Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. They are named the BRICS countries after 2010, when South Africa joined them. Before they were named BRIC and the original term was coined by a British economist who reunited the fastest growing economies, geopolitically opposing the G7 bloc. They met from 22nd to 24th august in Johannesburg and they also accepted further six nations to join them: Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. All of them had previously expressed a desire to join them and had sent official applications to do so. As Cyril Ramaphosa (the Southafrican leader) said, their full membership will be effective from 1st January 2024.
Alliances or not?
Some tensions could linger between members who want to forge the grouping into a counterweight to the West – notably China, Russia and now Iran – and those that continue to nurture close ties to the United States and Europe.
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva had vocally lobbied for neighbour Argentina’s inclusion while Egypt has close commercial ties with Russia and India.
The entry of oil powers Saudi Arabia and UAE highlights their drift away from the United States’ orbit and ambition to become global heavyweights in their own right. Russia and Iran have found common cause in their shared struggle against the U.S. – led sanctions and diplomatic isolation, with their economic ties deepening in the wake of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.
Beijing is close to Ethiopia and the country’s inclusion also speaks to Ramaphosa’s desire to amplify Africa’s voice in global affairs.
Every BRICS country has its own interest in expanding its economy or making its way to a new global order, but some western media criticised them for being a large group which lacks any commonality. In fact, the regularly repeated desire of its member states to wean themselves off the dollar, for example, has never materialised. And its most concrete achievement, the New Development Bank, is now struggling with sanctions against founding shareholder Russia.
Even as BRICS leaders this week weighed expanding the group – a move every one of them publicly supported -as we’ve seen divisions surfaced over.
These are the words of the UN general secretary Antonio Guterres:
“To ensure stability we need to consolidate strong multilateral institutions. Otherwise it is chaos.” “Our world is in serious trouble,” “Instead of working together, divisions grow and tensions increase.” And the causes are “divergent perspectives and strategies to global crises and the consequences of COVID-19 and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine,” and on the topic of ‘enlargement “I hope my words [on the importance of respecting both human rights and economic and social rights] are not in the wind,” “There is no International Order that works, if that Order is not based on the UN Charter, international law and human rights.” As if to say that on the one hand fundamental rights cannot be forgotten but on the other hand Western structures can no longer stand still in the face of geopolitical and environmental change
Let’s see what we should expect in the next few months!
✅ Edited by Eileen, from the Shanghai office of Pangea Studio Associato
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