G20 and the Gordon Brown self-destruction show

For once, Gordon Brown has managed to up-stage his cross-channel compatriot, Nicholas Sarkozy, at a G20 event. This might have had something to do with the fact that neither Brown nor Sarkozy really belonged at a meeting for Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors, so the Frenchman had understandably stayed at home. But that technical detail was not enough to stop Gordon Brown, oh no.

In case you missed it, Gordon Brown gate-crashed the G20 meeting in St. Andrews by backing a proposal for a transition tax. (For a backgrounder on the transition tax, see here). This continues the trend of the Prime Minister attempting to use home-turf advantage to blatantly hijack G20 meetings to advance his electoral prospects.

The trouble is, it's not working very well. Remember that $1 trillion dollar figure that emerged from the chaos of the London G20 summit? The one which Berlusconi is said to have described as "the most expensive election campaign ever?" No? Well neither is the British electorate come voting time next year.

At least after the London summit, Gordon Brown managed to temporarily project the image of international statesmanship. With his latest PR stunt, the PM just comes across as desperate. He clearly hadn't bothered to build a coalition for the idea, instead trying to catch his colleagues off-guard. The effect was predictable: representatives from Russia, Canada, the IMF, the ECB and, most singificantly, the United States immediately rejected the proposal. Without the US, the idea goes nowhere.

So Brown backtracked from his position by the end of the weekend, looking very much unlike an international statesman.

Here's the thing: I believe that Brown is sincere in his arguments for a new social contract in which taxpayers do not provide costless insurance for large financial institutions. But the way he has gone about promoting this view smacks of political manipulation and panic. His headline-grabbing attempt over the weekend was yet another episode in the Gordon Brown self-destruction show.

The rest:

The big disappointment for me in the G20 communique from St. Andrews was its deafening silence on the issue of macroeconomic imbalances. The Pittsburgh G20 communique from September impressed me in that it actually included a commitment to address the issue head-on (and somehow China agreed!). The real test for G20 commitments, however, is that they continue to appear is subsequent communiques. So far, this one isn't looking good.