Political and international affairs experts expecting tectonic and transformative changes to international relations at the BRICS’ Russia Summit were not disappointed, with bloc’s 43-page Kazan Declaration, entitled ‘Strengthening Multilateralism for Just Global Development and Security’, containing 134 points aimed at:
creating “a more just and democratic world order,”
“enhancing cooperation for global and regional stability and security,”
“fostering economic and financial cooperation”
and “strengthening people-to-people exchanges for social and economic development.”
The declaration called for reforms to Bretton Woods – the international financial architecture established at the end of the Second World War, to make its institutions more representative of developing countries’ interests, rejected “unilateral, punitive and discriminatory protectionist” climate change-related measures, and expressed support for a comprehensive transformation of the United Nations, including the Security Council, to make it more representative of modern realities.
On the economic front, the bloc expressed support for the expanded use of national currencies in trade, highlighted the importance of the continued implementation of the BRICS Economic Partnership macroeconomic policy coordination and cooperation strategy, and welcomed “the considerable interest by countries of the Global South” toward BRICS.
Specific commitments include plans to strengthen cooperation in high-tech via the BRICS Business Council’s New Technological Platform, efforts to expand the role of the bloc’s New Development Bank “in promoting infrastructure and sustainable development” of member countries, and the ramping up of cooperation in medicine across a wide array of areas, from traditional and digital health to nuclear medicine, radiopharmaceuticals and vaccines.
The declaration committed bloc members to continue negotiations into the ambitious BRICS Clear cross-border settlement and depository system, welcomed further exploration into “opportunities to establish a logistics platform to coordinate and improve transport conditions for multimodal logistics between the BRICS countries,” and welcomed the Russian proposal to create the BRICS Grain Exchange platform to ensure (and insure) global food security.
In a development highlighting the BRICS’ growing view of itself as an independent geopolitical actor, the declaration offered comprehensive commentaries on the bloc's take on international security issues of the day, from the illegal use of sanctions and the placement of weapons in outer space, to the Ukrainian crisis, Palestine's drive for full membership in the UN, Israel’s “premeditated terrorist attack” targeting communication devices in Lebanon, and its attacks in Gaza, Syria and Iran, the crisis in the Red Sea, the situations in South Sudan, Haiti, Afghanistan, and more.
‘Inflection Point of International Politics’
“The 16th Summit of BRICS is an inflection point of international politics because the BRICS are showing that there is a collective way of negotiating in the international system that does not need hegemony or the use of force,” Anuradha Chenoy, Jawaharlal Nehru University Centre for Russian and Central Asian Studies professor emerita told Sputnik, commenting on the contents of the Kazan Declaration and its global implications.
“The Kazan Declaration is a road map for BRICS countries because it combines ‘common interests’ with ‘strategic partnership’,” Dr. Chenoy said, contrasting the bloc’s approach to Western-led pacts and agreements, where “interests” are reserved for Western countries, “and the term strategic means the threat or possible use of force.”
In calling for reforms to Bretton Woods institutions, the Kazan Declaration actually highlights the bloc’s efforts to set “up their own version of Bretton Woods institutions in an entirely different way,” Chenoy believes, pointing to BRICS’ use of economic partnership agreements, national currencies in trade, the New Development Bank, etc. for this purpose.
“This is in direct contrast to Bretton Woods way of functioning, [which] is intrusive - in that it directs control of economies, is unilateral whereby countries are left with neither voice or choice of what direction their economies can take,” the professor said.
Ultimately, the summit in Kazan is about tectonic shifts to the global balance of power, Chenoy says, “because the rise and common agenda of the BRICS shows a re-distribution and dispersal of global power that was earlier held by the US led collective West. Now, the combined economic strength of the BRICS in terms of PPP equals if not beats that of the G-7. This provides smaller nations the chance to leverage between countries to strengthen their strategic autonomy and look for choices. BRICS is offering trade in local currencies, so countries are protected from the dollar and dollar-related debt; a diverse market for their produce and production, and so on.”
BRICS as Counterbalance to Western-Dominated World Order
“From a strategic point of view, BRICS in Kazan counterbalance the ailing G7, at a time that sees several key members of the ongoing bi-annual meeting of The Commonwealth [choosing] BRICS instead, and when the US and the EU are peddling of fear in the uncertainty of their own national and international institutions,” Paolo Raffone, director of the Brussels-based CIPI Foundation geopolitical affairs think tank, told Sputnik.
“The attendance by the UN Secretary general, Guterres, confirms their peaceful and cooperative intentions within the multilateral system. To the dismay of the ideological critics of BRICS no incendiary statements were heard or written,” Raffone said.
Commenting on the declaration’s points about the need to reform the United Nations and the Bretton Woods financial institutions to make them more inclusive, the observer pointed out that while such proposals have been under debate since the 1970s, only now, with the combined power of the economic and geopolitical global majority in the face of the BRICS nations, is it becoming truly possible.
“The declaration is quietly but resolutely stating that despite the hegemons’ opposition the path towards a more balanced representation and responsibility in world affairs cannot be stopped anymore. It’s just a matter of time not of direction and outcome,” Raffone said.
“BRICS underline that the ‘system’ is not an end but a tool. Therefore, the ‘system’ should be serving all people on Earth without hindering their legitimate aspirations to preserve their identity. In this sense, BRICS oppose the dramatic twist imposed to the world institutions in late 1970s with the neoliberal ideology that sought shredding identities into the convenient market-driven categories of debtor/creditor, consumer/producer, and, of course, good/bad guys and people,” the observer summed up.