This year’s gathering of the BRICS represents the largest group of world leaders traveling to Russia in decades, Al Jazeera reports.  The original BRICS countries — Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa — will be joined by several others interested in discussing global finance.

It is widely believed that the group aims to challenge American financial control and replace the dollar with a different currency.

“BRICS, which represents countries containing nearly half the world’s population, has been described by some as a potential rival to U.S. global dominance,” writes Kelsey Ables for The Washington Post.

Russia and China have already been working on ways to trade with each other without using the Western banking system.  The potential for cryptocurrency is being explored.

Other BRICS members have been using their own national currencies for trade, thus circumventing the U.S. dollar.

Russia’s president, Vladamir Putin, is leading the effort to replace U.S. global dominance and is developing alliances with world leaders interested in joining the effort.

Leaders from South Africa, Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia, Brazil, Turkey, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam are in attendance at this year’s BRICS Summit, The Washington Post reports.  Over 32 countries were invited to attend.  Putin is also engaging in individual meetings with several heads of state. 

“What we are all witnessing today is the dynamic development of BRICS as well as strengthening of its influence over global affairs,” Putin said in his opening remarks.

The recent sanctions placed on Russia by the Biden administration prompted Putin to forge stronger partnerships among the BRICS nations and to take further steps to advance a new financial system.

Although the target of the sanctions was Russia, other countries have been alerted to the potential consequences of dependence on SWIFT, the Western financial system.

Although the Biden administration’s intent was to isolate Russia, the result may be a stronger global alliance among the BRICS countries.  As the Biden administration appears uncommitted and leaderless, other countries are advancing on the world stage.

“Without a doubt the event in Kazan is a major one and it signals to the entire world that multipolarity is no longer a conspiracy theory,” Lena Petrova, geopolitical commentator, said during a World Affairs in Context podcast.

“It is no longer someone’s narrative,” Petrova said.  “Multipolarity is indeed the new world order, if you will, and the BRICS nations are seeking to define ‘new’ effective approaches to local governance.  BRICS are reducing their dependence on the U.S. dollar and the SWIFT financial messaging system. They are looking for alternatives.”

The group appears to be becoming larger and stronger as more nations seek to join.

“After the alliance of the emerging economies expanded last year these 9 countries now represent a bigger slice of global wealth than the G-7, the main economic group of the United States and its junior partners,” says Steve Clemons for Al Jazeera.  “Population-wise, BRICS represents 5 times more people around the world than these G-7 nations.”

For many years, the threat to world order has been considered small, due to the strength of Western economies and the weakness and disorder of many BRICS nations.

Just over a year ago, in September of 2023, Stanford fellow and international politics professor Josef Joffe wrote, in an article published by The Hoover Institute, that a realignment of world order would be unlikely.

Several of the countries in the BRICS or Global South are central economies, Joffe wrote.  In China, totalitarianism is increasing, not decreasing under Xi Jinping.  Centrally managed economies cannot survive for long.

“Obedience stifles feedback that corrects a misbegotten course,” Joffe wrote.  “Wars of aggression like Putin’s destroy growth and drive out talent.”

The strength of the American economy has long been attributed to entrepreneurism and ingenuity.  Small businesses that start on a shoestring in a basement or garage can become global powerhouses.

As the bureaucratic and regulatory state continues to encroach on business in the U.S., however, that incredible advantage may be slipping away.  Under oppressive regulations, new businesses becomes unlikely.  Stable organizations may be reluctant to expand operations.

“When top-down control advances, the economy does not,” Joffe wrote.

While Democrats and Republicans argue, the Deep State grows, along with the ever-increasing absorption of GDP.  The growth and stability of the American economy will be increasingly important as the potential for a global realignment exists.  Americans, comfortable with a history of global dominance, may be burying their heads in the sand.

“Russia is increasingly isolated on the world stage,” White House national security communications adviser John Kirby said in a press briefing.  “There’s no question about that.  Mr. Putin is still having to take radical steps to prop up his currency and to keep his war economy going, and he continues to have to take drastic steps to try to keep an army in the field and to try to achieve even a modicum of success on the battlefield.”

Kirby said he does not consider the BRICS arrangement a “threat” and that the BRICS countries have the right to be “economically linked with one another.”

It is not expected that there will be an announcement of a new financial system after the summit concludes.  However, it is likely that the agenda has been advanced.

Eileen Griffin-Ray, Ph.D., MBA has many years of leadership experience in the financial services industry and has researched and written books and articles on politics, power, and leadership.

Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Image: www.kremlin.ru via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.