BRICS, a grouping of five countries working together on key issues, had its summit last month in South Africa. During it they announced it will grant full BRICS membership to Argentina, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and the UAE on January 1, 2024. BRICS member states claim that over 40 countries seek to join the group as they are seen as a growing alternative to Western rule of global affairs.
Despite this being a major step for the organisation, very few in Ireland even know what BRICS is and who is a part of it. As this group grows in size and influence, it is important to know who they are, why it was created, and how it may change the state of global politics.
BRICS, in its simplest terms, is an acronym based on its five members Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa.
The term BRIC was created by Goldman Sachs, a US investment bank and financial services company as they believed those four economies would dominate global growth by 2050. South Africa was later added in 2010. Goldman Sachs said these countries could have the potential to form their own economic bloc, but that this is dependent on their political policies and relationship between each other.
Today, These five current members represent over 40 percent of the world’s population and are all ranked among the world’s fastest-growing emerging economies for years due to low labour costs, and abundant natural resources.
They currently operate as an informal grouping of nations that meet annually at the BRICS convention, where members and heads of each state seek to further economic cooperation between each other. Each head of state acts as the chairman of the group, rotating once a year. Informal meetings between Brics nations began in 2006 with their first official meeting on June 16, 2009, in Yekaterinburg, Russia.
Its stated aim is to ‘amplify the voice of the Global South’ and stand as a global alternative to Western International Institutions while deepening economic cooperation between member states. Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said BRICS is not meant to rival the United States, but to instead organise the developing Global South.
They are calling on a fairer world order less focused on western powers such as the USA and EU and a reform of international institutions. Many in developing countries, including those in BRICS, view many of them as western-led, with even the U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres supporting these claims.
White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said he does not see BRICS as “evolving into some kind of geo-political rival to the United States or anyone else”. His reason for this was due to each country having different views on critical issues, but would be “more of a complementarity than a replacement that is on the horizon.”
By working together, they can push for projects that can be beneficial to some or all members of the group and make themselves less reliant on US and European countries. Each member has their own ideas and projects they want to progress in this regard, ranging from increasing the group’s membership to forming their own currency to compete with the US dollar.
Brazil’s president said nations should not be forced to trade in their currency when they do not use the dollar, and advocated for a common currency for South American countries. He is also advocating for a common currency to be used among BRICS member states which was pushed for during last month’s summit.
The group’s slow but gradual distancing from the US dollar can already be seen as members are discarding billions of dollars worth of assets backed by the US government.
China has reduced its US treasury holdings by $117.4 billion over a 12 months period, but still held $821.8 billion in July.
The dollar is still overwhelmingly dominant in global trade, however, as it is on one side of almost 90% of global forex transactions, according to Bank of International Settlements Data. Completely de-dollarising would take a lot more support to be done due to its prevalence and it will require countless importers and exporters, borrowers, lenders and currency traders globally to independently decide to use other currencies.
This growing economic power also brings growing political power, and as these five countries act more unified in regards to international affairs, their global influence grows with it.
Their most unifying aspect is a set of joint priorities that include:
- Resolving regional problems such as the Iranian nuclear program and conflicts in Libya, Syria, and Afghanistan.
- Tackling financial and economic issues such as reforms to the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF).
- Establishing a BRICS Interbank Cooperation Mechanism.
Despite these joint initiatives and their newfound unity, however, they still disagree on even fundamental policies such as transparency and a balanced approach, sometimes even bringing some member countries into conflict.
India and China are still in the midst of a border dispute which has led to unarmed skirmishes between each other as recently as 2022. This has been further escalated when China published a new map in August of this year where they lay claim to territory India says they own who lodged a protest in response. One of these areas is India’s northeastern state of Arunachal Pradesh, which China considers to be part of Tibet, and where the two countries fought a full-scale border war in 1962.
Their largest flaw, and one that can isolate their members from other international institutions, is the reputation of Russia and China who have committed very recent human rights violations.
This is already causing some issues for the group as an arrest warrant for Putin issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC) accusing him of War crimes in Ukraine meant he could not attend the BRICS Summit. Russia rejected the accusation and said it had no legal meaning due to them not being a member of the ICC, but South Africa is, and would have been obliged to arrest him if he travelled there.
On top of their invasion of Ukraine, a UN Special Rapporteur for Russia said there is a pattern of suppression of civil and political rights currently in the country. There are also concerns over their mass arbitrary arrests of anti-war protesters and persistent use of torture and overall ill-treatment of those detained.
China has also been arbitrarily detaining critics or making them disappear, and harrassing states who speak against them. It attempted a boycott of public United Nations events highlighting their human rights violations in Hong Kong, Tibet, and Xinjiang, including protest crackdowns and the incarceration and genocide against Uyghurs in Tibet.
Russia was still able to represent themselves online despite this arrest warrant and the four other members also gained from the summit in their own right. China got its plan to expand BRICS membership to six other countries, further growing the group’s influence on the global stage. Brazil’s push for a common currency was taken seriously by other members. India was able to balance its friendship with both BRICS members and the US. Lastly, South Africa was able to host a successful meeting with zero public fallout.
These may seem to be small successes, but this could mark a change in global politics as countries outside the Western powers garner more power and unity on the international stage.
