Enlarging BRICS

Multipolarity in the international arena is fast holding ground and may soon become order of the day. This situation is emerging three decades after the fall of the Soviet Union that ended the Cold War, and no one could definitively predict that this end of bipolarity would transform into multipolarity so soon. At the disintegration of Soviet Union, it was quite clear that the unipolarity of the US that emerged thereafter would remain influencing international events for a long time to come. The reasons for the global dominance of America were varied and substantial conveying the impression that the influence factors it contained would prove long-lasting. It somehow did not happen, and rival axes of influence started to appear just a decade after end of the Cold War. It was not surprising therefore that Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa bloc (BRICS) began making waves pointing out to a major shift in international alignment.

South Africa hosted the BRICS summit that agreed to more than double the membership of the emerging-markets bloc but the true VIP was his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping who was given special treatment. He was personally received by the South African president, an honour that was even denied to Narendra Modi. Xi’s importance can also be seen in the anxiety created when he failed to appear for his first big address of the summit to business people from across the BRICS bloc though no explanation was given and he showed up later in the evening for a leaders’ dinner.

The real evidence of Xi’s importance was the expansion that looks set to add Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to the five-member bloc. This fits into Xi’s plan that China should lead the developing world in confronting US hegemony even as he also grapples with an economic slowdown and deflation at home.

Resultantly, the BRICS going from five to 11 countries is a diplomatic victory for Beijing. This is despite the expanded grouping facing more internal contradictions than ever before if China wants it to truly rival the G7 and other western-dominated institutions.

Countries such as Saudi Arabia and the UAE, traditional military allies of the west, and large IMF borrowers Argentina and Egypt, were among those invited to join Brazil, Russia, India, and South Africa in an expansion largely brokered by the club’s biggest economy. It is mostly viewed as a deal favouring China as is borne out by the fact that Ethiopia, Africa’s second most populous nation, will bring up the rear as the BRICS’ smallest member by GDP but it is a key debtor to Beijing.

Though South Africa’s Ramaphosa raised with Xi the need to narrow the trade deficit between South Africa and China which was more than $10bn last year yet the deals his government signed with Beijing sought to promote Chinese technology to overcome South Africa’s punishing rolling blackouts.

The BRICS summit was also noteworthy for a rare bilateral meeting between Xi and Modi in which they agreed to de-escalate tensions on the Sino-Indian border that have led to serious skirmishes in recent years. The two countries otherwise remain locked in a growing security dilemma as India expands strategic ties to the US and other western states. On the other hand, Indonesia, a natural BRICS candidate in economic terms as the world’s fourth most populous country and South-east Asia’s largest economy, also appeared cautious about adhering to an increasingly China-dominated club with the result that Jakarta, which was set to be among this week’s invitees, declined to submit its interest.

While presenting a comparison it is mentioned that by trying to turn the BRICS into a pre-eminent international forum the thorny issue remains that achieving this remains a challenge as the G7 is framed in a positive way, as grouping together as like-minded liberal democracies whereas the BRICS is the complete opposite of that, just a hodgepodge of countries and that the only common unifying issue for them to come together is in opposition to the current international system, as dominated by the west.

BRICS was originally an acronym coined in 2001 and the bloc was founded as an informal four-nation club in 2009 and added South Africa a year later in its only previous expansion. Now it is quite clear that multipolarity has become the new buzzword in geopolitics and geo-economics as states within the Global South seek an alternative path to development, and obviously this path is not designed and dictated by the West. BRICS is now prepared to expand as its original members Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa have welcomed six new entrants to the club, including Saudi Arabia, Iran, the UAE and Egypt.

Leaders of the BRICS emerging economies, which account for about a quarter of the world’s wealth are of the opinion that the traditional global governing system has become dysfunctional, deficient and missing in action and mention that BRICS are increasingly becoming a staunch force in defending international justice. There is growing interest in the bloc as at least 40 countries have expressed interest in joining, and 23 of those have formally submitted applications to become BRICS members. Formally launched in 2009, the BRICS now account for 23 per cent of global GDP and 42 per cent of the world’s population. The expansion brings Muslim and Arab voices to the bloc and is a strong signal that the old international order led by the US and Europe is undergoing seismic changes.

BRICS proponents profess that they want a new world order that is inclusive as they believe that the old order, dominated by the Global North, has been anything but just and inclusive.
The six new candidates will formally become members on 1 January, 2024 and 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. It is touted that BRICS has embarked on a new chapter in its effort to build a world that, according to BRICS leadership, is fair, a world that is just, a world that is also inclusive and prosperous. They point out that they have arrived at a consensus on the first phase of this expansion process and other phases will follow.

The group’s leaders left the door open to future enlargement, potentially paving the way for the admission of dozens more countries motivated by a desire to level a global playing field they consider rigged against them. The expansion adds economic heft to BRICS, whose current members are China, the world’s second largest economy, as well as Brazil, Russia, India and South Africa.

It could also amplify its declared ambition to become a champion of the Global South but long-standing tensions could linger between members who want to forge the grouping into a counterweight to the West and those that continue to nurture close ties to the United States and Europe.

This enlargement of BRICS opens up the prospects of Pakistan of joining the bloc. With the expansion, five of Pakistan’s regional neighbours are part of the grouping. BRICS, much like SCO, which Pakistan has joined, offers immense opportunities on a global scale. All this makes a logical case for Pakistan applying to the bloc. India may create hurdles but Pakistani relations with China and Saudi Arabia can be leveraged to support membership.

In this context the official Pakistani position is that it has yet to make a formal request to join the bloc.