By Vy Dang, Sven Grimm and Wulf Reiners / Part of the European Development Policy Outlook Series
The EU has been a permanent member of the G20 since the group was founded in 1999, alongside three member states: France, Germany, and Italy (EU3). Additionally, Spain and the Netherlands are regularly invited as guests to the G20 meetings. Strengthening engagement within the G20 has been one of the key priorities in the EU’s multilateral engagement over the past years, as highlighted in the 2024 Joint Communication by the Commission and High Representative for Foreign Affairs.
Since 2021, the EU has shifted towards a more strategic approach to multilateralism, aligning with von der Leyen’s previous agenda of a “geopolitical Commission”. Viewing multilateral cooperation as a means to reach objectives, the EU has departed from the “effective multilateralism” approach previously outlined in the 2003 European Security Strategy, which saw multilateralism as a goal in itself. This shift is expected to intensify during von der Leyen’s second term, as evidenced in her Political Guidelines 2024-2029 and the Mission Letters to the Commissioners, which call for a more assertive EU in pursuing its strategic interests.
Challenges for the EU’s effective engagement in the G20
Similar to other areas of EU external action, the EU faces challenges in effective engagement in the G20 both internally and externally. Internally, coordination is difficult because of the involvement of different institutions and divergent interests among them and/or with member states. The broad G20 agenda cannot always be easily translated into the EU’s division of competencies between the institutions and the member states. Consequently, an informal setting like the G20 puts decision-making in the EU to the test; the absence of legally binding processes and divergent political convictions among the EU3 can lead to incoherent voices.
At the same time, the EU3, with their privileged positions in the G20 club, have an interest in controlling the EU internal coordination, either through their informal meetings before a G20 summit or by dominating the EU coordination with non-G20 EU member states and institutions. Besides that, the G20’s agenda is determined by the rotating presidency and can lead to dynamic discussions. This flexibility sits uneasily with the complexity of consensus-seeking in the EU.
Externally, other G20 members criticise what they perceive as “overrepresentation” by the EU. Indeed, European delegations account for about 25% of the total G20 seats, even if this comes with varying agenda-setting power. Despite being granted full membership, the EU, as a regional organisation and just like the AU that joined in 2023, cannot assume the rotating presidency.
These challenges have led to mixed results in the EU’s influence in the forum, if success is measured by the extent to which the EU influences the commitments adopted by the G20. A positive example was the G20 Rome Leaders’ Declaration on global health governance, which aligned with the EU’s proposals for an international instrument on pandemics before the 2020 and 2021 Summits. However, the EU’s influence in the G20 is much lower on matters that are internally contentious or diverge significantly from other G20 members. For instance, the EU’s efforts to condemn Russia over its war in Ukraine were not successful during the 2022 and 2023 Summits.
Geopolitical shifts and the G20
The EU’s shift to a more strategic approach to multilateralism is a response to geopolitical and economic power shifts. Geopolitical tensions between the United States (US) and China, and diverging views on Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine or the conflict between Israel and Hamas illustrate the struggle over defining international relations. Meanwhile, the inefficiency or dysfunctionality of existing international organisations, including the United Nations (UN) and the World Trade Organisation (WTO), fuel the questioning of existing multilateral solutions.
This “gridlock” in multilateralism has given rise to informal plurilateral settings, such as the G20. These forums are seen and employed by rising global powers as a tool to gain influence in world politics where traditional powers are reluctant to cede policy space. Rather than integrating into the global governance system and its norms, country groups have created new institutions that help project their global agendas. For instance, Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa created BRICS (now expanded to BRICS+), aspire to balance the influence of the G7 as a representation of the voice of the Global South. Other examples include the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), driven by China. The “shadowing” of traditional settings has led to competing institutional landscapes of fragmented global governance.
In line with global power shifts, the G20 has experienced some form of “Southernisation” since 2022 – and prospectively through 2025 – with Indonesia, India, Brazil, and South Africa holding the consecutive presidencies. This sequence of presidencies and the troika system provide the opportunity to prioritise Southern perspectives and development concerns for four consecutive years. India, for its part, called for inclusiveness and better representation of the Global South in international organisations during its G20 Presidency. Consequently, following an approach of “differentiated inclusion” to strike a balance between manageable size, the economic and political weight of members, and global representation, the G20 enlarged permanently in 2023 with the admission of the AU.
Recommendations for the EU’s role in the G20
Amid geopolitical shifts, it is in the EU’s interest to acknowledge and respond to the rise of informal plurilateral fora and navigate the “Southernisation” in world politics through meaningful engagement within the G20. At the same time, as a committed defender of multilateralism itself, the EU should advocate for the G20 to aim towards a rules-based order based on cooperative global governance rather than becoming a parallel structure – and thus preventing further fragmentation of the global governance system.
With the recent admission of the AU, the EU is no longer the sole regional organisation within the G20. This momentum presents an opportunity for the EU (jointly with the AU) to push for elevating the roles of regional actors in the G20. One reform idea is to grant both the EU and AU the right to hold a rotating presidency and host a summit, which would thus enhance internal coordination requirements and agenda-setting capabilities. Such a reform could also facilitate the participation of smaller EU states (through the EU) and African countries (through the AU) and promote inclusivity in the G20. This reform could also serve as a model to include other regional organisations, such as ASEAN, the Association of the Southeast Asian Nations, in the G20.
With a looming Trump 2.0 administration and increasing tensions over China’s industrial subsidies, trade wars may escalate in the next years; the WTO could continue to be dysfunctional; and new trade agreements could become both more difficult and more important at the same time. This situation could prompt the European Parliament’s attempt to have a stronger voice in the G20 discussions on trade-related issues, which would require the EU to carefully consider how to most effectively engage in the G20 and coordinate internally to this end.
The EU’s most likely short-term path is to clearly define its priorities in multilateral cooperation, while acknowledging the importance of the G20. Another pragmatic yet still challenging step forward would be to gradually improve the consistency and unity of its positions in the forum on a case-by-case basis to counter criticism of “overrepresentation” by other G20 members. In any case, the strategy of a concerted EU voice needs to be used wisely. A single EU stance may seem inflexible at times and hinder the ability to adapt in negotiations over contentious issues with non-EU members. Beyond the leader’s summit, it is also important for the EU to seek a form of representation for major engagement groups if the EU wishes to maximise its influence in G20-related processes.
Last, but not least: EU leaders must recognise that increasing their influence on G20 commitments and advancing their collective (and individual) agendas relies on stronger partnerships with rising global powers across a wide spectrum of issue areas. These countries are more assertive and do not always share the EU’s priorities; consequently, joint initiatives require closer permanent interactions. This necessity could prove difficult to reconcile in part with the electoral shift in the EU 2024 elections. The shift to the right and stronger national swings in several EU member states (including amongst the EU3 in the G20) could lead to even more polarised debates on the rationale and necessity of EU (development) cooperation, diminishing the EU’s attractiveness to international partners. The new EU leadership must, therefore, communicate its priorities combined with attractive solutions in light of partner countries’ interests as expressed in the G20 arena, and offer cooperation for implementing global agreements such as the Paris Climate Agreement and the 2030 Agenda.
Vy Dang is Researcher in the Managing Global Governance Programme, Department of Knowledge Cooperation and Training at the German Institute of Development and Sustainability, IDOS (formerly Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik, DIE) in Bonn, Germany.
Sven Grimm is Head of the Department “Knowledge Cooperation and Training” at IDOS.
Wulf Reiners is Head of the Managing Global Governance Programme in the Department “Knowledge Cooperation and Training” at IDOS.
Image: Lula Oficial under a creative commons licence on Wikimedia
This blog post was adapted from a new IDOS publication with contributions on priorities for the next EU leadership: Hackenesch, C., Keijzer, N., & Koch, S. (Eds.). (2024). The European Union’s Global Role in a Changing World: Challenges and Opportunities for the New Leadership (IDOS Discussion Paper 11/2024). Bonn: German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS). https://doi.org/10.23661/idp11.2024. It gives the views of the author, not the position of the EADI Debating Development Blog or the European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes.