BRICS: A Pragmatic Laboratory for Global South Multilateralism
In an era marked by geopolitical polarization and growing trade barriers, BRICS is increasingly viewed through a geopolitical optics, with some observers portraying its expansion as an effort to challenge the existing architecture of global governance and financial institutions.
Such interpretations capture part of the changing landscape, but do not fully explain BRICS’s evolution.
A more useful understanding is to see BRICS as a pragmatic platform through which emerging and developing economies seek greater institutional agency.
Rather than defining itself simply in opposition to the West, BRICS has gradually developed mechanisms for development finance, trade, technology, agriculture, health and sustainable development, while calling for reform of existing multilateral institutions.
BRICS’s significance lies not merely in its collective political voice, but in its attempt to translate that voice into practical instruments that expand the policy space and development options of the Global South whose voices are not heard.
The body has pursued two related objectives: greater representation for developing countries within existing global institutions and stronger cooperation among its members. Its approach is increasingly about reform, diversification and institutional choice.
At the first BRIC summit in Yekaterinburg in 2009, Brazil, Russia, India and China called for a more representative international financial architecture. At New Delhi in 2012, they explored creating a BRICS development bank.
The 2013 Durban Summit advanced the proposal, while the 2014 Fortaleza Summit produced the institutional breakthrough: agreements establishing the New Development Bank (NDB) and the Contingent Reserve Arrangement (CRA).
It demonstrated that emerging economies could create institutions addressing development and financial vulnerabilities while operating within the wider multilateral system.
The NDB focuses on infrastructure and sustainable development, while the CRA provides a financial support mechanism for members facing balance-of-payments pressures.
Neither institution needs to replace the World Bank or IMF to be consequential.
Their importance lies partly in broadening the institutional options available to developing economies.
As BRICS matured, its agenda expanded beyond macroeconomics into agriculture, science, technology, industry, digital cooperation, health and climate-related issues.
The 2015 Ufa Summit adopted the Strategy for BRICS Economic Partnership, while subsequent presidencies developed sectoral cooperation mechanisms.
The BRICS Agricultural Research Platform, for example, sought to connect scientific cooperation with practical challenges including food security and agricultural productivity.
The BRICS Plus approach introduced at the 2017 Xiamen Summit marked a significant step towards expanding cooperation beyond the original five members to include other emerging markets and developing countries.
The 2023 Johannesburg Summit accelerated this process by inviting six countries to join. Argentina ultimately declined, while Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates joined in 2024.
Indonesia became a full member in 2025. The result is an 11-member grouping spanning Asia, Africa, the Middle East and Latin America.
The partner-country mechanism established at the 2024 Kazan Summit has added another layer of participation.
This flexible architecture matters because openness does not require every participating country to share identical political systems, economic structures or foreign-policy priorities.
Different levels of participation can allow countries to cooperate where interests converge, focusing on “harmony without uniformity”.
BRICS’s greatest strength lies not in geopolitical homogeneity, but in its capacity for issue-based multilateralism. Members do not need to agree on everything to cooperate on development finance, agriculture, public health, energy, digital technologies, trade facilitation or climate finance.
In a fragmented international environment, the capacity to pursue practical cooperation despite political differences may be more valuable than institutional uniformity.
The group’s credibility will depend increasingly on implementation rather than declarations. It has accumulated numerous summits, ministerial meetings, working groups and cooperation mechanisms.
The harder question is whether these structures produce measurable benefits for developing economies.
This is particularly relevant to financial cooperation. Discussions on greater use of national currencies and cross-border payment arrangements may increase resilience and reduce transaction costs, but their success will depend on interoperability, financial stability, market confidence and business adoption.
The 2024 Kazan Summit, for instance, concerned studying the feasibility of an independent cross-border settlement and depositary infrastructure to promote a multipolar world order.
It should, therefore, be viewed as a work in progress, not an established alternative to existing financial systems.
The NDB’s significance will be measured by the reach of its financing. Digital cooperation will matter if it expands access while respecting national sovereignty.
Climate initiatives will matter if they mobilise affordable finance for adaptation and resilience. The partner-country mechanism created another layer of participation.
As a founding member and a major economic force within BRICS, China has contributed substantially to trade, development finance, infrastructure and South-South cooperation.
Yet BRICS cannot be reduced to any single member. India, Russia, Brazil and the newer members bring distinct priorities, making the grouping more pluralistic and potentially more representative of the developing world.
The 18th BRICS Summit in New Delhi on 12-13 September comes at an important stage in this evolution. Under India’s 2026 chairship, the focus on resilience, innovation, cooperation and sustainability provides an opportunity to shift attention from expansion towards consolidation.
The Global South needs institutions capable of delivering development. BRICS should, therefore, be judged by whether its political solidarity can become practical cooperation: trade mechanisms reducing unnecessary barriers, technological cooperation widening access, agricultural innovation strengthening food security, and climate finance responding to developing countries’ needs.
This does not require BRICS to become a closed geopolitical bloc, nor does it require abandoning existing global institutions. Its greater contribution may instead be to create additional institutional options while supporting reform of organisations such as the IMF, World Bank, WTO and UN, “instead of reinventing wheel”.
The rise of the Global South should not be measured simply by the loudness of its collective political voice. It should be measured by the strength of the institutions it builds, the choices it creates and the tangible improvements those institutions deliver.
BRICS is, therefore, best understood not as a finished alternative to the international system, but as a pragmatic laboratory for a more open Global South, where political solidarity is tested against the harder standards of institutional agency, implementation and developmental results.
(The Writer is the Diplomatic Correspondent of the New Nation)
