The G7 is a club of Western nations (with Japan given that status as an ally of the West and a major economy) that have dominated the world and its institutions, in some cases for centuries, and retain the ambition to maintain that position by policy coordination amongst themselves and by co-opting rising powers, including India, given the shifts in global power in recent decades.
The G7 recognised that they could not manage the 2008 financial crisis on their own and needed a wider international partnership, but one under their aegis. With this in mind, the G20 forum hitherto at the finance minister level was raised to the summit level. The G20 agenda is, however, shifting increasingly towards the interests and priorities of the developing countries (now being referred to as the Global South). During India’s G20 presidency, with India holding the Voice of the Global South summits before presiding over the G20 and at the conclusion of its work, and with the inclusion of the African Union as a G20 permanent member at India’s initiative, the pro-Global South content of the G20 agenda has got consolidated.
The functioning of the G20, already under strain because of the collapse of G7 ties with Russia as well as the challenges from China, will become increasingly difficult because global geopolitical divisions have become even sharper. Finding common ground in the G20 between the G7 on the one hand, and Russia and China on the other, will not be easy. The other G20 members have major stakes in both “camps” and are unwilling to take sides for reasons of national interest and geopolitical strategy. This is just as well because otherwise, the G20 will get divided into two blocs and become dysfunctional much like the UN Security Council. It is the Global South members of the G20, unaffiliated to either of the two antagonist parties, that can still help preserve the geopolitical rationale and utility of the G20.
Both the G7 and the G20, however, face challenges from other platforms for consensus-building on global issues. BRICS, a group of non-Western countries, is getting expanded to resist the hegemony of the West that is still expressing itself in the form of sanctions, the weaponising of finance, regime change policies and double standards in addressing issues of democracy and human rights etc. An expanded BRICS will rival both the G7 and the G20 as a platform for promoting multipolarity, a greater role of developing countries in global governance, more equity in international relations, and introducing much-needed reforms in the international system.
It is in this general background that Prime Minister Modi participated in the recent G7 summit. It was important that he did so even though the event was taking place soon after the national elections in India in which, contrary to expectations, the BJP failed to get a majority of its own, unlike in 2014 and 2019. To counter the impression that he had been politically weakened, Modi needed to affirm at the international level that he had obtained a massive democratic mandate to govern and that it would be business as usual. He needed to exude a sense of confidence and self-assurance, and use the occasion to highlight some policy priorities of his government. The opportunity to interact with the leaders of the principal Western countries and Japan could obviously not be missed, especially as India has major equities in the G7 countries, whether political, economic, defence-related, technology-centred, diasporic and so on.
Modi’s reduced electoral mandate obviously has domestic political implications but is not very material in the context of participation in international meetings like the G7. Almost all the G7 leaders have seen a major erosion of their domestic political base and public image, be it Biden (may not win in the election this year and appears to have cognitive problems), Macron (low in polls and highly contested politically at home), Kishida (plagued by party scandals), Sunak (widely expected to be out of power after the elections in July), Trudeau (in minority and dependent on the NDP for political survival) or Scholz (heads a coalition government and is viewed as weak). Meloni too heads a coalition government. Compared to them Modi, having won a rare third term in a democracy and in power for another five years, appears much better positioned.
It does not diminish India’s or Modi’s stature to be invited to G7 summits as part of the outreach programme of the group, contrary to some sundry comments. India too has used its presidency, be it of BRICS or G20 to invite non-members as part of its own outreach diplomacy. Good and growing relations with most G7 countries are vital for India’s rise as a power. But India has to be aware of the limits to the India-G7 relationship, and the need to balance this relationship with our other ties.
All G7 countries are either NATO members or military allies. The G7 is becoming a vehicle for promoting Cold War-type geopolitics, as is attested by the paragraphs on Russia and the Ukraine conflict in the summit document. As a collective, it is not credible as an instrument of major reform of the international system or of multipolarity (though we cooperate with Japan and Germany for an expansion of the permanent membership of the UN Security Council, and countries like France support a multipolar world). Some of these G7 countries shelter anti-Indian elements, attack us on democracy and human rights issues, and their press, think tanks, academics and civil society are generally antagonistic towards us.
Modi used the G7 platform to, first of all, address indirectly the rampant criticism in G7 countries about the backsliding of democracy in India under his leadership. He highlighted to his interlocutors the enormous scale of the democratic exercise that has returned him to power: “More than 2,600 political parties, more than one million polling booths, more than five million Electronic Voting Machines, 15 million polling staff, and about 970 million voters, out of which 640 million people exercised their franchise.”
Modi refuted indirectly domestic doubts about EVM manipulation by pointing out that the entire electoral process was made fair and transparent by the ubiquitous use of technology, and that the results of such a large election were also declared within a few hours. He called it “the biggest festival of democracy in the world and the biggest in the history of humanity”. He was not deterred from calling it “a living example of our ancient values as the mother of democracy”.
Refuting any impression that the electoral results were a setback for him, Modi said that he was “fortunate that the people of India have given me the opportunity to serve them for the third consecutive time”, and that “this has happened for the first time in India in the last six decades” and that “this historic victory is a victory of democracy. It is a victory of the entire democratic world”. He communicated a sense of triumph, rather than conveying any sense of being politically weakened.
At the outreach G7 meeting, Modi chose to focus on the transformative impact of technologies on human society. He called for ensuring collectively that the benefits of technology reached all sections of society, and that monopoly in technology was converted into mass usage. India, he said, was striving for a better future through its human-centric approach. It was among the first few countries to formulate a National Strategy on Artificial Intelligence. As a founding member and lead chair of the Global Partnership for AI, India was promoting cooperation among all countries.
The other theme of importance for discussion at the G7 summit being energy, Modi noted that India was the first country to fulfil before time all the commitments made under COP. To usher in a Green Era, India, he said, had started Mission LiFE i.e. Lifestyle For Environment, of which a campaign to make tree plantation a mass movement: “Ek Ped Maa Ke Naam” (One Tree in Mother’s Name) was a part.
Finally, he reiterated the resolve to build a developed India by 2047, with no section of the society left behind in the country’s development journey. Harking back to India’s G20 presidency, he recalled that the countries of the Global South were bearing the brunt of global uncertainties and tensions, and that India had considered it its responsibility to place the priorities and concerns of the countries of the Global South on the world stage. A high priority to Africa was being given in these efforts (African issues have been extensively covered in the G7 summit document). Modi expressed his intention to continue dialogue and cooperation with the G7 on all the issues mentioned in his address.
All in all, Modi’s participation in the G7 summit sent the message that his plans and ambitions for India had not been affected by the election results and that he remained firmly in charge.
Kanwal Sibal is a former Indian Foreign Secretary. He was India’s Ambassador to Turkey, Egypt, France and Russia. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect News18’s views.