MADRID — The world financial crisis has served as a quick and efficient catalyst for the Group of 20 economies. The first three G20 summits of chiefs of state — in Washington, London and Pittsburgh — will be remembered for advancing multilateralism and coordinated global action.
Yet, the G20 remains very much a work in progress and one that needs much work to succeed, as its most recent summit in Toronto demonstrated.
The G20 summit in Washington in 2008 was the first at which the member countries' chiefs of state had met since the group's creation in 1997. The G8 was no longer an appropriate vehicle for global economic governance, given the need to stabilize financial markets around the world. The voices of countries such as China, India and Brazil had to be heard if a coordinated response to the crisis was to be found.