Saudi Arabia’s G20 Presidency in 2020

The G20 is an informal institute of global governance and one of the most prominent international forums for both - key developed and developing economies. The G20’s agenda embraces various issues including international taxation, digital growth, macroeconomic stability, labor market development, fight against crime and corruption, implementation of effective and eco-neutral energy technologies, etc. The G20’s decisions, even lacking legal force, tend to transform into international standards and joint initiatives. Due to the absence of a permanent secretariat, a host country exercises great influence on formulation of the G20’s working agenda. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is a key actor in the Middle East and the only Arab state with G20 membership. In 2020, Saudi Arabia will take the G20 presidency for the first time ever and thus take the leading role in shaping its agenda. In this context, several issues regarding Saudi Arabia’s policy towards implementation of its national development agenda, promotion of previous presidencies’ decisions and its influence over further development of the G20’s agenda are of particular interest. The authors analyze Saudi Arabia’s current status and national priorities and recent developments of G20’s agenda to forecast the results of the forthcoming presidency. The authors point out that discussion on digital growth, energy efficiency, climate change mitigation and macroeconomic policy would very likely result in concrete decisions. Modest success is expected in making decisions on gender-related agenda. The core items of G20’s agenda such as reform of international financial institutions and fight against protectionism in global trade are less likely to attract much attention and lead to concrete decisions.