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At the closing of the 2014 G20 Brisbane Summit, the presidency of the 2016 G20 was awarded to China. This is the first time China will chair the world’s ‘premier forum for economic cooperation’. Yet the G20 is just one way that China, now the world’s largest economy on purchasing power parity terms, may seek to shape global economic governance. China is both seeking changes to the ‘traditional’ global economic governance model, centred upon the Bretton Woods Institutions, and experimenting with new processes such as the BRICS forum and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank.
According to the report`s authors, China will likely pursue a combination of pragmatic and opportunistic approaches that do not reflect any overarching ‘grand strategy’ toward global economic governance. The G20 has the potential to help China expand its role in global economic governance while retaining the fundamental building blocks of the current governance architecture.
The analysis also notes that the presidency in the G20 will be an opportunity for China to promote its own domestic program of economic reform. The Chinese G20 presidency will occur within the first year of the 13th Five Year plan (2016-2021). While the G20’s long-term agenda and China’s G20 presidency will have little influence over the content of the 13th plan, there will be an opportunity to use the 2016 presidency to strengthen the plan’s credibility and to garner international awareness — if not support — for it.
Full text of “China, the G20 and global economic governance” at Lowy Institute web-site