Global Economic Leadership and the Group of Seven

The decline of the dollar, the Mexican crisis, and sluggish global growth reveal the failure of the Group of Seven industrial nations to provide effective management of the world economy. The G-7 once played this crucial role effectively, and must do so again if future crises are to be averted and global prosperity to be promoted. This study assesses the G-7's record and the reasons for its demise. It outlines an action program that includes reforming the exchange rate regime, creating a new financial facility at the IMF to deal with crises sparked by private capital flows, and instituting an early warning system to prevent serious new disruptions in the world economy

C. Fred Bergsten, senior fellow and director emeritus, was the founding director of the Peterson Institute for International Economics (formerly the Institute for International Economics) from 1981 through 2012. He is serving his second term as a member of the President’s Advisory Committee for Trade Policy and Negotiations and was co-chairman of the Private Sector Advisory Group to the United States-India Trade Policy Forum, comprising the trade ministers of those two countries, during 2007-14.

C. Randall Henning was a Visiting Fellow who has been associated with the Institute since 1986. He serves on teh faculty of the School of International Servce, American University. He specializes in the politics and institutions of international economic relations, international and comparative political economy, and regional integration. His research work focuses on international monetary policy, European monetary integration, macroeconomic policy coordination, finance G-7 and G-8 summit cooperation, and regional cooperation in East Asia.