and thus would increase its reputation and influence in the world. In other words, support democratic global governance. This would imply that European countries withdraw from antiquated positions of power in order to allow for the new powers to gain more leverage. For example, EU states should pool their voting rights and seats in the IMF and agree to a substantial reduction. Also, Europe should be represented with a single seat in a reformed summit architecture, as in the proposed „L20+“ of heads of state and government from North and South. If Europe is not ready for a voluntary relinquishment of power and sustainable change of course, it will be faced with a concert of great powers consisting of the US, China and India, which will undermine the foundations of the United Nations and block democratic global governance for a long time to come.

The EU leaders have the right opportunity to discuss their strategy to support democratic global governance at Heiligendamm. The question however remains, whether they will take the first step forward.

Dr. Thomas Fues is a senior economist at the German Development Institute (GDI) in Bonn; Sachin Joshi is a researcher in New Dehli and is currently attending GDI's Global Governance School.