The Newsweek magazine reported that the BRICS summit shows how the United States is struggling to extend its influence throughout the vast global south.
Newsweek reported that the growing interest in expanding the group, to include additional countries from all over the world, is likely to enhance the future of the bloc as a force in global geopolitics.
With no seat at the table for the United States, the three-day BRICS summit in Johannesburg, illustrates how Washington has struggled to extend its influence throughout the vast and growing global south.
According to Akhil Ramesh, a senior fellow at the Pacific Forum, “The United States lags behind countries like Russia, India and China in the global south”.
Ramesh added, “The Global South doesn’t have this special solidarity, which it does with countries like China and India… Being a victim of Western imperialism and colonialism, and facing similar challenges in reconstruction and development, it has a unique solidarity”.
He said, “The American approach is still the approach in which it uses the countries of the Global South as pawns in its future greater cold-hot conflict with China or Russia, and this didn’t help Washington win friends in an understandable way”.
This solidarity continues to extend to Russian President Vladimir Putin, who hastened his country’s communication with developing countries, especially in Africa, in recent years.
Moscow’s initiatives were met with constant interest, as evidenced by the recent Russian-African summit, which took place in St. Petersburg.
On the other hand, US warnings about establishing closer economic relations with China met with stronger resistance.
The countries of the Global South simply “don’t see Beijing and Moscow the same way the West does… Instead, it sees new opportunities, where traditional mechanisms have failed,” Ramesh said.
“So, when there was a group that offered an alternative to the world order, which is led by the West, or the vision of the world, countries rushed to join,” he added.
The growing interest in the BRICS group indicates that the United States’ attempts to assert its influence, especially across the global south, haven’t always yielded the desired results.
BRICS indicates the transformation of the power dynamics of the world system, which has been traditionally dominated by the West, to a more multipolar world.
