JOHANNESBURG – The BRICS economic bloc has invited 69 leaders to its upcoming summit, including all African Heads of State and the political heads of major Global South bodies, various media reports indicate.
More than 40 countries have expressed interest to join the BRICS group, with 22 nations already having submitted official applications. “We’ve never had such a large outreach,” said Anil Sooklal, South Africa’s diplomat in charge of BRICS relations.
South Africa is hosting this year’s BRICS Summit, which is scheduled to take place in Johannesburg from August 22-24, 2023. The BRICS economic bloc comprises Brazil, Russia, China, India, and South Africa.
However, Western countries including the U.S., U.K., and France have not been invited to the upcoming summit. Last month, French President Emmanuel Macron expressed interest in attending the BRICS summit but was met with opposition from Russia.
According to Sooklal, South Africa’s President, Cyril Ramaphosa took a decision to invite all the 54 African Heads of State to the BRICS, and summit because of the bloc’s involvement in the continent.
Sooklal said: “Ramaphosa’s decision to invite all African leaders to the BRICS summit was driven by the bloc’s involvement in Africa. South Africa recognised the importance of using its chairmanship to foster development on the continent, with a specific focus on advancing the continental free trade agreement.”
“We’ve never had such a large outreach,” Sooklal stressed, noting that this year’s summit will be the largest. In comparison, he said: “In 2018, we had the entire Southern Africa Development Community [SADC] Heads of State present as well as leaders of the Global South.”
Sooklal emphasized that the interest in participating in the summit demonstrated a vote of confidence from global leaders in the BRICS bloc.
He clarified that while the group did not invite Western countries to its summit, the BRICS nations engage with the global community to address common issues.
He also said that discussions at the summit will include “deepening interaction in trading in local currencies.” He added: “Countries want to have greater flexibility and to be less dependent on the dollar.”
Why the BRICS is ascending on the world stage
According to Yaroslav Lissovolik, an economists and founder BRICS+ Analytics, in the past several years the BRICS have greatly increased their prominence in the global economy as a rising number of developing countries are applying for membership in the block.
He adds: “Over and above the discussions on BRICS expansion there is also the possibility of BRICS transforming the global financial system with the creation of a BRICS common currency. This enthusiasm and spotlight are in stark contrast to earlier pronouncements of the lack of luster in the grouping coming from observers both in the developed and developing world.”
He says the emergency of alternatives like BRICS dollar is pulling countries to the bloc of emerging countries. “In fact, it may be precisely the emergence of such alternatives in the past several years that engendered the greatest interest with respect to the BRICS block – most notably the possibility of creating a new common BRICS currency,” he says.
The second factor behind the rising prominence of BRICS, Lissovolik says, is the block’s greater openness. “The BRICS+ initiative re-launched by China in 2022 has generated a massive response throughout the Global South. The block of developed economies will have difficulties in emulating the degree of inclusivity demonstrated by the BRICS+ format.”
Furthermore, he says, the openness and inclusiveness of BRICS is multifaceted – it concerns not only the formal membership and the various formats in BRICS and BRICS+, but also the acceptance of various developmental models, political/economic systems and modernization paths. “In this respect, BRICS openness and inclusiveness are closely related to the “divergence paradigm” and the emergence of alternatives brought about by the block into the world economy.”
According to Lissovolik, another aspect of this greater inclusiveness and rising appeal of BRICS throughout the Global South is the sense of “shared prosperity” that is relevant not only for countries, but also wide strata of the population in the developing world.
“In some respects, the BRICS project may be perceived as a start-up of the Global South – with great uncertainty and doubts that faced the innovations introduced by BRICS into the global economy. It is also a certain vision of the future that has tremendous innovative power to shape new global governance for the new generation and by the new generation of global citizens. This is because there is an important generational element in the BRICS project that also raises its appeal in the developing world,” he says.
In the end, BRICS is not just an agent of change, it is increasingly seen by the young generation of the Global South as a key pillar of a more equitable and sustainable future, Lissovolik says.
According to a 2006 dossier titled “Follow-up Letter” by Goldman Sachs on the BRIC group, the share of the bloc in world economic growth could increase from 20 percent in 2003 to more than 45 percent in 2025.
Meanwhile, the African Heads of State are currently in Russia attending the Russia-Africa Summit.
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