Andrés Rozental is Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Mexican Council on Foreign Relations, (Consejo Mexicano de Asuntos Internacionales), and he is currently a foreign policy advisor to the Mexican Government.
Public Engagement
As stated by Prime Minister Berlusconi during his press conference at the end of the summit, it appears that a G-13 or G-14 grouping dealing with a broader array of topics has a better chance of engaging a larger public around the world. A single focus on the financial crisis, or on climate change, is less interesting for the average citizen. On this occasion, there was more coverage and interest in the Mexican press precisely as a result of the wider agenda. Special emphasis was given to President Calderon's participation in the climate change discussions, in the setting of a target date for finalizing the Doha round and in giving the G-5 greater autonomy and an agenda going forward. The Italian G8 Summit was indeed many things to many people and that seems to have given it a greater degree of interest as seen from the number of analysis and opinion pieces in the media.
Public Focus
The l'Aquila Summit took place only a few days after mid-term elections in Mexico, which resulted in a major political defeat for President Calderón and his PAN party. Public attention has been focused almost entirely on the aftermath of the elections and on several other relevant domestic issues. However, as compared with last year's summit in Japan and the London G20 Summit, this gathering was treated with greater relevance and importance than the previous ones. The main reason for this would appear to be President Calderón's press conference, as coordinator of the G-5, during which he discussed a wide ranging set of issues and announced the convening of a G5 leader's summit immediately prior to the next G20 meeting in Pittsburgh, so as to set a specific G5 agenda for financial institution reform, the economic crisis, growing trade protectionism and climate change. In spite of the fact that there was no underlying agreement during this summit between the developed and developing countries on a common position going into the Copenhagen meeting on climate change in December, there were a series of intermediate commitments by both sides which might allow for a compromise.
G8 Relevance
There seems to be a growing consensus that the G8 format by itself is no longer useful or valid. There still is no agreement of whether a G13 (or G14, including Egypt) is the way to go in the future, or whether the Italian model of dozens of leaders invited to various parts of the three-day Summit works better. From a public opinion perspective, the variable geometry model with different leaders participating in consecutive events does not seem to arouse a great deal of confidence. It would clearly be preferable to have a limited group of between 13 and 20 heads of state and government to gather annually, discuss burning global issues and make concrete commitments and recommendations which are easily understood and measured from year to year as to compliance. The vague nature of decisions reached at l'Aquila this year, together with the complex agenda of each of the major parts of the three-day Summit certainly didn't "grab" anyone outside of the meeting. Media coverage focused on the failure to reach agreement on greenhouse gas emissions, on Berlusconi's personal soap opera, on the criticisms by Kofi Annan and others with regard to not fulfilling aid commitments to Africa and on the lack of any concrete idea of how to move out of the current global financial and economic crisis.
Global Leadership
In the case of Mexico, President Calderon's G5 coordinating role was emphasized by the media in coverage of the G8 Summit. However, other events such as the first ladies audience with the Pope also received coverage. As with the previous G8 Summit last year and the London G20 meeting, there was little coverage of the substance of Mexico's participation or proposals. Bilateral talks with the new President of South Africa and the decision by Brazil and Mexico to issue another condemnation of the coup in Honduras attracted as much media attention as the summit itself. It would be difficult to expect that public opinion could be reassured by the results of the summit as relates to bringing the economic crisis to an end because there were no clear decisions or commitments on how and when to do that.
*This article is unedited.