BRICS promises to be strong economic bloc

World leaders gather for photo ceremony at the BRICS 2024 summit in Kazan, Russia. Reuters

Russian President Vladimir Putin has indeed scored big in terms of diplomacy by hosting the summit of the expanded bloc with its 10 members, with five members taking part in the summit for the first time, which includes the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Ethiopia and Iran at Kazan in Russia. Pakistan and Turkey are keen to join the group. Turkey President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was there at Kazan. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’s presence at the summit added diplomatic weight to the group.

The emergence of BRICS is seen as an alternative to the West-dominated groups like G-7 and institutions like the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank (WB). The sentiment in the group is to find an alternative system for international trade payments to the dollar, and thus counter the US economic sanctions on countries like Russia.

According to Shi Yinhong, professor at the School of International Studies at Renmin University, China, “In light of the rise of the Global South we should respond favourably to the calls from various countries to join BRICS…we should deepen fiscal and financial cooperation.” He said, “We must ensure that the international financial system more effectively reflects the changes in the global economic landscape.” He has however conceded that many BRICS members want to nurture their ties with the West.

The Chinese and the Russians are certainly looking to break the stranglehold of the West and of the dollar on the international trade system, and effectively challenge the West’s dominance. But it is more likely that the expanded BRICS is a stronger group representing 45 per cent of the global population and 35 per cent of the global trade flows which will not create an alternative economic bloc but it will become a strong and influential player in its own right, able to represent the interests of the emerging markets and that of the developing countries.

BRICS is closer to the developing countries both geographically and economically to the more than 100 smaller, developing countries. BRICS would be able to create a better balance of power in economic terms in the world which is now dominated by the G-7 of advanced industrialised countries.

Before the expansion, BRICS appeared to be a small group with limited economic and diplomatic influence. But the inclusion of major representatives of the Gulf Arab nations like the UAE and Saudi Arabia, and African economies like Egypt and Ethiopia makes BRICS a more representative group. With the coming together of the emerging market economies, the profile of the group becomes stronger. BRICS may not replace the West-dominated groups and systems, but it will show how dramatically the global landscape has changed in the 21st century.

The advantage with BRICS is that it is seen as an economic grouping more than a political or security grouping as Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO). It is more in the nature of the Association of the South-East Nation Nations (Asean) which again is an economic grouping in the south-east Asia.

And BRICS is also different from the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), which was a political gathering with its anti-colonial stance in the context of the post-Second World War global situation. BRICS marks the new economic reality of the world where many countries outside Europe have gained economic clout and they are rivalling the European countries in terms of development.

It is possible that this economic strength of the BRICS could in the future gain political weight as well. But at the moment, it is the joining of the economic forces of the emerging market economies. The BRICS would not become like the European Union (EU), which began as an economic grouping but then the European leaders have tried to make it a political union as well because all the EU members were in a single geographic region. This is not the case with BRICS, whose members are spread across continents.

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