Bread and Circuses, Part 2 – Italian Style
Edition 29: The Apulian G7 Summit + Books/Films of the G7
Ciao, amici miei.
I’m in Bari, Italy, part of the media delegation for the G7 Apulia Summit. What that really means, is that I’ve joined the G7 Research Group, headed by the indefatigable Professor John Kirton and Madeline Koch, for my first summit since the 2005 summit in Gleneagles, Scotland.
Founded in 1987, by Kirton and the late Bill Graham at Trinity College (University of Toronto), the research group is comprised of students, academics, and alumni, who live around the world.
The group tracks commitments made during the summit and compliance against them, across all policy areas. It also acts as a key resource for media, providing interviews, backgrounders and expert insight.
Tutto il mondo were invited to the G7 Summit this year by Italy’s prime minister Giorgio Meloni. In addition to the heads of the G7 countries (Canada, US, Germany, France, Italy, UK and Japan), Meloni included leaders from Africa, Indo-Pacific, the Middle East, the Global South, as well as Zelensky from Ukraine, and Pope Francis.
My area of research for the group is migration. It’s of great personal interest to me as the daughter of two immigrants and as someone who runs a literary mentoring organization that has supported more than 700 writers across Canada’s diasporic communities over the past two decades.
But I’m also here doing research for my next novel. It explores the dramatic aftermath of a migrant boat from Tunisia which sinks off the coast of Italy. Early chapters are set at this G7 Summit.
Years ago it was assumed that the G20 would eventually surpass the G7 as the leading global governance forum given its membership represents the world’s most populous countries. That didn’t happen.
The G7 has its swagger back, throwing open its doors - according to Meloni - to work collectively with other countries in the pursuit of shared prosperity.
Last Sunday’s European Parliament elections created seismic shifts, particularly in France and Germany. While the pro-European centre held, the shift to centre-right and far-right parties is pronounced, with migration being a top issue for voters.
Many on the populist right and left spout anti-immigration rhetoric, including the blunt instrument that is France’s Marine Le Pen, with her recent threats to deport any immigrants who threaten France.
Italy’s Meloni uses more nuanced language as she shifts closer to the centre while still appealing to the base who elected her. She is by far the most popular G7 leader, and increasingly the most powerful in EU politics.
Meloni frames migration as an issue of human rights – people should have the right to stay in their own country and receive education and employment opportunities. Thus the G7 articulated a strong focus here on root causes of ‘irregular migration’ aka improving conditions so people don’t need to flee their homes.
Through their Mettei Plan for Africa, Italy is investing billions in infrastructure projects, often green energy, and often in partnership with powerful orgs like the African Union.
At the same time, Meloni – like most other leaders including the traditionally xenophobic Japan – recognizes that immigrants are necessary to offset declining populations and to fill jobs that Italian-born citizens don’t want to do.
They’ve recently signed a multi-year deal with Tunisia to simplify visa and residence procedures for Tunisians who want to come here. Italy has also taken in hundreds of thousands more people than expected given Meloni’s campaign rhetoric of 2022.
At this summit, the G7 launched a new initiative to prevent transnational organized crime – aka people smugglers – and enhance border security, while committing to the creation of safe and regular pathways for migration.
The efforts to stop asylum seekers from reaching European shores via Italy have at times seemed draconian, including a deal with Albania to process migrants picked up at sea (similar to the UK’s deal with Rwanda).
But the leaders at this summit unanimously reconfirmed the right of everyone to seek asylum from persecution as per the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and to seek international protection as safeguarded by the Geneva Convention on Refugees.
Let’s hope these commitments are kept, thus providing people increased short- and long-term options. And let’s always remember migrants are simply people seeking a better life, no different than all of us do.
FYI, for those who are interested: the G7 Italy summit has just released their final communique with commitments, available here.
Behind the Scenes of the G7.
Life inside the G7 media centre is a strange 24/7 bubble.
Three football fields large, this venue is located in Bari, about an hour’s drive from Borgo Egnazia, where the leaders are meeting. Summit organizers have tightly controlled access to media briefings through limited press pool cards which get you on the bus and out to Egnazia.
Meanwhile, the rest of us work away in the media centre at tables, or in the broadcast area, or doing stand-ups (tv journalists talking directly to camera) and interviews.
When we’re not working, we’re eating and drinking, collecting our swag, or visiting trade booths for free samples. In Puglia, this is primarily agriculture, given the region is a top producer of bread, pulses, veggies, olive oil and wine. And if all that grazing gets too much, there’s always games or lounging to be had.
The best part of being here though, is hearing the briefings directly. It’s always a surprise to then read coverage of the same event which contains different conclusions from your own, like this pneumatic Guardian article. A reminder just how personal all reaction is.
The Books and Films of the G7.
My last summit was Gleaneagles, Scotland. The first day of the summit, four coordinated suicide attacks targeting morning commuters ripped through London, killing 56 people. The deadly event sent seismic shocks through the summit.
Meanwhile, anti-poverty and anti-globalization activists from all over the UK and world, spurred on by Bob Geldof and others, immobilized the city, drawing the ire of ordinary Edinburgh residents, who wanted the entire circus – the massive security presence, the politicians and the activists – to get out the hell out.
I recently re-read The Naming of the Dead by Scottish novelist Ian Rankin, which delightfully skewers the politicians, activists and security alike, while weaving a top-notch murder story throughout. Highly recommended.
Then there’s the Emmy award-wining movie, Girl in the Café, set at a fictionalized G8* Summit in Iceland (Iceland was never part of the G8 and could never host a summit, but hey, it’s the movies).
Starring Bill Nighy, this romantic drama written by famed screenwriter Richard Curtis was essentially a propaganda piece aka communications strategy by the British summit organizers, released just days before that same Gleneagles summit.
Throughout, the film incorporates the agenda priorities the British set that year, including Make Poverty History’s ‘a child dies every three seconds’ by shifting story beats every three seconds in a scene where the issue is discussed.
The movie’s best line, though? When Nighy’s love interest says, ‘you got to sit beside the most boring person here’ – aka the Canadian prime minister 😎
*The G7 was the G8 before Russia was suspended from the group in 2014, following their annexation of Crimea.
Thank you for joining me for this twenty-nineth edition of Letterbox.
Please see earlier editions of Letterbox: Bread and Circus’s Part 1; Puglia, and Matera, Italy.
I stayed in Rome enroute to Bari and had some very informative walking tours which I’ll write about next. Ciao for now!