Russia Hosts Largest BRICS Summit Yet – With aspirations to Rival the West

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping meeting on the sidelines of the BRICS summit. Photo: Alexander Zemlianichenko, AP News

Last week, President Vladimir Putin hosted the annual BRICS summit in Kazan, Russia. At the conference, the first since the group's major expansion last year, BRICS attempted to present itself as a rival economic force to the West. 

BRICS stands for Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. An investment banker coined the term in 2001 to label a group of fast-developing economies. Brazil, Russia, India, and China held their first summit in 2009 and were joined by South Africa in 2010. Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, and the United Arab Emirates all joined the group in 2023, and dozens more countries have been invited or expressed interest in joining. Today, BRICS represents 41.1% of the world’s population and 37.3% of its gross domestic product.

The group of countries lacks one clear commonality. Some members are democracies, others are not. There is a wide range of friendliness towards the US among members, and some of the countries like Egypt and Ethiopia are in conflict with each other. This year, Putin attempted to consolidate their interests as a coalition that could counter the West’s unipolarity. 

Alexander Gabuev, director of the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center in Berlin told the New York Times that Putin sees the invasion of Ukraine as the leading force in challenging the global status quo.  

“BRICS is the most potent and representative structure of this new world order,” Gabuev said. 

A primary aspiration for these countries is to challenge the International Monetary Fund and US dollar supremacy, as well as establish an alternative to SWIFT, a global banking messaging network, to circumvent sanctions. These goals represent dissatisfaction with a global system seen as favoring the West but do not yet pose a credible challenge. 

Mario Holzner of the Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies told Reuters that the establishment of BRICS has not improved the growth-per-capita path of its founding nations. 

"They might be able to establish some kind of money transfer systems which at least on a low level will work but that most likely won't really be a game-changer," said Holzner.

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres at the BRICS summit. Photo: Vladimir Astapkovich, United Nations

One aspect in which the summit could be seen as a victory for Russia is in its large attendance, which counters the narrative that Russia has alienated itself from the rest of the world. The UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres spoke at the summit, his first visit to Russia in over two years. Guterres used his platform to call for a “just peace,” in Ukraine, but his visit was still criticized in Kyiv as legitimizing the group. 

In a post on X, Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry wrote, "This is a wrong choice that does not advance the cause of peace."

In September, Ukraine rejected a peace plan proposed by BRICS members China and Brazil, with President Volodymyr Zelenskiy calling it “destructive.” According to Reuters, Zelenskiy said he had offered to participate in discussions with China and Brazil but was left out of the process.

After the summit, BRICS issued “the Kazan Declaration,” which covered the main agreements of the group. Key takeaways ranged from commitments to reforming the international financial system to preventing future pandemics.

Though Guterres’s presence at the BRICS summit was highly controversial, his speech emphasized the group’s role in collaboration. He urged BRICS nations to work not just with each other but globally — to take climate action, reform global finance and seek peace.