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Gx delivery legitimacy: compliance by members
This article presents the analysis of the G8, G20 and BRICS delivery legitimacy which is understood as the outcome of two factors: the institutions members’ compliance with the decisions the leaders make at their summits, and the decisions implementation effectiveness for addressing key global governance issues which takes into consideration the combination of economic power and representativeness of a particular institution.
To assess compliance performance, the analysis was carried out using comparative data on the number of commitments made by the three institutions in 2009-2013 and the level of institutional compliance, distribution of commitments and compliance across issue areas, and individual compliance by member states. The average compliance scores were then adjusted using an integral indicator comprised of the two sub indicators: the institutions’ aggregate PPP-based GDP and size of population. The GDP (economic power) indicator was considered as a multiplier reflecting the degree of impact. The population size indicator was considered as a multiplier showing the degree of representativeness. The integral indicator was regarded as a proxy reflecting the effectiveness of the G8, G20 and BRICS decisions implementation in addressing global governance challenges.
The analysis of compliance revealed that G8 compliance performance is generally higher as compared with the G20 and BRICS with the G8 average of 0.54 over the period of 2009 to 2013, the G20 average of 0.40 in the same period and the BRICS average of 0.41 in the three years from 2011 to 2013. Although an upward trend in G20 and BRICS compliance scores is observed, their delivery on the commitments made is still considerably weaker than that of the G8.
Compliance data adjusted for the PPP-based GDP and population size reveals a different picture. The G20’s delivery legitimacy is the highest among the three institutions (3.93) due to its substantial economic potential and representativeness. The effectiveness of the G8 decisions implementation for addressing key global governance issues declines as the result of its decreasing share in the global economy and world population. The G8 delivery legitimacy stands at 0.54. The indicator for BRICS is 1.13.
Thus, the approach used in this article allows to integrate compliance data and factors of economic and demographic capability of the three institutions in the assessment of their delivery legitimacy.