Global governance fail: National sovereignty stands tall at the G20
Sunday, June 27th, 2010
While we must admire Mr. Corcoran’s optimism, there is reason to fear it may be dashed all too soon – there is always some new war, some new pretext for globalizing treaties waiting around the corner. COP 16 (Mexico) and the Seoul G20 are both scheduled for November this year. Certainly the globalist agenda ius on its heels, and reporting from the Bilderberg group this year affirms this – but as the saying goes, the price of freedom is eternal vigilance. And though the gridlock of the $1.2 billion G20 summit deserves a cheer, our vigilance has been sorely lacking of late.
Related: How will democracy fare under the G20’s new world order? | Blame Canada: How Paul Martin, Larry Summers sketched out G20 new world order | G20 agenda named as “global government” by thinktank, Toronto summit set to sit on hands | Harper calls for global economic governance, lauds G20 as ruling forum | Terence Corcoran: The rise of global statism | For more, see the G20 Coverage page feature
Terence Corcoran, The Financial Post
June 27, 2010
Global governance, one of the drearier hallucinations of statist think tanks and back-room bureaucrats — and the phantasmagorial nightmare of anti-capitalist black-clad ideological crazies — crashed into the great wall of national realities at the G8 and G20 Toronto summits and went up in smoke. But that does not make the Toronto summits a failure. What still stands tall in the world economy and in global politics — as it should — is national sovereignty.
The governance camp will try to scrounge fragments of globalist achievement out of the official verbal and rhetorical shambles generated in the final communiqués and closing comments of the Toronto summit leaders. But there is little in the end that could be reassembled into a coherent statement of collective action. Prime Minister Stephen Harper, host of the summits, tried on Sunday to claim summit unity on the basis that the summits established a “framework” for common cause and policy convergence.
But in fact the Toronto summits represent a near total collapse of efforts to create some kind of overarching centre of global economic power. Despite repeated reference to strong collective commitments to international cooperation, sustainable development and macroeconomic co-ordination, the G8/G20 separately and jointly agreed to go their own ways and avoid collective action as much as possible.
On everything from deficit reduction to climate change, from financial regulation to trade, foreign aid, currencies and Afghanistan, the G20 ultimately marched off in 20 separate directions.
The Group of 20 will adopt deficit- and debt-cutting targets proposed by Prime Minister Stephen Harper but allow governments to attack their fiscal gaps as their own economic dynamics dictate.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper officially greeted leaders of the G20 nations inside a heavily fortified enclave in downtown Toronto at the start of the organization’s summit.
HUNTSVILLE, ONT.— G8 leaders wrapped up their cottage country summit today with some tough words for Iran and North Korea — and a commitment to work with the G20 to stave off another global financial crisis.
Signs of deep rifts over how quickly to cut national deficits were emerging as world leaders gathered in Toronto for summits of the G8 and G20 groups of rich nations today.
There’s little that shouts “seriously rich” as much as a little island in the sun to call your own. For Sir Richard Branson it is Neckar in the Caribbean, the billionaire Barclay brothers prefer Brecqhou in the Channel Islands, while Aristotle Onassis married Jackie Kennedy on Skorpios, his Greek hideway.
The European debt crisis may not be having much effect on Canada’s economy, but it is creating chasms in the Group of 20 that could complicate Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s efforts to forge a united front on how to secure the global recovery.