As 2026 draws to a close, three major summits will bring together world leaders in overlapping yet distinct fora: The East Asia Summit (EAS) in Manila, the APEC Economic Leaders’ Meeting in Shenzhen and the G20 Summit in Miami. Their significance will lie not merely in the declarations they produce, but in which leaders attend, the ones who stay away, and what bilateral or trilateral encounters take place on the sidelines.

These summits occur amid deepening international divisions: The US-China rivalry , conflicts in Ukraine and West Asia, economic disruption and weakening multilateral institutions. Their challenge is to restore cooperation increasingly subordinated to great-power competition.

The East Asia Summit comes first. The Philippines concludes its ASEAN chairmanship amid sharp confrontation with China in the South China Sea. Manila has emerged as ASEAN’s most outspoken challenger of Chinese maritime assertiveness.…