BRICS Information Centre
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BRICS Information Centre |
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Building the Bigger, Broadening BRICS
John Kirton, Ridhima Sinha, Sara Cai and Maria Fernanda Erthal, BRICS Research Group
July 2, 2025
The BRICS serves as a platform for cooperation among major emerging economies. It plays an influential role in global governance by promoting multipolarity and a development-focused agenda. The bloc allows members to coordinate their positions on international issues and advocate for more inclusive and representative global institutions.
The BRICS combines the world’s most influential economies that are not traditional members of the western-dominated order. In many cases these countries have diverging foreign policy goals and disagreements, but they have come together in this group to promote the role, priorities and significance of emerging economies. The BRICS can thus be seen as a spiritual successor of earlier diplomatic efforts to create a bloc to spearhead the interests of emerging countries, such as the Non-Aligned Movement during the Cold War. It now serves as the voice for the Global South, providing a powerful platform for emerging and developing economies to articulate their interests and concerns on the global stage.
The most visible pillars of the BRICS’s importance and influence are, first and foremost, its economic weight and its role as a driver of global growth. Together the BRICS countries represent a significant share – almost half – of the world’s population. They represent an even larger portion of global gross domestic product and have surpassed the G7 in purchasing power parity. BRICS countries are essential engines of the global economy, offering vast markets and significant potential for trade and investment. In energy, they hold over 70% of the world’s rare earth reserves and account for more than 40% of global oil production.
The BRICS’s central goal of advancing more equitable global governance continues. It continually seeks to foster Global South cooperation, shared growth and development, and a bigger place in the international order for emerging economies.
Its initial focus on economic and energy cooperation and development has broadened to include political coordination, international governance reform, security dialogue and cultural exchange, largely in response to global developments.
Beyond challenging and reforming the western financial order, the BRICS now seeks to strengthen the Global South in three main pillars: politics and security, economic and financial cooperation, and cultural and people-to-people exchange. Its central objective to reform global governance now emphasizes the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), to make it more representative of current power distributions and dynamics. It also offers alternatives to traditional financial institutions, such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, through its own instruments, notably the New Development Bank. The group’s determination, scope of its actions and the tools it employs to achieve its objectives have shifted from a primarily demand-driven stance to one focused on actively building alternatives.
The BRICS was created to counter the predominance of the G7, rather than in opposition to any particular country such as the United States. Its primary aim is to strengthen cooperation and development among countries of the Global South, and promote a more balanced and inclusive international order through constructive engagement and multilateral collaboration.
Many BRICS members, especially the new ones, are neutral or somewhat aligned with the United States. But because the BRICS collectively seeks to reform the international order to become less western dominated, the group inherently opposes this dimension of US predominance and influence.
Indeed, although BRICS members are diverse in their political systems, economies and specific national interests, they share a dissatisfaction with the existing Global North–dominated international order. This includes concerns about perceived inequities, the application of international law and the lack of a strong voice for developing countries.
The BRICS thus seeks reforms in global governance institutions, notably the UNSC, IMF and World Bank. It accurately argues that these institutions, largely shaped by western powers after World War II, do not adequately reflect the current global power balance or the interests of emerging economies. The creation of the NDB and the Contingent Reserve Arrangement further shows the BRICS’s desire to create alternative financial mechanisms that reduce reliance on traditional Global North–dominated ones.
However, Russia and China do view the BRICS as a platform to counter US and western influence. Russia, facing western sanctions, has actively used the BRICS platform to seek international support and build alliances. China, too, sees it as a vehicle to expand its global presence and challenge the US-led order. Both countries have actively sought to reduce the dominance of the US dollar in international trade and finance.
Indeed, the current “strong” de-dollarization effort of BRICS countries has included promoting trade in local currencies and exploring alternative payment systems, including BRICS Pay, which are seen as direct attempts to lessen the economic leverage the US and the impact of its sanctions. The creation of a common BRICS currency faces significant hurdles, but ongoing de-dollarization efforts clearly point to a desire to diversify away from the dollar, which is one of US president Donald Trump’s worst nightmares.
Thus, although BRICS members are diverse, their collective actions and stated goals, particularly in challenging Global North–dominated institutions and promoting a multipolar world, are consistent with the BRICS serving as a counterweight and alternative to US global influence, but not a purely “anti-US bloc.”
The now bigger BRICS remains open to increasing its membership. Since its first summit in 2009 with Brazil, Russia, India and China, it has gradually expanded, first with South Africa in 2011, then with Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran and the United Arab Emirates in 2024 and, most recently, with Indonesia in January 2025. This shows a clear commitment to broadening the group’s membership and thus global reach. New members are admitted by consensus. They are expected to align with BRICS principles such as respect for sovereignty, commitment to development and support for multilateralism.
The BRICS is open to new members because this expands its prominence and influence, especially as recently joined members wave have strong regional economic influence. The exact terms of inclusion will likely be the result of internal negotiations possibly subject to varying interests within the group, countries interested in supporting a more multipolar international order are likely to be welcomed.
To be sure, no clear, fixed framework currently exists for how countries can join the BRICS. Strategic US allies are generally avoided, except in pragmatic cases such as the UAE. There is a focus on regional and functional balance, meaning countries with geopolitical potential are prioritized, and need not be democracies or economically stable countries.
Chile’s participation in Brazil’s 2025 Rio Summit reflects the country’s openness to engage with the BRICS dialogue and agenda. Gloria de la Fuente, Chile’s under-secretary of foreign relations, has said that Chile will remain open to exploring participation in new groups, including BRICS, based on its national interests and a commitment to fair, mutually beneficial cooperation.
Whether this interest leads to more formal involvement depends on Chile’s own priorities and its alignment with BRICS’s guiding values. Any step toward formal participation would also require consensus among current BRICS members.
BRICS countries are major trade partners of Chile and so there are grounds for economic benefit from joining. Yet this not likely, given the current political environment, as the United States is also a major partner of Chile, in its sphere of influence and under the Trump administration, so joining the BRICS could result in US retaliation.
The BRICS Rio Summit will focus on strengthening cooperation among BRICS members, addressing pressing global challenges and reinforcing shared positions on governance and development. It may also offer further clarity on the group’s approach to expansion and its engagement with new and interested partners.
Given the division in the geopolitical world created by Russian president Vladimir Putin and US president Donald Trump, this year’s BRICS summit may make greater strides forward. However, the absence of Chinese president Xi Jinping as well as Putin at Rio may in unity among the leaders meeting there, but will decrease the breadth and weight of the summit’s results.
Moreover, the newly expanded membership will present significant challenges to decision making and consensus building within the group, which are likely to surface during this summit. There will be progress on the NDB, particularly through strong financial contributions. But on de-dollarization, there will be no concrete or groundbreaking advances at Rio.