ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the record of the summits. It explains how and why the summit keeps on returning to problems. The summit concentrated on mobilising help for Central European countries in 1989 and 1990, but then switched its attention to Russia. One major consequence of globalisation is a direct cause of iteration at the summits. Earlier summits of the 1990s, from Naples 1994 onwards, recognised globalisation as a powerful, all-embracing force, with benefits as well as dangers. Birmingham is the first summit where crime was chosen as a principal theme. The Paris Arch summit of 1989, set up the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) to check the laundering of drug money. The UN has periodic summits on special issues: environment, population or social affairs. The Group of Seven summit began as a free-standing entity at head of government level.
