BRICS expansion could undermine G7 dominance: Financial Times
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The new BRICS group now accounts for 47% of the world’s population and 37% of its GDP by PPP.
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China's President Xi Jinping claps during the BRICS summit in Johannesburg, South Africa, Wednesday, August 23, 2023. (AP)
A report by the Financial Times on Friday detailed the implications that BRICS expansion may have on the G7, noting that from a Chinese perspective, the inclusion of six countries into the bloc would serve to undermine Western hegemony.
On Thursday, the BRICS group announced that six countries were added to the bloc, namely Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates.
The report states that China has been spearheading efforts to "build a club" that would mark a shift in the global balance of power.
"Beijing’s focus is on creating a counterweight to the G7," Moritz Rudolf, research fellow at Yale Law School’s Paul Tsai China Center in the US, told the Financial Times. "Strengthening the BRICS grouping is a valuable tool in the pursuit for Chinese leadership."
Read more: BRICS expansion will breed fear of losing hegemony for West: UnHerd
The G7, which is comprised of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, UK, US and EU, is losing steam in the face of the BRICS expansion.
The G7 accounts for 37% of the world GDP (in 2022) and 9.8% of the world's total population, but without the EU it accounts for only 9.8 % of the world’s population and 29.8% of the global GDP by PPP.
The new BRICS group now accounts for 47% of the world’s population and 37% of its GDP by PPP.
It also possesses a greater share of global oil and gas reserves and an immense variety of natural resources.
Beijing's demands in its BRICS Declaration
The report states that the move to expand BRICS could provide Beijing with enough leverage to boost Chinese ambitions across the globe.
"Beijing seems to have been particularly successful at shaping the agenda and the BRICS discussion this year," Helena Legarda, lead analyst at Merics, a Berlin-based think-tank on China, told the Financial Times. "Much of the language in the leaders’ declaration reflects Chinese positions."
One of the demands that were voiced by China in its BRICS declaration was to reform international institutions, in particular the World Bank and the IMF, which are both largely dominated by the US.
Demands also included the call for "a greater role for emerging markets and developing countries, including in leadership positions," the declaration said.
While the IMF's director has traditionally been European, that of the World Bank has been a US citizen.
The declaration also called for a "comprehensive reform" of the UN, which Beijing regards as biased and Western-centered.
It said that the UN Security Council should "increase the representation of developing countries," a potential move that could equalize or outweigh Western representation.
Read more: Ex-rivals Iran, Saudi Arabia hail BRICS expansion
Internal conflicts
The BRICS group is also facing some internal challenges due to Russia and China espousing an anti-Western stance while India and Brazil seem to be less radical.
There have also been some conflicts with certain positions adopted with regard to the crises in Sudan, Haiti, Palestine, and the war in Ukraine.
"We recall our national positions concerning the conflict in and around Ukraine," the declaration read.
"It will be difficult for Beijing to create a parallel structure to the G7," Rudolf told FT, noting that trust is still a work in progress among member-states of the BRICS group.
Despite all of this, the group has now become the most influential bloc the developing world has ever formed.
