Impact case study database
Shaping global summits
1. Summary of the impact
Dobson’s research on global summitry has shaped the agendas, statements, commitments and functioning of the annual Group of 7 (G7) and Group of 20 (G20) summits since 2018. These impacts can be seen across the three G7 summits chaired by Canada, France, and the US, and one G20 summit chaired by Saudi Arabia. The pathway to this impact is through his participation in formal engagement groups, the Think 7 (T7) and Think 20 (T20), established to act as ‘ideas banks’. Dobson’s research has enhanced the G7’s commitment to its shared values of freedom, democracy and the rule of law. G7 and G20 members have also demonstrated increased compliance with commitments on gender issues.
2. Underpinning research
In a world where global political structures are in flux, the roles of the G7 and G20, and how we understand them, have emerged as key subjects of enquiry. Both have sought to address some of the biggest global challenges of our age, from the Global Financial Crisis to infectious and parasitic diseases. Dobson’s research constitutes a body of work based on archival study, interviews with a range of key summit participants, attendance at over a dozen annual summits as a fully accredited media representative, and participation in formal engagement groups. This body of work includes monographs, particularly The Group of 7/8 (2007), articles in leading journals, book chapters and working papers with leading think tanks.
Dobson’s research from 2007 onwards (R1, R2) demonstrates that informality is the key characteristic of the G7 and G20 that distinguishes them from formal intergovernmental organisations like the United Nations. He has argued that it is this very characteristic that gives them the potential to become effective bodies in promoting certain global governance issues. Furthermore, in the absence of formal membership criteria, the G7 differs from the G20 in its shared values of freedom, democracy, the rule of law and respect for human rights and commitment to a rules-based international order. Moreover, Dobson argues, the G7 exhibits the characteristics of like-mindedness, inclusivity, and trust and again this is a potential asset in making progress on new, unprecedented and highly disruptive issues that characterise our complex world, rather than well-understood international problems that fit into existing categories. When consensus cannot be reached and progress stalls, Dobson argues that minilateral sub-groups of like-minded countries, such as those in the G7, can take an issue forward.
Dobson is one of a few researchers to have explored the G7 and G20 as a site of hegemonic masculinity, the role of women and their impact upon global summitry, identifying a range of formal and informal ways in which gender issues can be reflected in the agendas and commitments of these summits (R3).
As regards the G20 specifically, Dobson’s research (R4, R5) has explored regional cooperation through the case study of Asian countries working together as a result of membership of the G20 and argued that regions have the opportunity to foster a greater sense of identity by caucusing ahead of summits and promoting a common position. Dobson has also argued for a degree of institutionalisation within the G20 by arguing for the creation of a secretariat that handles logistics for summits, ensuring consistency on protocols, providing an interim home for key documents and archived data. Dobson suggests locating this secretariat in a neutral setting but within Asia. This development would serve to strengthen the design of the G20 and promote greater regional cooperation.
Finally, through the specific case studies of China and South Korea, Dobson’s research (R5, R6) has highlighted the role of the rotating Presidency of the G20 in ensuring a success summit by addressing concrete logistical issues such as cooperating with a range of stakeholders through formal engagement groups or the creation of a secretariat.
3. References to the research
Dobson, H. (2007). The Group of 7/8. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203029756
Morin, J., Dobson, H., et al. (2019). How Informality Can Address Emerging Issues: Making the Most of the G7. Global Policy, 10(2), 267–273. https://doi.org/10.1111/1758-5899.12668
Dobson, H. (2012). Where Are the Women in Global Governance? Leaders, Wives and Hegemonic Masculinity in the G8 and G20 Summits. Global Society, 26(4), 429–449. https://doi.org/10.1080/13600826.2012.710594
Dobson, H. (2011) The G20: Engine of Asian Regionalism, GIGA Working Papers, November, No.179. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1973062.
Chin, G. T., & Dobson, H. (2015). China’s Presidency of the G20 Hangzhou: On Global Leadership and Strategy. Global Summitry, 1(2), 151–170. https://doi.org/10.1093/global/guw002
Cherry, J. and Dobson, H. (2012). Seoul-Searching: The 2010 G20 Seoul Summit. Global Governance, 18(3), 363-381. https://doi.org/10.1163/19426720-01803007.
4. Details of the impact
2018 Charlevoix Summit
As a leading researcher of global summitry, Dobson was the only representative from a UK university invited to the T7 meeting at Laval University, Quebec, in May 2018. The T7 was set up to be an ideas bank for the G7 members to gather information and recommendations on issues that they face. He contributed to the drafting of the T7 Quebec Declaration on Global Governance and the Challenges of Complexity and Inclusiveness (S1), with his research (R1) informing the sections on the G7’s shared values as well as the treatment of gender issues (R3), a key priority for the Canadian Presidency of the G7 (S2). The T7 presented the Declaration directly to the leaders’ personal representatives in a working session on 23 May 2018. Consequently, the Canadian-hosted Charlevoix G7 Summit Communiqué of 9 June 2018 included several ideas and arguments included in the T7’s Declaration and shaped by Dobson’s research, including:
Paragraph 1 on the importance of the group’s shared values of freedom, democracy, the rule of law and respect for human rights and our commitment to promote a rules-based international order.
Paragraphs 10, 11 and 12 on gender equality and women’s empowerment, specifically promoting quality education for girls in developing countries and combating gender-based violence in digital contexts (S3).
The Communiqué concluded with the G7 leaders thanking ‘the formal G7 engagement groups and other partners for their meaningful input to Canada’s presidency’ (S3). According to the G7 Research Group at the University of Toronto, which monitors ongoing compliance with summit commitments, all G7 members fully or partially compiled on the commitment to greater educational opportunities for young girls and 5 out of 8 members fully or partially complied with the commitment on gender-based violence. (S4).
2019 Biarritz Summit
Ahead of the French-hosted G7 summit of August 2019, T7 researchers continued their collaboration and Dobson was a lead author of ‘How Informality Can Address Emerging Issues: Making the Most of the G7’, published in the leading journal Global Policy (R2). Another lead author, Dr Claire Peacock of Laval University, was invited to the 2019 T7 meeting and assigned its third priority area: global governance and the future of multilateralism. She was thereby able to input Dobson’s research as reflected in the arguments of the previous year’s T7 meeting and this consequent output into the 2019 T7’s final recommendations, specifically:
‘systemizing more ad hoc and informal cooperation through the participation of non-state actors’,
when ‘consensus cannot be reached … [the G7] should consider partial agreements and minilateral initiatives’, and
‘the reduction of structural inequality factors among social groups, and in particular gender inequality’ (S5).
The T7 recommendations were presented directly to the leaders’ personal representatives and several research findings were subsequently reflected in the Biarritz Summit documentation. These included those shaped by Dobson’s research on the importance of renewed and effective multilateralism, rules-based international cooperation as a powerful tool to fight inequalities, and gender in particular (R1, R2, R3). The French Presidency ‘commended the contributions’ of the engagement groups (S6), and according to the G7 Research Group all G7 members, fully or partially, complied with the specific commitment on gender equality (S6).
2020 US Summit
Under the US Presidency of the G7, Dobson was again invited to join the T7 and share his research findings on gender issues (R3). These fed into the drafting of Recommendation 5 on the adoption of a multi-stakeholder approach to addressing the gender dimensions of the pandemic and ensured that the final T7 recommendations were gender mainstreamed (S7). These recommendations were then delivered directly to G7 sherpas as part of the process of preparing their leaders for their summit.
Looking ahead to the UK’s G7 Presidency in 2021, Dobson briefed the Cabinet Secretariat’s G7 Presidency Taskforce in November 2020 providing ‘invaluable’ guidance on how to host a successful summit specifically as regards summit logistics and multi-stakeholder engagement (S8).
2020 Riyadh Summit
Under the Saudi Presidency of the G20, Dobson was invited to join the T20’s taskforce on the future of multilateralism and global governance and shared his research findings on what the G20 Presidency could do to ensure a successful summit (R5, R6). This included recommendations on how the formality/informality and like-mindedness/diversity of international institutions could be leveraged to address specific challenges (R2), and the general challenges faced by the G20 in fostering regional cooperation (R4). These findings were reflected in a number of the taskforce’s policy briefs and the final T20 Communiqué, such as Proposal 7 on regional representation that calls on the G20 to ‘elicit the views of stakeholders from a broad range of geographies’ (S9).
Dobson also collaborated with Dr Ronja Scheler of the Körber Foundation (a German nonprofit organisation), to produce a T20 peer-reviewed policy brief entitled ‘Joining Forces: Reviving Multilateralism through Multi-Stakeholder Cooperation’ ( http://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/166307/). This policy brief was based on research into the formalisation of the G20. It recommended an audit of existing platforms for engagement with stakeholders. This research was also reflected in Proposal 9 of the T20 Communiqué calling for such an audit and the upscaling of multilateral stakeholder engagement to tackle existing policy challenges (S9). The G20 Leaders’ Declaration recognised the ‘valuable work’ of engagement groups like the T20 and committed itself to multi-stakeholder engagement on a number of issues, including COVID-19 recovery, trade, travel, sustainable development and tackling inequalities (S10).
5. Sources to corroborate the impact
The T7/I7 Quebec Declaration on Global Governance and the Challenges of Complexity and Inclusiveness (http://www.g7.utoronto.ca/T7/T7\-2018.html); Testimonial by Professor Louis Bélanger, Chair of the 2018 Canadian T7 and Director of the Institute for Advanced International Studies (HEI) at Laval University.
Testimonial by Senator Peter Boehm, former Associate Deputy Minister at the Ministry of Global Affairs, Canada and Deputy Minister for the G7 Summit and Personal Representative of the Canadian Prime Minister. Appointed to the Senate of Canada in 2018, he was a career diplomat and ambassador of Canada to Germany from 2008 to 2012.
The 2018 Charlevoix G7 Summit Communiqué ( https://www.banque-france.fr/sites/default/files/media/2019/02/26/20170608_g7summitcommunique_en.pdf).
The 2018 G7 Charlevoix Summit Final Compliance Report ( http://www.g7.utoronto.ca/evaluations/2018compliance-final/index.html).
The T7 Recommendations Paris 2019 ( https://www.elysee.fr/admin/upload/default/0001/05/ac58dfb1c28b59061e2e6853c3d4b1624b66742c.pdf).
The 2019 Biarritz Summit Official Documents ( https://www.elysee.fr/en/g7/2019/08/26/official-documents) and 2019 G7 Biarritz Summit Second Interim Compliance Report ( http://www.g7.utoronto.ca/evaluations/2019compliance-interim-2/index.html).
Think 7 USA 2020: Report of the Think 7 Summit ( https://www.global-solutions-initiative.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/T72020Report_DS.pdf-summit); Testimonial by the Co-Chair of the 2020 US T7 and Director of the Canada Institute at the Woodrow Wilson International Centre for Scholars.
Email from Policy and Engagement Adviser, G7 Presidency Taskforce, Cabinet Office
The 2020 T20 Communiqué ( http://www.g20.utoronto.ca/t20/2020-T20%20Communique-EN.pdf); Testimonial by the Lead Co-Chair of the 2020 Saudi T20 Taskforce on the Future of Multilateralism and Global Governance and Chair of the Gulf Research Centre.
The 2020 G20 Riyadh Summit Leaders’ Declaration ( http://www.g20.utoronto.ca/2020/G20_Riyadh_Summit_Leaders_Declaration_EN.pdf).