The Impact Of The Brics On The Future Of Global Governance

Since the BRIC acronym was coined in2001, there has been an intense focus on the emerging economies of Brazil, India, Russia and China. With the addition of South Africa to the group in2011, the newly termed BRICS extended their span of influence to include a fourth continent. These five countries have caught the attention of the international community not just for their continuous economic growth, but also for their aspirations of reforming existing international institutions and changing the landscape of global governance.Due to the political, economic and social heterogeneity of its members, the BRICS have faced an uphill battle in the development of a unified group strategy. In this thesis, the author examines the cooperation agreements that exist between BRICS members and the challenges that have resulted from their implementation as a means of predicting whether or not the BRICS will be capable of acting together as a single entity in the future. In order to determine the possible advantages and disadvantages of this increased intra-BRICS cooperation, Keohane and Nye’s interdependence theory is employed as well as Polachek’s theoretical perspective of the trade-conflict relationship. There is also an evaluation of the tactics of the BRICS members to ascertain if they will ultimately utilize their strategic partnership to pursue absolute or relative gains.As the BRICS economies continue to grow, they are struggling to transform their newly achieved economic might into political clout. They have jointly declared their unwavering commitment towards reforming international institutions such as the United Nations and the International Monetary Fund, yet they have been unable to achieve any lasting, tangible results after years of negotiations. In addition, their recent endeavor to establish a BRICS Development Bank has been stalled in the planning stages due to difficulties in reaching a consensus on funding and location. If the BRICS are to enhance their stake in international affairs and play a meaningful role in global governance reform, a more coherent approach is needed along with increased cooperation on a variety of levels.