Bono and Bob Geldof hit the stage in Japan last week. They weren’t singing songs, but drumming up support for an unlikely cause: the Group of Eight (G-8).

The rockers lent star power to the Tokyo International Conference on African Development. Their real agenda was putting the developing world on the discussion table at next month’s G-8 meeting in Hokkaido. Japan’s efforts to do the same may just reinvigorate a grouping that has lost its groove.

A quick quiz: What was the location of last year’s G-8 summit? What about in 2006 or 2005? If you don’t know the answers—Heiligendamm, Germany; St. Petersburg, Russia; and Gleneagles, Scotland, respectively—you’re hardly alone.

The G-8’s once mighty confabs have devolved into hollow talk fests big on photo ops and spin, small on results. If anyone remembers anything about the 2006 summit, for example, it was US President George W. Bush shocking German Chancellor Angela Merkel with a shoulder massage.

Tell that to Japan’s government, which seems to think it’s hosting the Olympics. Countless press briefings and a barrage of daily news reports detail planning, strategy and security. Japan is even minting new 1,000-yen coins for the July 7 to 9 event.

Why is Japan so excited about something that would garner scant attention elsewhere? It’s realizing the extent to which the world isn’t looking its way. Japan’s efforts to bolster its status could, by extension, reinvigorate the G-8.

Japan’s chance

Japan last hosted the G-8 in 2000. It was back when Yoshiro Mori was prime minister and banking crises were undermining the nation’s global prestige. Japan spent about $750 million on an event that ended with little headway on forgiving the debts of the world’s poorest nations.

The eight years since have seen Japan’s influence wane substantially. Its $4.4-trillion economy may be far bigger, but China’s $2.6-trillion one is more important globally.

Part of Japan’s problem is unimpressive growth. Many bet that once Japan shook off deflation, its markets would roar back. More than 15 years after the 1980s asset bubble burst, growth is modest, interest rates are close to zero and Japan’s debt load is the largest in the developed world.

A revolving door of uninspiring leaders hasn’t helped. Japan also suffers from a widely held perception that it hasn’t done enough to atone for its World War II aggression.

Relevance quest

It’s among the reasons why Japan doesn’t have a permanent seat on the UN Security Council and is underrepresented in diplomatic circles. It also keeps Japan from getting credit for the billions of dollars it has spent from Beijing to Jakarta in recent decades assisting Asia’s weaker links.

The sense that Japan is becoming a wallflower amid Asia’s boom is inspiring a sudden desire for greater relevance, and the G-8 could be a key forum.

Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda seems keener than his peers to reach out to emerging markets. It’s a smart move to give fast-growth emerging nations such as Brazil, China and India a greater say in Hokkaido. These economies are vital to the economic and climate-change-related trends affecting the US, Japan, Germany, the UK, France, Russia, Italy and Canada.

Kicking Russia out of the G-8—something US Sen. John McCain is arguing for—wouldn’t accomplish much. It’s better to bring key developing nations into the tent. Japan’s G-8 will be the most inclusive ever, a nod to the rising influence less-developed economies are having on the richest ones.

African focus

Equally important is Japan’s push to get G-8 officials more focused not only on Asia’s food-price crisis, but Africa. Fukuda aims to make the event a new chapter in the G-8’s interaction with one of the most impoverished, yet promising, regions.

It’s hardly pure altruism. Japan has watched China pour billions of dollars into Africa to gain access to energy and other vital commodities.

China’s investments are shoring up unsavory regimes in places, such as Sudan and Zimbabwe, which also buy China’s weapons. Whereas China invests in dodgy governments, Japan could go a long way toward investing in Africa’s people and giving the continent real hope.

Putting the G-8’s attention on Africa is the right thing to do. Bono even took the stage at the MTV Video Music Awards in Japan last week to talk up the G-8—a rarity in pop-music circles.

Japan also should lead on climate change. The issue dominated last year’s G-8 summit in Germany, where leaders vowed to fight rising temperatures. They agreed not to force the US and Russia to set immediate targets for cutting greenhouse-gas emissions, so it was a wash.

It’s vital to persuade developing nations to take part in a successor to the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. So is shaming the US into doing its part. Here, Japan’s efforts to put the issue firmly on the G-8’s table are commendable.

Japan’s desire to make the most of its moment in the spotlight could do the world good. Its quest for relevance may give the G-8 the shakeup it badly needs.

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Bono and Bob Geldof hit the stage in Japan last week. They weren’t singing songs, but drumming up support for an unlikely cause: the Group of Eight (G-8).