The Hangzhou G-20 Summit is over; it ended with a substantive whimper after more than enough media splashes to fill a swimming pool.
The G-20 or “Group of Twenty” was assembled in 1999 as the successor of multiple efforts to create a mechanism to coordinate international economic policy. The “20” consist of 19 countries and the European Union.
There was and continues to be considerable debate over the composition of the membership, which are supposedly the most economically important countries. Such doesn’t happen to be the case as, except for the most obvious large economies (United States, China, Russia, Germany, U.K., France, India, Japan, South Korea), a number of powerful economies are not represented (Switzerland) and others only through the EU (Netherlands).
There are also several permanent guest invitees, for example, Spain (the 14th largest economy) and major politico-economic actors inter alia the International Monetary Fund, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the United Nations, and the World Trade Organization.
