A Last Roundup for the Group of Seven?

To: Trade war watchers
From: Lawrence Herman
Date: June 11, 2025
Re: A Last Roundup for the Group of Seven?

As this weekend’s G7 meeting in Kananaskis nears, the mood is overwhelmingly coloured by fear of a public blowup between Donald Trump and the other leaders over tariffs, leading to a US walkout that would shatter the proceedings and endanger the group’s viability as an organization.

The prospects for avoiding that confrontation do not appear good.

The context is decidedly bleak. Mr. Trump took little time after his inauguration in blowing apart the global trading order, discarding bilateral trade obligations and sabotaging the multilateral system, including core World Trade Organization rules regarding bound tariff rates and non-discriminatory most favoured nation (MFN) treatment of imports from all members.

Nothing could be clearer than the theatrical “Liberation Day,” display in the Rose Garden on April 2, where a baseline 10-percent tariff on all imports from all countries was unveiled, along with country-specific “reciprocal” tariffs to counter allegedly unfair trade practices by approximately 60 individual nations.

There have been additions, suspensions and adjustments since Liberation Day, including last week’s doubling of steel and aluminum tariffs to 50 percent. Mr. Trump’s tariff war continues unrelentingly. Even the early court victories of tariff opponents have been stayed, and have not deflected the administration’s apparently unalterable, undiminished resolve to use tariffs as its keystone trade policy.

These events show that there’s nothing – no trade agreement or set of international rules – that will interfere with the MAGA agenda. And no G7 nation is spared, putting enormous pressure on Mark Carney as he tries to steer the ship at Kananaskis.

Past confrontations with Trump don’t augur well. There was a blow-up after the last G7 held in Canada in 2018, when Mr. Trump left early, rejected the final communiqué, and began his personal attacks on Justin Trudeau in the process. 

The disagreement was eventually smoothed over, although the spectre of that shameful episode lingers. Then at the G7 meeting in Biarritz the following year, Trump had what was described as a “sharp and sometimes bitter disagreement” with several other leaders over his desire to welcome Vladimir Putin back into the club.

Subsequent G7 summits, notably during Joe Biden’s presidency, went reasonably well. Last year’s communiqué now seems positively quaint:

“We remain united in our commitment to the rules-based, free and fair, equitable, and transparent. multilateral trading system, with the World Trade Organization (WTO) at its core … we reaffirm our attachment to transparency, to coordination, and to the respect of WTO rules in our respective policies.”

Now, of course, the rules-based order is besieged. In Kananaskis, the other leaders will want to use the opportunity express their views face-to-face with Trump, with the risk that this will precipitate a disruptive response.

There have been efforts to show a degree of collective spirit in separate, preparatory meetings these past weeks among G7 foreign, trade and finance ministers, where there any discord was played down in the various communiqués. However, when the leaders gather, it seems pretty certain they will use the chance to hammer Trump’s trade policies head-to-head.

The challenge for Mr. Carney and the other five leaders will be to try keep these exchanges behind closed doors as much as possible, hoping a public Trump explosion can be avoided. The situation is doubly tricky for Mr. Carney because of his parallel discussions with Mr. Trump on a new Canada-US economic and security arrangement of some sort

Similarly, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has his own trade deal in the works and doesn’t want it jeopardized by any public confrontation. And other European leaders may have similar concerns. But these unprecedented and destructive American actions, plus Mr. Trump’s predilection for theatre, may make it impossible to keep these disagreements from erupting in the open.

None of this bodes well for Kananaskis. But if disaster is avoided, there might be some hope for consensus on another issue that hits all members: China and its aggressive, state sponsored export strategies. This could provide the basis for a semblance of unity in the final communiqué.

As to other items on the Kananaskis radar, including international peace and security, global economic stability, growth and the digital transition, there could also be room for agreement, including on some of the trade related recommendations in the Business 7 report from the heads of G7 Chambers of Commerce.

But Mr. Trump’s trade wars have pre-emptively compromised any semblance of G7 unity, presenting tough, possibly existential, challenges. Without full US support, the institution faces an uncertain future.

These are overarching challenges that will test Mr. Carney’s skills and experience as chair. Trump’s adversarial policies and the pace and intensity of other geopolitical events may mean the G7 has outlived its usefulness and risks fading into irrelevance.

Lawrence Herman is an international lawyer with Herman & Associates, a senior fellow at the C.D. Howe Institute in Toronto.

To send a comment or leave feedback, email us at blog@cdhowe.org.

The views expressed here are those of the author. The C.D. Howe Institute does not take corporate positions on policy matters.

A version of this Memo first appeared in Policy Magazine.

Want more insights like this? Subscribe to our newsletter for the latest research and expert commentary.