Excerpt

CIGI works on a very different set of frontlines than Oxfam International – or indeed that focused on by your other keynote presenter, Jim O’Neil (Head of Global Economics, Commodities and Strategy Research) at Goldman Sachs. Our pivotal concern is in the rule making structures of international institutions, how they work and how they could work better. I have just come back from the L’Aquila G8, a club which is under increasing stress because of its perceived double gap in legitimacy and efficiency. Jim O’Neil has highlighted one serious challenger to the established order, the rise of the BRICs. In doing so, he emphasises the factors which allow these countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China), big markets, big growth, big flows of investment and big potential for a continuation of these trends. But diplomacy is subordinated to economics in this analysis.