Coming from anyone else, an invitation for Australia to participate in the G7 meeting would be seen as a tremendous compliment.
The G7 is the big league, the first grade, the game that matters. To be offered a guernsey in that company is an offer no politician could refuse.
And Scott Morrison is not about to refuse it, even though the invitation comes from Donald Trump – the world leader who is leading his own nation into something close to civil war and the entire globe into unpredictable division.
Being seen as a protégé of Trump is a problem in itself, but it is compounded by the glance down the rest of the guest list. Bringing in India and South Korea area is fine, but the re-inclusion of Russia is still unacceptable.
Russia was tossed out over its invasion of The Ukraine, and at least two of the current G7 – Britain and Canada – have made it clear that it is still due for more time in the sin bin. Which once again brings up the question: what is the G7 actually about?
Russia remains a military superpower and a big economic mover and shaker. Its status as an international heavy hitter cannot be questioned. But it is not a team player, an observer of global rule and convention. It is, in short, not a democracy, and does not aspire to become one under its present leader, Vladimir Putin.
Thus placing it on the same dance card as Australia takes some of he gloss off Trump’s move. This will not and should not deter Morrison from accepting his chance, And come September, it will presumably become apparent whether Australia’s membership of the group will be confirmed as permanent.
If so, it will complete the journey begun by Kevin Rudd. who was one of the reformists who expanded the then G8 into the G20, in which Australia also became a member. The G20 has not lived up to its promise as a more inclusive and influential international forum, but it broke the grip of the old guard, who had effectively run the place for some fifty years.
And should Australia breach the inner sanctum of the G7 as well, Rudd should receive some of the credit. His rescue of the local economy from the Global Financial Crisis, in which Australia avoided recession as the rest of the world floundered, was seen and applauded by the other industrialised nations.
In this context, there will be a certain irony if Morrison collects the trophy. Whatever his virtues, he will be forever remembered as the leader who led his country into recession after an extraordinary three decades of economic growth.
But whatever caveats we may have about both The Donald and ScoMo, the G7 is the place to be. It is not quite a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council but it is just about the next best thing. So let’s regard the invitation as a compliment – not to either of the two transient political leaders, but to some 30 years of success, some serious good management and some good fortune – the lucky country.
Mungo MacCallum is a veteran political journalist and commentator. His books include Run Johnny Run, Poll Dancing, and Punch and Judy.
mungomccallum@staging-johnmenadue.kinsta.cloud
Comments
9 responses to “The G7 and Trump’s protege”
All the comments on this piece by Mungo speak for me. A minor but important request I would make to Mungo is, please, do not refer to Morrison by his own preferred tag, Scomo. He flaunts this to promote his image as a good bloke, daggy dad, ordinary Aussie, which of course is a confection, a ruse to conceal the ruthless, schemer we have as PM.
I find it hard to believe that Mungo wrote this piece.
I was equally incredulous about his encomium last week.
I agree with Hal & Bill below for the reasons that they cite.
If SmoKo had any integrity or smarts he would refuse this tainted ticket.
Which means, of course, that he will not.
Considering that after the State Dept coup that ousted the (acknowledged incompetent) sitting President, the two areas closest to Russia refused to admit the acknowledged fascists who had overthrown him were their legitimate leaders, they basically seceded.
For months after that we were regaled on TV with shots of the Ukrainian army on their way up to these areas, the Donbass and thus civil war broke out. To say that Russia invaded the Donbass is absurd as the people of the Donbass used weapons that had been stored by the old Warsaw Pact within disused mines that were to be used in the event of an attack by the West on Russia (their second layer of defence, the first being the 600,000 troops stationed in East Germany and Poland prior to the breakup of the Soviet Union). The only mention I have ever seen from the West that Russia assisted the peoples of the Donbass militarily have come from sources that could only be classed as highly suspect such as the State Dept and media organisations with a deep connection to the West’s security apparatus and thus have to be dismissed as propaganda.
In fact Russia, to the Donbass’ dismay, refused to be drawn into this conflict, seeing perhaps that it was a trap by the West to use as an excuse to attack them. And as for the Crimea – an area which Catherine the Great had bought from the Turkish Khan back in 1783 and had built up to the extent that their descendants voted by a huge majority to remain in the (OSCE reported) fair election of 2014, the people of that area remain happily within the Russian Federation.
And let us not forget the backlash in the Odessa region at the same time to the rise of the Western (Lviv based) fascists which resulted in many people being burnt alive by these fascists in the Odessa Trades Hall while the West remained mute.
Not an invasion, more like a response to hostile actions against them I would have thought.
And irony of irony, ‘Uncle’ Joe Biden, who admitted influencing Ukrainian politics in a presentation to the Council of Foreign Relations and who assisted in gaining corrupt influence for his son in the Ukrainian gas market is the best option for the US Presidency while Trump, a disaster if I’ve ever seen one, was attacked relentlessly for doing the same without a scintilla of evidence to back it up. What a pack of hypocrites we are!
The inclusion or exclusion of certain countries from international clubs is in its very nature political rather than based on some kind of moral superiority. In so far as membership in the G7, G20 (or the UN for this matter) should depend on being a “team player, an observer of global rule and convention” one wonders which country should qualify, given the long list of internal and external, minor or major, violations of human rights, even crimes against humanity. In global terms, every country which possesses nuclear weapons is endangering life on Earth. Just about all nations are involved in destroying the life support system of the planet by continuing to emit massive amounts of greenhouse gases.
All sorts of people mention 29 years of economic growth as though it is an incontestable good when accompanied with it have been precarious work conditions and casualisation, growing inequality, decline of public services, corruption and profiteering, and avoidance of key social and economic issues such as climate change, education and indigenous reconciliation.
Are these the costs of such an alleged economic feat, or could things have been managed much better than benefits for the few?
Without China it’s a fantasy big league. It’s time we went back to a saner time when we dealt with the world as it is and treated countries as having the right to be who they are. If we don’t do that we rot (or get a j9b at the ABC or Fairfax or News).
It’s also disgraceful to contemplate going to Barnum and Trump’s Circus in the closing stages of an American election campaign. We should stop saying Morrison will go and urge Morrison not to go. When sane people are in charge in the United States they will be pleased. There is a principle democratic countries stick to, stay away during elections.
It is questionable whether such clubs/leagues would even have on their agendas the two major issues humanity is facing, namely the catastrophic deterioration in the Earth’s climate (https://www.audible.com.au/pd/The-Uninhabitable-Earth-Audiobook/0241399564?source_code=M2MOR1341126180055&ipRedirectOverride=true&source_code=M2MOR131091619005N&ds_rl=1252391&gclid=Cj0KCQjwoPL2BRDxARIsAEMm9y8Dv6C1Uz7rCTrcQEbOcHbg4XiqiC5N68rCJUF1pFiVFgffOOBVt_YaApvkEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds ) and the 14,000 nuclear missiles global suicide system, much of it on alert (https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/Nuclearweaponswhohaswhat), both factors capable of eliminating most forms of life, including humans.
More likely the discussions may hinge on military alliances.
Mungo, every criticism you level at Russia can be equally levelled at the US Empire and it’s antipodean poodle – or for that matter at Britain or France. Principle has nothing to do with it.
Extraordinary! Russia invaded Ukraine. Really?
“But it (Russia) is not a team player, an observer of global rule and convention.” And the US is?
If the event is held, and if Australia is invited, of course ScoMo will go. Of course he will.