Written by Leslie Vinjamuri
Historically, international crises have given new impetus to leaders to reimagine and reinvent world order. In response to the Great Depression of the late 1920s and the 1930s, however, states adopted protectionist measures designed to shield their economies and people. This had devastating, and now well-known, consequences for international relations. In the mid-20th century, the US and the UK drew on the lessons from the Great Depression and two world wars to build an international order that embraced multilateralism as a strategy for fostering democracy, security and economic growth in the West.
Today, leaders from G7 and G20 states are confronted by multiple crises that threaten to unravel this post-1945 order. The COVID-19 pandemic unleashed a global economic and health crisis, and many developing economies still lack adequate access to vaccines or the means to distribute them. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 has compounded the pandemic-induced crisis and has now also created a crisis in energy and food markets that, if not managed carefully, could further undermine human security and political stability worldwide.
It is in this context that G7 leaders convene in Germany in June 2022 to consider their plans for international development assistance, and the US seeks to innovate a partnership for global infrastructure among the G7 countries. All this is unfolding in a world in which the two greatest economic and military powers – the US and China – remain deeply interdependent in economic terms while engaged in an intense competition for influence in the Indo-Pacific, in multilateral institutions and across the developing world.
2022 marks the 75th anniversary of the Marshall Plan, which serves as a reminder that international development assistance can have profound and transformative impacts. The challenge for development assistance today is complex. Across the G7, there is an acute awareness that the benefits of economic success have been unequally distributed, and a growing wariness about the future of US leadership. Meanwhile, the US faces internal division that is undermining its own democracy. The US and its European partners have failed to demonstrate a robust commitment to providing international assistance on the scale that is needed. Concerns about inflation threaten to dampen domestic enthusiasm for development assistance even further. And yet the imperative to act – and to act multilaterally – could not be stronger.
This paper is the first publication in a year-long initiative made possible by the financial assistance of The Rockefeller Foundation. It provides vital context for efforts being made across the G7 to assist governments and societies in the Global South as they confront long-term development challenges in the context of climate change and multiple international crises. The project is underpinned by a recognition that, alongside public leadership and strong partnerships, private capital is essential to mobilizing a global recovery.
