A New Era in Global Economic Governance

In the midst of the most serious global economic crisis since the Great Depression, it seems pertinent to reform the current system of global economic governance. There is a widely shared assumption that a new Group of 20 nations (G-20), represented by their Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors, may succeed the Group of 7 (G-7) in re-shaping the future of the global economic architecture. This paper addresses the importance of re-shaping the pillars of global economic governance, provides an analysis of the G-20 as the forum for such an initiative, acknowledges multipolarity and the rise of regionalism as the new global reality, and notes the lack of coordination between multilateral and regional mechanisms of economic governance.