BRITAIN: On the way to Gleneagles from Edinburgh you pass the monument to the Scottish patriot William Wallace. "It's a monument to Mel Gibson," said a cynical observer, alluding to the Hollywood star's portrayal of Wallace in the film Braveheart. But the film's title entered the language and now the term "braveheart" is applied to those who try hard and fight the good fight in some noble cause even if, like William Wallace, they end up being disembowelled either literally or metaphorically.
The chief aspirants for "braveheart" status at the G8 Summit in Gleneagles this week are, of course, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. But after all the fanfare and the slogans, something real, concrete and substantial has to be delivered, or else the pair of them might as well join those protesters dressed up as clowns who have been romping through the streets of Edinburgh all week.
The same faultline that was evident in international relations over the Iraq War can be seen again in the G8 deliberations but this time Britain is broadly on the same side as the rest of Europe. The Bush administration and the US in general do not have the same level of interest in African affairs as Britain and the rest of Europe, perhaps not least because the US has never been a colonial power in Africa.
Thus there are differences in attitude towards countries like Nigeria and Kenya, motor-forces in the African economy but beset by problems of corruption and defective governance. Neither of these countries qualifies for debt relief under the $40-billion package announced by G7 (G8 minus Russia) finance ministers on June 10th.
The US takes a stern view on corruption and governance issues and would be loath to provide debt relief for Nigeria and Kenya, whereas countries like Britain would be more inclined to ease the burden as a means of promoting the overall economic health of those two key countries, and in the hope that economic wellbeing will be conducive to better governance and less corruption.
Thus we are not likely to see any spectacular developments on the debt relief issue, indeed it is said that the June 10th announcement would have been held over until this week but for fears that the US would pull out of the deal.
On global warming, US president George Bush has set his face firmly against anything that looks remotely like the Kyoto Protocol for the curbing of greenhouse gas emissions. The focus will shift as a result on getting some kind of basic agreement and transatlantic consensus over "the science".
So it is not expected that there will be a cap on carbon emissions, one of the main contributors to the "greenhouse effect", but instead there will probably be a commitment to reducing these emissions through investment in new technologies.
On trade, the G8 countries will be holding their fire until the World Trade Organisation ministerial meeting in Hong Kong in December, but it is expected that, with some fanfare, nations with Least Developed Country (LDC) status will be given quota-free and duty-free access for their exports to G8 countries. The EU already grants this under its "everything but arms" initiative.
The G8 leaders start arriving this morning at Prestwick airport, 90 minutes away from Gleneagles, and will be greeted on the tarmac by Scottish first minister Jack McConnell, who is using the occasion to boost local tourism. After a drinks reception this evening they and their spouses will attend a dinner hosted by Queen Elizabeth.
Tomorrow, leaders of Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa, as well as UN secretary general Kofi Annan and heads of other major institutions such as the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, will arrive to join the Gleneagles deliberations, but most of the political leaders in this group will leave at the end of the day. South Africa is the exception and will return on Friday, along with six other countries from the African continent: Algeria, Ethiopia, Ghana, Nigeria, Senegal and Tanzania.
This could be the emblematic picture from the entire occasion: African leaders arriving to meet representatives of the rich countries of the world, gathered under heavy security at a luxury hotel and golf resort. Will they be sent away empty-handed? Mr Blair will hold a press conference of the summit on Friday afternoon, immediately after a working lunch between the G8 and African leaders. The presence of the African group will increase the pressure on him to have something substantial to unveil to the world. After that, other G8 leaders will hold individual press conferences.
The great dangers are vagueness and lack of ambition but, given the gap between the US and the rest on global warming, progress will be modest in this regard. An extra injection of hard cash for Africa should prove easier to deliver, although it probably won't be enough to satisfy the critics who will also want further concessions on trade and debt relief. Gordon Brown, who won't be present at Gleneagles since the summit is confined to heads of government and foreign ministers, has spoken of a Marshall Plan for Africa, along the lines of the US programme to rebuild Europe after the second World War.
This will be the 31st summit of its kind since the first one was held at Rambouillet, France, in 1975. It is not easy to think of any decisions made or conclusions arrived at by previous summits, although they did provide a convenient focus for the anti-globalisation movement. But this time the spotlight is intense and Sir Bob will have something to say about it if his friend Tony Blair fails to deliver. The "Braveheart" title is there for the winning, while the consequences of failure will be denunciation and excoriation on the soundstages and in the broadcasting studios of the world. But Tony can't become a Braveheart unless George W undergoes a change of heart.