Talks can drive economics evolution
Gatherings ol leaders such as the (120 summit are needed to patiently work toward global progress and revival
Top officials of the worldls largest economies will meet in China on Sept 4-6 in what is colled the G20 leaders Summit.
What is the use of such a summit, onlookers may wonder. Amid the lingering aftermath of the 2008 global financial ciisis. indeed what is the use of any occasion for politicians to keep talking about the need for doing something but not coming up with a shared agenda, even less a collective action plan?
'Iiiere is some use for sudi a summit, as China may point out.
Now that it is eight years since the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the Wall Street meltdown, it is not difficult to tell, in retrospect, what all the globalist talk shops — from the G20 to international business seminars
of various levels — have helped the world to at least avoid.
It is important that, so far, governments that represent more than 80 percent of the world's economic power have kept working to prevent a major setback in international business, or a full-scale trade war.
There seems to have been an agreement on a bottom line, or on a few dangerous things that politicians should avoid doing, such as excessive measures in competition and in trade protection.
All this is far from enough, admittedly, to help the world escape the shadow of the 2008 global financial crisis. As the radical critics — from both left and right — would argue, the world economic pattern up to now still carries all the limitations of neoliberalism, an old ideological framework that has lost much of its luster.
But the question is: Now that a recovery has proved so slow and painful, should politicians just toss away their bottom line?
With so many people — middle
class in the developed nations and the poor in developing nations — feeling bitter about the performance of neoliberal economics, should the world beat a retreat?
should the definition of economics be rewritten from trade-based prosperity into something else — say a game for politically protected small circles?
Should people who have not benefited from the global market system, especially those in the underdeveloped corners of the world, give up their hope for opportunities from expanding business ties overseas?
The annual U20 summit provides an important occasion for people around the world to check on the attitude of the key political leaders, and to find out what, if anything, they can do together in whatever can be called progress.
For this purpose, China is likely to make a contribution this year by pledging more efforts in mitigating climate change.
However, it will take some time to develop a replacement for the
economics that did not seem to do a good job. More often than not, changing a basic idea is more difficult than rebuilding a government.
In practice, for a new brand of economics to start to work, such as to involve more people in the poor countries today in the global business game, it will take many governments to build new functions —just as what the Chinese government is trying to do in what it calls a transition to the new normal.
'Filings to be covered by the would-be replacement economics would include:
•  More collaboration between public mid private investors;
•  More channels for the financial business to serve the real economy and common people, to avoid creating a small Independent class of financial capital out of touch with the rest of society;
•  More cities with affordable housing and accommodating services;
• More countries ready to receive foreign investment and to produce
for the world market - with effective rule of law and a capable government;
•  More policy-based measures to avoid internal inequality, especially in education, medical care and social security;
•  A more effective global gover-nunce system in far trade and anti-corruption.
For the foreseeable future, all world leaders and all who want to be world-class leaders will have to keep sharing their views and comparing their notes about these, at the G20 and all similar occasions, before they can grow from ideas into realities.
That may not sound like a very effective solution, certiiinly not a quick solution.
But, what kind of politics am the world expect to help it walk out of the shadow of the last financial crisis — and the danger of repeated ones?
Vie author is cditar-at-large of China Daily. Contact the writer at cdzhang@chiiKnlaily.com.cn