 | |||||||
| ホーム | 略 歴 | 新政研究会 | サミット | 保守合同 | 論 文 | LSE Forum |  |
２００００７１８
Globalization
and the Role of the Summits
Shinichiro
Uda* * See last page Summits
and Leadership The
Importance of the Summits in the World Governance Development
of the Summits Nation,
Modernization and Globalization My
Proposal to the Current Summit
Summits
and Leadership The
most unique characteristic of the summits is that top leaders of eight influential
countries exchange views face to face and make proposals on what is important to society.
Depending on the leadership of the time, this process offers an opportunity to promote the
peace in the world society as well as to develop political, economic and environmental
policies. At
the G8 summit in Okinawa, for the first time, the so-called information divide will be
addressed in order to correct the gap brought about by the information revolution and to
extend the benefit of such technology more widely. However, conventional issues, such as
security, the world economy, trade issues and development, will also be addressed, and it
appears that the Japanese organizers will emphasize that the Kyushu-Okinawa Summit will
focus on connecting to the lives of “ordinary people,” touching on such health issues
as food safety, HIV/AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis and others, in addition to the issues
relating to aging, children in the workplace, crime, the environment and biotechnology. I
recently had the opportunity to participate in a number of symposiums related to the
upcoming summit, in order to help my own research efforts as a member of the G8 Research
Group. Among the symposiums I attended was the “Okinawa Forum: Asia’s New Openness,”
hosted on June 25 in Naha by the Asahi Shimbun Corp. as a planning session for proposals
to be made at the summit. During the symposium’s second session-“Globalization and the
Asian Economy,” Mr. Yen commented that “the influence of the summit has declined.”
His remarks are perhaps based on the observation that the expansion of the global market
economy has been accelerated by the IT revolution as well as the creation of a network
society that transcends national borders, culminating in a kind of information capitalism. A
foreign participant at a summit-related international symposium on information technology
and development cooperation, held in Tokyo on July 3-4, said that the summit is just an
event and not a system. He evidently has no idea that the summit has developed into a
consolidation of various permanent conferences on important global issues, attended by
different ministers. Having
said all this, we must admit that there are today many conferences where world leaders
meet, compared to 1975, when the first G7 summit was held. For example, with the
integration of Europe since the 1990s, coinciding with the end of the cold war, there has
been increased compatibility of extremely close macroeconomic policies, coordination of
social policy, establishment of a central bank and currency unification, with leaders of
European countries meeting frequently. In
addition, of the 15 countries in Western Europe, 12 have adopted a stance of conducting
government from the philosophy called the “Third Way.” This is defined as social
democracy that takes into consideration social welfare and employment and the like, not
simply adopting a total free-market philosophy. In the U.S., the Democratic Party’s
philosophy is closer to this way of thinking. Therefore, along with U.S. president Bill
Clinton, the western European social democratic leaders have had many opportunities to
meet at international conferences, like the one in 1999 in Florence, Italy. Moreover,
since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1990, world leaders, including those of the U.S. and
Russia, have been meeting frequently, including meetings between leaders of the U.S. and
Russia, and leaders of the U.S. and China. A
more important reason, however, is that the summit is not a “world government,” and
thus the influence it exerts on various international organizations is, at present,
limited.
The Importance of
the Summits in World Governance
Nevertheless,
from the perspective of world governance, I believe that the summit is growing in
importance. First, however, I would like to point out something with regard to the
important potential brought about by the change in quality of the summit, namely that the
nature of the summit has slowly changed along with the times, due to the development of a
global society and the changing nature of national polity. At its base, the summit’s
character is one of an economic summit. Naturally, added to its economic agenda, a number
of other social policy matters, including the perspectives of politics, employment and the
environment, also began to be included as themes. The most important factor above all
else, though, was the participation of Russia once the European cold war had ended. By
thinking about this from positive viewpoints, the leaders of the G8 countries have created
an extremely effective mechanism for maintaining world security if only it functions well. For
example, at the Kyushu-Okinawa Summit, let us propose a joint declaration such as the
following: “We
eight countries will not engage in war with each other. Moreover, if an outbreak of
instability or conflict appears imminent in any region of the world, we will strive to
create stability through a maximum level of cooperation ,including political and economic
measures, within the limits imposed by the basic laws of each of country. This cooperation
shall also be extended in the case of conflicts that, unfortunately, have already arisen.” If such a peace declaration were to be made, it could have a major impact on, for example, the preservation of peace in the Taiwan Straits and on the Korean peninsula, although it also would serve as a general statement applicable to any region in the world.
Development of the
Summits
Let
us take a very general look back at the development of the summit. Up
until 1975, the year of the first economic summit, it was a rare event when leaders of the
world’s most influential countries would meet under one roof. French president Valèry
Giscard d’Estaing, who first proposed the summit, met with Germany’s chancellor Helmut
Schmidt, and was told that Japan should be included in the organization. Thus, with the
inclusion of Japan and Italy along with Britain, the U.S. and France, the summit started
out as a gathering of six nations. Now,
of the summit member countries, those from the European Union comprise over half. Britain
joined the European Community, the predecessor to the European Union, in 1973, only two
years before that first summit. When I had the opportunity to observe the British
Parliament in 1962, British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan was proposing EC membership
for Britain. Then, the national interest of Britain was balanced on three pillars-Europe,
the Commonwealth and the U.S. Just over ten years later, membership in the EC was finally
realized. Around that time, even among the countries of western Europe, it was felt that
close cooperation was necessary, and amid the bi-polarization created by the cold war
there existed the idea of wanting to coordinate global issues together with the U.S., the
top leader. With regard to the military, the U.S. presence of the U.S. was prominent in
all facets, including NATO. Therefore, in security and military terms, the summit, which
centred on the UN and regional security structures, generated leadership from the top
countries on world economic issues. For that reason, Japan’s presence could not be
ignored, as it was in a period of high economic growth and had successfully navigated its
way through the first oil crisis. In
this context, in the 1970s, the so-called era of the economic summit, a number of
international news-making annoncements were made. These included news that the seven
countries of the summit, which by now included Canada, had established an international
currency regime. The U.S., Japan and Germany were now engines of growth with determined
growth rate targets. Furthermore, an agreement was reached to conclude the Tokyo Round of
multilateral trade liberalization successfully, and agreements were reached regarding
targets for energy consumption and import quantity at the time of the second oil crisis. With
the invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union in 1979, and since the beginning of the
1980s, along with the conventional economic issues, political issues also began to be
taken up at the summits. The tense relations that marked the cold war era, such as
anti-Soviet declarations, security partnership declarations, democratic declarations,
human rights issues and détente, among others, were in evidence at summit meetings.
After the conclusion of the cold war, around the time that Russia started attending the
summit meetings as an observer nation, the issue of Japan’s northern territories was
being debated. In addition, the issue of the world’s north and south hemispheres started
to be taken up at the summit meetings, which then led to the issue of cumulative debts and
debt relief for heavily indebted developing countries. In
addition to security issues and global political and economic issues, we now see that the
summit also has come to cover most other major problems that greatly affect the internal
policies of all countries, such as non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, disarmament,
ethnic issues, Kosovo, the safety of nuclear power, employment measures, reform of
international organizations, reduction of greenhouse gases, global environment,
international financial systems, economic structural policies and education. Hence, many
issues regarding globalization have been discussed before or after their actual
occurrence. Nation,
Modernization and Globalization
It goes without saying that globalization is having a large impact on the formation, development and changes of nations. So, what happens when we consider this matter from a viewpoint of each nation? If
we look at the history of modernization, we can conclude that events and phenomena that
occur in a country are greatly influenced by various conditions regarding that country’s
specific history, economy, society and culture. However, at the same time those aspects
are rising & diminishing in a larger context through the formation of comprehensive
global society. This distinguishing feature of modernization was described in my article
titled “A Study on the Internationalism of Nations,” written in 1958. Now if we
replace the term “formation of a comprehensive global society” with “globalization”
and look back the situation of Japan after the 19th century, we find that Japan has faced
challenges in three different phases. The first phase was the Meiji Restoration in the
middle of the 19th century, during which Japan had no choice but to rush into
modernization in order to maintain its independence against the overwhelming western
powers. It was then that an unprecedented event in the world history took place. Only a
several years after the construction of the Suez Canal, approximately 100 Japanese
delegates including
almost half of the influential cabinet misters were
sent, in an observation trip to the U.S. and Europe for three years; on their way back,
they travelled to Asian countries via the Suez Canal. Having studied the western
civilization and even meeting the president of the U.S. and Queen Victoria of the United
Kingdom, these delegates were deeply impressed with Anglo-Saxon-style civilization. Up to
that point, they took the same course as the Japanese modern philosopher Yukichi Fukuzawa.
However, when the delegates met Germany’s Otto von Bismarck, they concluded that
becoming “wealthy and militarily powerful” as well as a becoming “bureaucratic
nation” would be the only solution for Japan to catch up with these more advanced
nations. This philosophy drove the fundamental policies for Japan and remained the driving
force until its 1945 defeat at the end of the Second World War. In fact, Japan was able to
resist invasion by western countries because this national objective had penetrated,
although, in the end, it had led Japan into a military dictatorship and eventual defeat.
Even at present, we still see that some countries believe that “development and
dictatorship” are more advantageous than being a “democratic nation” for their
evolution into a modern country. The
second challenge for globalization began when Japan moved forward onto the path to
becoming a “democratic nation” after the defeat in the war. Although the military
clique had diminished, a bureaucratic system remained and, in a way, supported the
restoration and high growth of Japan. However, at present, the system itself is suffering
from system fatigue. Elements in the public and private sectors are out of balance, and
Japan is leaning more toward the public sector than are other advanced countries, leaning
so far as to lead Mikhail Gorbachev to comment that even with the collapse of the Soviet
Union, the ideal of communism still remains in Japan, exaggerated though it may be. Although
such remnants of the past fetter Japan, the country is now facing the third and genuine
challenge of globalization?in
which the information technology revolution accelerates the drive toward a boarder-free
society, global market, changing sovereignty and other changes affecting lifestyles,
deregulation and global standardization. This challenge presents a global shift from
development and dictatorship to respect for human rights, and a political revolution of
conversion to democracy-that is, the process of a full-scale formation of a comprehensive
global society. Now at the end of the 20th century, the entire world faces the issue of
globalization, but in case of Japan, its formation as modern nation in itself has been a
challenge for globalization. I
have taken the situation of Japan as an example because most of the world’s 190
countries have had more or less similar experiences, although depending on varying
conditions, there may be a time or cultural lag to a certain extent. To be more specific,
some countries face a similar situation to Japan’s three globalization challenges.
Globalization
and the Summits
Without
the presence of a world government or a world central bank, at the G8 summit the leaders
must discuss issues that are contemporary and common to all human beings, such as
political systems and economic management. They must also address the issues that reflect
the needs of nations in the process of developing and modernizing. Meanwhile,
the process of globalization might produce various confederations such as cities (so
called city-nations), world enterprises and non-governmental organizations affected by the
border-less market, networking society or “information capitalism.” On the other hand,
there is a tendency in some parts of the world toward the devolution of localism,
especially culturally. In other words, a nation-state may be too small to solve world-wide
problems by itself and too big for local devolution. Nevertheless, until the advent of a
world government, it is up to the nation-state to find an effective solution to the
problems inherent in the various stages of globalization. One
possible solution to the global problems is to achieve a level of regional cooperation,
confederation or integration among nation-states. For example, the broadcasting industry,
with which I am most familiar, has a regional broadcasting union that tackles
international issues and coordinates international interests, first at regional level and
then internationally. Developing
a regional union of nations such as the European Union is surely one method for solving
various problems related to the process of globalization. In the case of EU, the highest
per-capita gross domestic product per capita may be two times greater than the lowest,
whereas in Asia it may be has great as 18 times. In addition, with exception of country
such as Yugoslavia, Europe has a similar culture and religion , while Asia has much more
varied cultures and religions. Therefore, it has been said that it will be some time
before Asian integration similar to the EU could be achieved. However, recently in Asia
there are indications of a more consolidated regional cooperation. The ASEAN countries,
following the proposed AFTA (ASEAN Free Trade Agreement), are to eliminate tariffs within
the region by 2018, with six countries in particular committed to doing so even earlier. A
framework now exists with regional agreements represented by AFTA and with bilateral
agreements including Japan. The recent Asian crises had an impact on Asian nations to
render more regional cooperation. A currency basket including the dollar, yen and euro is
now under consideration as a way to reflect the foreign exchange system that existed
before the crisis-de facto pegged to the U.S. dollar-and that resulted in destabilization
of trade and excessive capital inflows. The Manila Framework has already established an
intra-regional surveillance mechanism as a way to prevent another currency crisis. In
May this year, the framework of the ASEAN + Three (Japan, China and Korea) included an
agreement on the Chiang Mai Initiative. This provides for the conclusion of bilateral
currency swaps and repurchase agreements among the member countries, and will strengthen
self-help and support mechanisms in the region. The
G8 summit should take the initiative that integrating regional nation-states into
confederations and seeking regional nation agreements constitute positive and constructive
ways to facilitate globalization, preventing the evils of globalization, not to mention
the type of economic blocs that led to world war. International
organizations such as the United Nations including those specialized ones such as the
World Bank, International Monetary Fund, the International Settlement Bank, World Trade
Organization, United Nations Development Programme, and so on, also provide effective
solutions. However, a sufficient system has not yet been established in order for those
organizations to communicate and cooperate among themselves for the purpose of solving
problems. For instance, although the World Forum, a communication liaison secretariat of
financial organizations, was established after the Asian economic crisis in 1997, it is
not an effective or comprehensive organization. Countries
participating in the summit can wield a great deal of influence over such organizations.
Half of the G8 countries are permanent members of the United Nations Security Council.
Votes by the G7 countries are crucial enough on decision-making at organizations like the
IMF. When full-scale structural or functional changes are attempted in international
organizations, G8 countries have the most significant impact. In other words, the G7/G8
are at their most influential and effective when they address critical issues including
globalization of society, economy, politics, securities and global environment. As
for the issue of regional security, although NATO initiated the air attack on Kosovo
without the approval of the United Nations, it was the G8’s foreign ministers conference
that politically settled that attack in the end. Professor James Mayall, now at Cambridge
University (and who, several years ago, participated in a forum named “Ethnic Conflicts
and the Crisis of the United Nations” co-sponsored by the LSE Forum and the Japan
Institute of International Affairs), recently visited Japan to attend the symposium under
the sponsorship of the Japan Foundation titled “Perspectives of the 21st Century: Beyond
the Century of Confrontation” held on June 26th and 27th. In his opinion, the fact that
the air attack was made without UN approval was a negative factor for the UN’s
authority. I believe, however, that it showed the capability of G8 countries to solve
conflicts. Thus
we should not underestimate the influence of the summit. Rather, is it not better to take
a more constructive stance and use it for the development of peace process in regional
communities? Besides, now we have the G20 Conference of the Ministers of Finance in
addition to the G7/G8 Conference of the Ministers of Finance and Conference of Central
Bank Presidents. Furthermore, the summit has other supporting conferences of ministers who
are responsible for different fields, such as environment, education, employment and
international terrorism, and so on. We can see that summits now address topics related to
different phases of globalization. Therefore, the summit must play an consolidating role
at every phase of the process of globalization. The summit must itself serve as an
effective leader of the world and take responsibility for the world governance, with
member countries keeping a higher level of compliance-the degree of achievement for what
they declared at the each summit. Otherwise, the co-existence of nations in the global
society cannot be achieved. If effective, however, each nation will also comply to a
higher degree higher to the decisions made at the summit.
My
Proposal to the Current Summit
As
one of the citizens of the host country for the Okinawa summit, I would like to focus on
three objectives that I truly wish to see realized. I have limited myself to only three in
order to focus on the issues that are not yet fully under discussion. 1.The
first objective I would like to see realized at the Okinawa summit is the declaration of
world peace and security that I mentioned above. Ideally, one more clause should be added:
“We G8 countries will not sell arms to other countries.” This may, however, be
stretching too far. 2. Reflecting on the Asian crisis, the G7 finance
ministers submitted a report for the Köln summit last year called “Strengthening
the International Financial Architecture” that addressed such issues as monitoring
capital flows and providing international liquidity. At this year’s conference on July
8, the finance ministers drafted a proposal for sustainable world economic growth taking
information technology as its principal theme, and also stressing IMF reform and welcoming
the regional currency agreement on crisis prevention. This is the right direction and
should lead to an improved response by international economic organizations at the time of
crisis. The G8 countries should take a step back from that declaration and drive more
organizational reform so that decisions agreed upon by international economic
organizations will function effectively.
With
regard to the ordinary current balance crisis, macroeconomic belt-tightening and “supply-side
structural adjustments” were appropriate countermeasures. Hence, as we saw in Germany,
France and England in 1950s and 1960s, it was a conventional practice for economic
organizations to demand a strict tightening policy in return for financial supports.
Because the Asian crises occurred when other global financial activities were overwhelming
the real economy, the following measures as reported by Asian Development Business
Institute were required in the first phase in order to avoid the international liquidity
crisis: 1) emergency funding, 2) compulsory rollover of short-term foreign private debt,
3) correction of excessive under-valuation and 4) coordinated demand expansion. Next, in
the domestic context, the following policies must be tentatively implemented if necessary:
1) relaxed monetary policy and financial consolidation, 2) unlimited and unconditional
provision of domestic liquidity, 3) classifying banks into two categories (“banks that
can survive” and “banks that cannot survive”) with the mandatory condition to
restructure in future and to carry out compulsory bank re-capitalization to those survivor
banks, 4) temporary suspension of capital adequacy standards, and 5) providing credits
through non-market channels. Having implemented such strategies, management of moral
hazard and liabilities should be pursued, followed by full-scale restructuring policies.
3.Lastly
is information and communications technology. I once made presentation on the
standardization of the three systems of broadcasting (PAL, NTSC and SECAM). I was one of
two guest speakers at an international conference called “Telecommunication, Information
Development and Economics,” held by Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the 1980s.
On that occasion, I invited delegates to see the demonstration of high definition
television which could become standardized system of color television. Delegates
appreciated the system but even now the tandardization was not yet accomplished. This
experience should be reflected to the standardization of IT in the future. When
we think about the cooperation towards developing countries in the field of IT, there are
strategies that donating countries and international organizations could carry out so as
to enable people of all social classes to easily enjoy the benefits of IT. A symposium
called “IT and Development Cooperation” was held in Tokyo on July 3-4 in the lead-up
to the Okinawa summit, where two critical issues were discussed. The first point is
disparity among the levels of information technology in the world. It is well known that
the levels of IT development in developing countries are far from equal to those of
advanced countries. According to the International Telecommunications Union, 96% of
Internet Host computers are located in the countries with high per-capita earning income.
For instance, there are more computers in Finland than in all the Latin American
countries. In addition to such disparity in hardware, there is also a difference in people’s
learning abilities of non-native languages. We hear the word “information divide” so
often, and we need to develop hardware that will prevent the information divide from
widening the literacy gap. We can find a solution to the information divide if we work on
hardware development. For example, developing a program similar to “Tron method”
together with advanced software capable of immediately translating the original language,
whether it is English or not, into another language is one way to preserve local culture.
This system was in development in Japan during 1980s, when Japan enjoyed an overwhelming
share of semiconductor production. However, when U.S. demands restricted production,
development of the Tron method was also suspended. Nonetheless, this method still remains
valid, so developing hardware such as this will enable us all to enjoy a global Internet
society while sustaining cultural values specific to each nation. Furthermore, it will
also bring forth IT benefits to business practices without widening the gap between those
who have and those who have not. Apart from the IT expansion by means of a free
competitive market in relation to international aids for IT development, the use of
hardware that preserves local languages should be a world-scale objective, because IT is
an international public property.
The next issue is that of the “digital divide,” which is spreading even among advanced
nations. As I mentioned above, standardizing the three broadcasting systems, for example,
has been difficult. As digitization advances, we should aim for an integrated
multi-faceted system. This would include developing a generic system combining
broadcasting, communication, computers, the Internet, and databases, as well as the cable,
ground and satellite lines necessary for the system. Standardization of the modes for
mobile phones and decreased telephone connection fees will facilitate user-friendly
utilization of e-commerce (business to business, business to consumer), the Internet and
databases. With
the digital integration of broadcasting, telecommunication and computer systems, there
will likely be more public sector organizations, think-tanks, research organizations and
universities, as well as more effective policy-building and increased intellectual
creativity and, in the private sector, innovations in production systems and technology in
addition to management and marketing. Furthermore, in both the public and private sectors,
technology can be used to collect information on a global scale, and, of course, it can be
useful for human resource development. Throughout
all these efforts, we must make an effort to standardize to avoid widening the digital
divide, paying attention to maintaining efficient market competition. The G8 countries
must enact domestic laws that combine communication and broadcasting as well as
international coordination. There should be some kind of joint council of those
responsible for these areas in the G8 countries and a specialized international
organization to coordinate legal provisions and create a reasonable international system. In
addition, there are many more issues rising to the surface, including the coordination of
macroeconomic policy, economic cooperation, trade issues at the World Trade Organization,
environmental issues, property rights and patent issues such as World Intellectual
Property Organization, all of which require G8 initiatives to find effective solutions and
which should be prioritized at the summit. Strong leadership is required for various
international organizations such as the United Nations. To
sum up, we are now in the end of the 20th century, and the entire world is facing the
ongoing challenge of globalization. The Okinawa summit must show strong leadership for the
process of globalization to be successfully completed. In terms of world governance, the
G8 summit is the most effective framework we have for global co-existence. Last,
but not least, this year marks the end of the 20th century. Some say this has been a
century of confrontation, conflict and war. Beyond the century of confrontation, it is my
desire that the 21st century will be one of hope. I hope the leaders of the eight
countries, in their collective will, will make the 21st century peaceful and prosperous,
and we will achieve the coexistence of human beings, enjoying interdependence and
cooperation, as well as harmony with their global environment. If the G8 leaders could
express a declaration such as the peace declaration that I suggested above, I believe it
will be the most powerful message to the 21st century from the 20th. * l President,
LSE International Social Economic Forum in Japan l President,
the Institute for the Promotion of Policy Reform l Honorary
associate, LSE Asia Research Centre ( former Visiting Fellow) l Member,
the Royal Institute for International Affairs(UK) l Member,
Japan Association for Planning Administration l Special
Member , Japan Centre for Economic Research l Formerly
controller, President Office, Japan Broadcasting Corporation(NHK) Essays
of late : *Where is Japan’s economy really going?---presented during the turmoil of
Japanese financial circles in the * An
effort for History Formation March 2000 Copyright(C) 1993-2004 Uda Shinichiro. All Rights Reserved. |