36th G8 summit

36th G8 summit
36th G8 summit official logo
Host country	Canada
Dates	June 25-27

The 36th G8 summit is to be held in Canada in June 25-27, 2010. The meeting will take place in Huntsville, Ontario, at the Deerhurst Resort. It will be the fifth G8 Summit hosted by Canada since 1976. The locations of previous G8 summits to have been hosted by Canada include: Montebello, Quebec (1981); Toronto, Ontario (1988); Halifax, Nova Scotia (1995); and Kananaskis, Alberta (2002). The G8 Summit has evolved beyond being a gathering of world political leaders. The event has become an occasion for a wide variety of non-governmental organizations, activists and civic groups to congregate and discuss a multitude of issues.

Looking forward from the perspective of March 2009, summit manager Gérald Cossette explained:

"Organizing a G8 event is like moving from a beast to a ballet. Now it’s a beast; but by the time the summit unfolds, it’s going to be a ballet."

The leaders of the G8 will be flying into North Bay/Jack Garland Airport in North Bay, Ontario where they will drive down to Deerhurst Resort.

Overview

The Group of Seven (G7) was an unofficial forum which brought together the heads of the richest industrialized countries: France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, the United States and Canada starting in 1976. The G8, meeting for the first time in 1997, was formed with the addition of Russia. In addition, the President of the European Commission has been formally included in summits since 1981. The summits were not meant to be linked formally with wider international institutions; and in fact, a mild rebellion against the stiff formality of other international meetings was a part of the genesis of cooperation between France's President Giscard d'Estaing and Germany's Chancellor Helmut Schmidt as they conceived the initial summit of the Group of Six (G6) in 1975.

The G8 summits during the twenty-first century have inspired widespread debates, protests and demonstrations; and the two- or three-day event becomes more than the sum of its parts, elevating the participants, the issues and the venue as focal points for activist pressure.

Leaders at the summit

Permanent G8 participants

• Canada
• European Union
• France
• Germany
• Italy
• Japan
• Russia
• United Kingdom
• United States

France would like to see China become a full member by the time the 37th G8 summit in 2011 is organized, while Japan continues to back India's bid.

Invited leaders (partial participation)

A number of national leaders are traditionally invited to attend the summit and to participate in some, but not all, G8 summit activities.

G8+5 leaders

The G8 plus the five largest emerging economies has come to be known as G8+5.

• Brazil
• China
• India
• Mexico
• South Africa

Heads of international organizations

Leaders of the major international organizations have also been invited to attend in the past; and this practice is expected to continue, including:

• African Union
• Commonwealth of Independent States
• International Atomic Energy Agency
• International Energy Agency
• United Nations
• UNESCO
• World Bank
• World Health Organization
• World Trade Organization

Priorities

Traditionally, the host country of the G8 summit sets the agenda for negotiations, which take place primarily amongst multi-national civil servants in the weeks before the summit itself, leading to a joint declaration which all countries can agree to sign. Prime Minister Harper explained at outset,

"As hosts, our government will have considerable say over the agenda. It will be a tremendous opportunity to promote Canada’s values and interests; to advocate for open markets and trade opportunities; to assist on global action against global warming; and to champion values like freedom, democracy and human rights and the rule of law."

Issues

The summit was intended as a venue for resolving differences among its members. As a practical matter, the summit was also conceived as an opportunity for its members to give each other mutual encouragement in the face of difficult economic decisions. However, the plausibly prescient British Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Peter Mandelson, speaking in 2009, expressed the opinion that "however long it might persist as a grouping, as a steering committee for the global economy, the era of the G8 is over. Mandelson's comment comes during a trip to Sao Paulo, Brazil.

Schedule and Agenda

A tentative agenda for the 36th G8 summit will include some issues which remain unresolved from previous summits. As chair of the G8 summit when many of the commitments for African aid and development are due to be fulfilled, special attention will be focused on Canada. International anti-poverty campaigners will descend on Huntsville.

The Rambouillet summit in 1975 produced no easy answers to what was then the most serious recession since the 1930s; but the main themes of what is now considered the 1st G8 summit have persisted at the top of the world's agenda—avoiding protectionism, energy dependency and boosting growth.

Citizens' responses and authorities' counter-responses

Protesters and demonstrations

Protest groups and other activists are expected to make a showing at the summit. Forward planning for this specific G8 summits began in advance of the 2008 Hokkaido summit. Activist organizations anticipate that early planning can result in greater networking effectiveness for G8 summits.

Not all demonstrations are expected to focused in opposition to some issue. At the 2005 Scotland summit, for the first time the tens of thousands of people protesting outside were actually supporting the summit's agenda of African aid; and some activists traveled to Hokkaido in 2008 for the same purpose.

Not all demonstrations will originate from outside the local community. For example, one 2008 letter to the editor of the Huntsville Forester suggested that the way in which local communities plan for 2010 could be seen as an "incredible opportunity to demonstrate for change in the world:"

"The summit will bring a lot of activity and money .... So, how will we, as a network of communities, move into it? Will the money drive us? Or will we take a larger position by looking to create future-friendly businesses that will continue to thrive long after the summit is over? Will we choose greed or balance as the underlying intent? Intention matters. As the first plans and preparations are being laid, this might be a good time to take steps such as networking with outlying communities and forming focus groups to define some of these goals."

Citizen journalism

Citizens' groups are expected to organize citizen journalism centers to provide independent media coverage of the G8 summit and the expected protests. In a sense, this article will evolve as the work product of something like citizen journalism, growing through serial draft texts as part of "the first rough draft of history."

Independent documentary

In December 2008, two independent filmmakers from northern Germany began introducing themselves and interviewing people in Huntsville. Their plans include making a documentary on the preparations for the upcoming G8 Summit. They also anticipate the impact and after-effects of the event. They hope to screen the finished documentary at an international film festival

Counter-conference

A religious counter-summit is planned to coincide with the G8 summit in 2010. The Canadian Council of Churches is organizing the event, anticipating that South Africa's Desmond Tutu, the Dalai Lama and Prince Karīm al-Hussainī Aga Khan IV will be amongst the internationallly known figures who plan to attend the multi-faith conference at the University of Winnipeg. Similar conferences have been held alongside the G8 summits since 2005, but organizers typically spent only a matter of months getting ready. Groundwork for this event began when Canada's 2010 venue was announced in 2008 at the Hokkaido summit in Japan. Counter-summit organizers project that it will be difficult for political leaders to ignore the admonitions of the world's religious leaders, even as they might tend to marginalize the protesters who battle police at each G8 meeting.

Accomplishments

The G8 summit is an international event which is observed and reported by news media, but the G8's continuing relevance after more than 30 years is somewhat unclear. The G8 summit brings leaders together not so they can dream up quick fixes, but to talk and think about them together.

Prime Minister Harper anticipates that "the 2010 G8 Summit will provide short and long-term economic benefits for the region and the province, and it will be an exceptional opportunity for Canada to advance its values and interests on the world stage." One industry speculating about a financial boon from the conference is real estate—for example, cottage owners looking to capitalize by renting their properties to deep-pocketed dignitaries. The local Huntsville-Lake of Bays Chamber of Commerce, believes the summit will produce economic spin-off and long-term benefits; but such optimism has drawn skepticism from some residents.

Infrastructure Consortium for Africa

The Infrastructure Consortium for Africa (ICA) was established at the 31st G8 summit at Gleneagles, Scotland in the United Kingdom in 2005. Since that time, the ICA’s annual meeting is traditionally hosted by the country holding the Presidency of the G8—in 2010 in Canada.

Security

Security planning is designed to ensure that the summit agenda can remain a primary focus of the attendees' discussions; but from the outset, local authorities were no less concerned with figuring out how to make the security footprint bearable. In February 2009, local residents and their representatives were working together to anticipate what it is likely to be like to live through a period of heightened security; and the RCMP and OPP were still conducting security reviews of the area and event.

The security zones are likely to be split up into concentric rings with the summit site at the center. The innermost security zone will be handled by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) because the RCMP have jurisdiction over the security of international guests and dignitaries. The second ring outside the innermost one will be under the management of the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP).

The RCMP and the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) will coordinate decision-making about establishing no-fly zones during the summit.

Securing protesters' rights

In the aftermath of the 1997 APEC summit in Vancouver, a Canadian judge concluded that protesters have the right to be seen and heard, which means that visiting leaders cannot be shielded from lawful protests. Canadian officials have determined that this means arrangements must be made so that protesters will be visible to those participating in the summit.

In a 2007 summit which brought together the Canadian Prime Minister and the presidents of Mexico and the United States, security organizers restricted demonstrators to a forest clearing more than a kilometre away, while using a video feed to beam images of the protests to a large monitor where the leaders could watch if they wanted. In response to questioning about demontrations and protesters, a spokesman for the authorities explained, "It remains our view that what they don't have the right to do is to preclude leaders from meeting. We will take the steps necessary to ensure that leaders can meet and that protesters will have an opportunity to protest."

Budget

The Canadian government announced that the nation expects to invest $50 million in hosting the G-8 summit in 2010; and the community celebrated followed the announcement. Federal funding will support construction plans for a new media centre which will be later converted into a second ice pad for Huntsville. The announced federal funding will pay for runway-resurfacing at North Bay's Jack Garland Airport, with about $5 million coming from the G8 fund and another $5.3 million being provided under the federal Airports Capital Assistance Program.

Local organizing plans

At early planning sessions and meetings with his constituents, Tony Clement (MP for Parry Sound-Muskoka) offered tentative ideas about the organizational structure for the area communities as preparations for the 2010 G8 Summit in Huntsville begin to take shape. He said one goal will be to minimize the footprint and impact of the security details on the local region.

Business opportunity

Thinking ahead on a small scale, one 2008 letter to the editor of the Huntsville Forester suggested that the community needed to "make sure we have plenty of ‘Made in Canada’ souvenirs on hand; the Europeans won’t haul home Canadian mementos made in China."

For some, the G8 summit becomes a profit-generating event; as for example, the G8 Summit magazines which have been published under the auspices of the host nations for distribution to all attendees since 1998.

Canada 2010

Anticipating the G8 summit, Prime Minister Harper explained that "Huntsville is a jewel in the Canadian Shield and an ideal location for this gathering of world leaders." When the G8 meets in Ontario in 2010, Harper said, "Our international guests will be charmed by the uniquely Canadian beauty of the region." Canada will host other international events in the same year, including:

• The G20 meeting of the major economies that will take place back to back with this G8 Summit;
• 2010 Winter Olympics.

See also

Other WIKI articles about the Group of 8

• G6
• G7
• International Panel on Climate Change
• United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change
• Centre for Military and Strategic Studies, University of Calgary

References

• Bayne, Nicholas and Robert D. Putnam. (2000). Hanging in There: The G7 and G8 Summit in Maturity and Renewal. Aldershot, Hampshire, England: Ashgate Publishing. 10-ISBN 0-754-61185-X; 13-ISBN 978-0-754-61185-1; OCLC 43186692
• Reinalda, Bob and Bertjan Verbeek. (1998). Autonomous Policy Making by International Organizations. London: Routledge. 10-ISBN 0-415-16486-9; 13-ISBN 978-0-415-16486-3

External links

• Canada's G8 website n.b., no official website is created for any G7 summit prior to 1995 -- see the 21st G7 summit.
• University of Toronto: G8 Research Group, G8 Information Centre