G20 Comms: What’s ‘Appening in Brazil?

The G20 Team are struck by WhatsApp’s dominance of communications in Brazil.

One thing the G20 team didn’t expect before we arrived in Rio de Janeiro was the sheer amount of time that would be spent on WhatsApp. In Brazil, everything is done on WhatsApp.

Indeed, even prior to leaving, our complicated accreditation difficulties were solved not through never-answered emails or phonecalls to official numbers, but by WhatsApping the (hugely friendly and helpful) organisers on their cellphones.

WhatsApp is even the main channel for releasing something as important as the G20 Leaders’ Declaration. We might expect an official reading or a coordinated multilateral launch to gauge progress on day one. But, on the evening of the 18th November, the very first day, the communiqué was released with little fanfare to the official press WhatsApp group.

This is surprising, given that the summit lasts two days, with declarations expected on the second. It is even more astonishing as the brief starts by claiming that ‘We, the Leaders of the G20, met in Rio de Janeiro on 18-19 November 2024’. Whilst some of us journalists are very good at our jobs, the early impromptu release may represent something more sinister.

The communiqué was released shortly before Argentinian President Milei’s damning review of the summit. Diplomats shared that Milei attempted to block the communiqué due to language regarding taxing the ultra-rich and gender. Was this an attempt to get ahead of the criticism? Milei shared on X (formerly Twitter) that the summit was ‘in crisis’. Following this, he refused to support several points of the declaration, some of which he’d previously endorsed.

These included the ‘promotion of the limitation of freedom of expression on social networks’, ‘the scheme of imposition and violation of the sovereignty of global governance institutions’, ‘unequal treatment before the law’ and ‘ the notion that greater state intervention is the way to fight hunger’.

Given that Lula’s Alliance against Hunger and Poverty has generally met with strong support among world leaders, Milei’s choice to withdraw support is particularly shocking. Moreover the global alliance does need to be international to work, so his very public withdrawal is not only inconvenient for Lula but also unconstructive.

The opposition to ‘freedom of expression’, ‘global governance’, and general chaos Milei caused at the summit feels like deja vu.

With speculation that Milei may be playing Trump’s ‘stand in’ at the G20 this year, is this a premonition of the next 4 years? Milei’s petulant outburst comes shortly after he was the first world leader to meet face-to-face with Trump since his recent presidential elections. Trump's first presidency was marked by a distinct preference for bilateralism over multilateralism and caused chaos in many global forums such as the G20. His withdrawal from the Paris climate was particulalry disruptive and put him in opposition with many other world leaders including

Watching Bridget Jones on the plane on the way home whilst writing, one quote particularly resonated: ‘tangerine-tinted buffoon’. If Trump's second presidency is as disruptive as his first – and all the portents suggest it might be more so — the next few G20’s may be full of world leaders feeling a similar sentiment.

G20 Team: Alicia Sear-Acinas, Amelia Eveleigh, Ethan Ryan, Gregory Stiles, Grzegorz Stahl, Madeleine Fearn, Matthew Bishop, Imogen Parry, Scarlett Vickers, Shengyao Guo.