Crises can bring clarity. In the financial crisis of 2008-09, the g20club of big economies came into its own, reflecting how economic power had spread beyond the rich world’s g7. One thing the covid-19 pandemic has laid bare is an absence of global leadership. This time the g20 has done little beyond a rhetorical pledge to “do whatever it takes” and supporting debt-repayment suspension for poor countries. America, which led global campaigns to defeat hiv/aids and Ebola, has been absorbed in its internal arguments. And the un Security Council has confirmed its dysfunctionality.
