My Take | G7’s Build Back Better World 2.0 won’t fare better than failed predecessor

It’s never a good idea to name an ambitious programme after a failed one, especially if you have staked your prestige on both. US President Joe Biden’s ill-fated infrastructure bonanza “Build Back Better”, his supposed version of the New Deal and signature domestic policy, has stalled or rather died in the US Congress. And sure enough, his Build Back Better World, his showcase foreign policy to counter China’s Belt and Road Initiative, has suffered a similar fate.

Now, it has been renamed as the “Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment” at the latest G7 summit. The title is longer and less catchy, but it’s the same wine in a different bottle. The question is, if the US Congress won’t put up hundreds of billions of dollars to rebuild its own country, how might Biden convince lawmakers to offer comparable amounts to build infrastructure in other countries?

Other Group of Seven nations are facing similar economic headwinds from stagflation, partly caused by their support for the war in Ukraine against Russia and its economic fallout. Don’t expect the other G7 leaders, Fumio Kishida, Mario Draghi, Emmanuel Macron, Boris Johnson, Justin Trudeau and Olaf Scholz, to have an easier time with their own domestic opposition than Biden’s.

Despite the mandatory grumbling from Beijing, it’s easy to imagine Chinese policymakers chuckling among themselves. When asked, the response from Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian was more sarcasm than criticism.

“Whether it’s the Build Back Better World initiative or something else, the international community wants to see real money and projects that actually benefit people,” he said, taking a jab at the Biden White House’s failure in the past year to attract enough financial contributions from other G7 partners.