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It is that time of the year when G8 leaders gather to resolve the world's problems in just three days. Except, of course, they never do.
The original concept of the summits was an informal forum of senior financial officials from the US, Europe and Japan discussing issues that had sprung up from the oil crisis in the early 1970s.
The group was first known as G6 and then, after the inclusion of Canada in 1976, it became G7 and ultimately G8 once Russia joined in 1998.
It was in the late 1970s that politics crept into the agenda once it was realised that issues such as global security and Middle East peace needed to be addressed.
Although unanimity is infrequent, with each nation promoting its own interests - the conclusions arrived at are almost meaningless as they are not binding upon participants.
Since the group was first initiated, there has been a dramatic shift in where the economic and political strength lies.
Consequently fast-growing economies such as China and India, which are not represented, tend to look upon the gathering as an elite club that serves little purpose in addressing the real problems of the people.
Demonstrators from these countries, with Latin America and Africa, gather at the summits to protest the limited views of the participants and the narrow perspectives the G8 has in relation to important issues such as poverty, food supply and climate change.
Without adequate representation from all the continents, any judgments made by the G8 will, by their very nature, be incomplete as not all sides of the argument will have been heard or addressed.
A raucous crowd in the street, nowadays kept several kilometres away from the conference hall, is not likely to receive the attention it deserves from the delegates, but only from the media.
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