2023-04-16 04:44:42
Estimates from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) indicate that the Brics’ contribution to world GDP in terms of purchasing power parity will exceed 50 percent by 2030. In 2020, the group’s contribution was already 31.5 percent, compared to 30 percent of the G7 countries, thus dwarfing the major Western powers.
Together, the five countries in the bloc—Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa—also account for more than 40 percent of the planet’s population, making up more than a third of the world’s food supply. Due to these numbers and the growing interest of various States in joining the group, we are witnessing the decline of the (old) idols of the international system, signaling the birth of a new era.
It is the unequivocal recognition of the role of the Brics as a factor of global political transformation, which shows the way to establish a truly multipolar world.
The rise of the group, for its part, occurs in the midst of a backdrop of distrust regarding the exorbitant privileges of the United States in the system (mainly due to the role of the dollar as an international exchange currency and store of value), as well as as well as a crisis of legitimacy suffered by the main post-war multilateral financial institutions, such as the World Bank and the IMF.
Consequently, Brics has presented himself as a kind of lawyer for developing countries, in defense of a fairer world order based on the sovereign choice of each country with respect to its social, economic and political organization.
Indeed, the obsolete notion that the great powers of the West were the only ones capable of giving stability to the international system was nothing more than a means to justify the maintenance of the the state in which and to oppose ongoing changes, changes that will serve the interests of an ever-widening group of countries.
The relative strength of the states belonging to the G7 during the 1990s and mid-2000s resided —in part— in the lack of political coordination between the emerging economies, which found no space in international organizations to defend their interests and increase their voice and voting power in global decision-making processes.
Now, since its first statement, the group has already highlighted the need to increase the “voice and representation” of developing countries in global governance mechanisms, in order to promote “open, inclusive and balanced economic globalization”, thus correcting the obsolete North-South dichotomy and contributing to the promotion of democracy in international relations.
At the same time, the Brics did not question the relevance of the international organizations themselves, but the political and economic inequalities present in their structures. This speech served as the main backdrop for the rapprochement of other major countries to the group over the years, as happened in the context of the Brics+ format.
In addition, another of the reasons that explain the importance of the Brics is their resistance to the unipolar order and the hegemonic role of the United States. In this context, the reformist movements in defense of the improvement of the main mechanisms of global governance, in which the Americans enjoy notorious structural privileges, only intend to make them more representative taking into account the new global economic and political reality.
As if that were not enough, an analysis of the documents issued by the Brics over the years shows that the group has always emphasized the importance of the existence of multiple centers of cultural and civilizational influence in the world, a discourse that goes against of the alleged universalism of North American values and of the so-called American way of life.
This translates into the recent interest of several countries in the Islamic world in joining the group (such as Tunisia, Turkey, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and others), who are also interested in defending the plurality of civilizations and value systems in international relations.
By cooperating with the Brics, the Muslim world will have greater political capital to confront the cultural imperialism of the West that is taking place today, represented by the shameless practice of clientelism that Americans and Europeans continue to carry out towards other peoples of the world.
The Brics, in turn, represent a limit to this new “civilizing” global process undertaken by the ancient idols, relying on the experience of societies with ancient traditions, such as Russia, India and China.
As countries formerly situated in the outer circles of ‘power’, the rise of the Brics serves to demonstrate the historically transitory character of Western dominance in international relations.
What explains this situation is precisely the infeasibility of a global hegemonic model, in which a single center of power has the capacity to impose its opinions and preferences on the other actors in the system.
The antithesis of this model, in turn, is precisely what the Brics represent: a project based on “collective” leadership in defense of multipolarity in the world. The intention is to build a fairer scenario for a greater number of peoples and societies through the strengthening and expansion of this alliance.
Everything in life has its cycle and duration. Today we are witnessing the decline of the Western powers, due to the dispersion of political and economic power towards new centers of influence. The day is coming to an end for the old idols. But it’s just getting started for the Brics.
Taken from Sputnik
#Twilight #idols #BRICS #outshine #West