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For its future contributions to global development, one must also ask if the G20 is an appropriate forum in which to discuss and take actions. Doubts have been cast about its representativeness, given that the majority of developing countries are not members. Also, development issues vary over time and there is the issue of whether the G20 is flexible enough to deal with these changing problems. Furthermore, development issues span many ministries within countries and many international agencies and whether the G20 can effectively work with these different bodies is also an issue.

The central issue with legitimacy is that the G20 excludes the vast majority of developing countries. It also raises the question of effectiveness. Does effectiveness depend on concentrating on the systemically important countries or does it need more legitimacy which is gained by dealing with all countries? This issue had arisen with respect to the Financial Sector Assessment Program (FSAP) established after the Asian Financial Crisis, where the issue was whether the assessments were to concentrate on systemically important countries such as the US and the larger European countries or were to also include developing countries.⁷

The legitimacy issue arises in a different way in the case of development. Most developing countries are small and may have different problems from the larger ones included in the G20. Can the G20 deal effectively with their problems? The success of the G20 process will depend on members drawing in the non-members through a process of consultation. Many analysts are worried about the G20’s lack of representativeness because of the exclusion of most developing countries and that it is a self-appointed group (UN, 2009; Fues and Wolff, 2010a; Dubey, 2009; Caliari, 2010).⁸ A number of suggestions have been made to deal with this issue. One is to develop a more representative body composed of representatives of different groups.⁹ Most would like it to be connected to the UN in some way to give it more legitimacy (UN, 2009; Fues and Wolff, 2010b; Jolly, 2010; Dubey, 2009; Hermawan, 2010). Some would like a more formal process of consultation between the UN and the G20. Other possibilities could be more regional consultations and participation by non-G20 members in Working Group Meetings.

Already a degree of regional consultation has emerged. Before each G20 summit, the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) has been holding meetings of its Asian members where discussions have covered the agenda proposed for the G20 by the host country. ESCAP officials and other experts have participated in the discussions. Indonesia has organised the Association of the Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)–Indonesia G20 contact group to consult with its ASEAN partners and coordinate their positions. The Inter-American Development Bank has organised a Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC)/G20 initiative to assist in the formation of a broad-based Latin and Central American and Caribbean approach to G20 issues. The G20 itself has recognised the need for wider consultation to increase legitimacy. Before the summit in Korea, the Korean government set up a special unit to consult with many non-members. Greater African participation is encouraged by inviting the head of the African Union and heads of other African countries to summit meetings. The issue of smaller countries from Africa is particularly relevant from the viewpoint of earlier achievements on the MDGs and now the SDGs.

The G20 at the finance ministers’ level cannot easily deal with development issues since these span many ministries in the different countries and many international bodies with different governance structures and their own links with the ministries in countries. Only heads of state have the authority to oversee the workings of these bodies and reach an agreement within a government as to the specific policies to be adopted by the different ministries so that these form a coherent overall strategy.

Similarly, at the international level they can ensure coherence among the policies being espoused and implemented by the different agencies, as lack of coherence can lead to inefficiencies and waste of resources. For instance, the international community has funded special facilities to deal with HIV/AIDS. Sometimes, there has been a surplus of such facilities, while there has been a shortage of facilities to deal with the other health needs. Tackling the question of food security, a priority area for the G20, may require action by the agriculture ministries to implement programmes to raise production and productivity, action by the education ministry to increase the number of agricultural scientists, action by the transportation ministry to improve the ability to shift food supplies from surplus to deficit areas and actions by other ministers as well. Also, the G20 has asked many international agencies to develop an Action Plan for agricultural development. FAO, World Bank, IFAD, WFP, IFPRI, UNHLTF, IMF, WTO, UNCTAD and the OECD cooperated to produce the Plan since action was required in many different areas. Only heads of state are able to deal with so many different levels of engagement and to focus and motivate.

A further concern that has been raised concerning the appropriateness of a G20 involvement with development is that the G20 does not have the expertise needed to deal with specific issues as it has no research body of its own. There is a limited secretariat in the form of a troika of previous, current and future hosts of meetings. But all the leaders have their own domestic resources to draw on and have also drawn on the expertise of the relevant international bodies. Not having its own body may be an advantage as it is free to approach the body or bodies best suited to tackle a particular problem. Furthermore, involving the relevant bodies from the beginning may prevent emergence of conflicts at the stage of implementation. If the recommendation of the separate bodies requires action by an international body or by a domestic ministry, they may resist as they were not involved in the decisionmaking process. A further point is that if the weakness of the secretariat proves to be a handicap, then the G20 can strengthen it. In brief, it is unclear as yet that lack of an extensive secretariat has hindered the work of the G20 in this area given its ability to mobilise relevant international bodies to develop solutions.

The G20 can also provide legitimacy to other international bodies, at a time when many other international agencies seemingly have weakened legitimacy. Few countries were borrowing from the IMF before the crisis. The IMF and the World Bank today face a challenge to their legitimacy partly because of their unequal voting rights, the composition of their Executive Boards and the method of selecting their heads. The G20 has moved to change all these aspects to enhance the legitimacy of these organisations. But as aforementioned, these recommended changes have not occurred. This does not augur well for the future of the G20 as a leading body.

More fundamentally, the rules of operation of autonomous organisations may need to be changed. For instance, under the fixed exchange rate system prevalent until 1971 the IMF was expected to be consulted before a country could change its exchange rate in order to prevent competitive devaluations. Once many countries moved to a flexible exchange rate system, the mandate of the IMF changed to reflect this — it was to keep track of a country’s exchange rate to ensure it was not manipulating it to gain a competitive edge. This required a change in its articles of agreement and governments had to agree to that. Further changes may be required in the working rules of institutions and the G20 leaders could be the entity to negotiate these changes or to mandate the relevant ministries to negotiate changes. If there are issues with the operations of many of the related UN bodies that deal with specific issues such as, say, the FAO, again the G20 is well placed to request changes.

In brief, the G20 is an appropriate body to deal with development issues, but, for now, as an addition to rather than replacement for existing entities. The lack of representation of small developing countries who are the majority of developing countries could prove to be a handicap. But steps have been taken to hold consultations between countries who are members of the G20 and other non-members, although it is to be seen how efficiently this works. The G20 also has the flexibility to change its working arrangements. It has sought the assistance of other more technical international bodies and seems to be developing a good working relation with them.