Three Hidden Subplots of the G20 Hamburg Summit

The Group of Twenty, known as G20, is an unaccountable and powerful organization that is the closest thing on earth to a true world government. German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the rotating President of the G20, will host the next G20 meeting in the city of Hamburg, on the mouth of the Elbe River near the North Sea Coast.
G20 refers to its twenty member countries. They are a mixture of what were once the world’s seven largest economies, known as the G7, consisting of the United States, Canada, France, Germany, the UK, Italy and Japan, and some fast-growing, newly emerging economies such as Brazil, China, South Korea, Mexico, India and Indonesia. Other countries such as Russia and Saudi Arabia are included because of their natural resources or for reasons of geopolitics.
The G20 operates at many levels. Several times each year their finance ministers and central bank heads meet to discuss technical issues and try to reach consensus on specific goals. The most important meetings, however, are the leaders’ summits, attended by presidents, prime ministers and kings, which meet periodically to discuss global financial issues.
It is at these leaders’ summits, both in the formal sessions and informally on the sidelines, that the actual deals shaping the global financial system are made.

This post was published at Wall Street Examiner on July 6, 2017.