This year’s BRICS summit has wrapped up in New Delhi with the usual promises of deepened cooperation and expanding economic ties. But there was an important absence.
Although the US-Israel war on Iran has affected most of BRICS’ 11 members and 10 partner countries, the declaration issued by the bloc did not address it directly. Nor did it condemn the United States, which – objectively speaking – is the aggressor state in the conflict.
The wording allowed all members to remain inside the same diplomatic tent. It also revealed just how difficult it is for BRICS to turn shared dissatisfaction with the Western-led order into coordinated geopolitical action.
The Iran test
The problem was already visible months before the summit. In May, the BRICS foreign ministers’ meeting in New Delhi failed to produce a common position on the war on Iran. The outcome document acknowledged differences among members and avoided naming either the US or Israel.
Iran wanted the group to condemn the US and Israeli military campaign, while the UAE opposed language that ignored Iranian attacks and its own security concerns. That failure was more than a diplomatic embarrassment. It was a clear sign of the political cost of BRICS expansion.
The group’s enlargement has increased its global reach, but it has also imported regional rivalries into the organisation itself. Iran and the UAE are a particularly clear example. Both belong to BRICS, yet their strategic calculations in the Middle East collide. Their participation in the same organisation therefore creates a built-in ceiling on how far the group can go in confronting a conflict that directly affects both.
The September summit produced a declaration, but the compromise was telling. Rather than taking a clear, strong position, BRICS became a platform for managing disagreement.
The episode therefore suggests that the central problem facing the bloc is not a lack of economic or diplomatic weight. It is the difficulty of converting that weight into a single geopolitical instrument.
Standing up to the US
While BRICS has emerged out of a desire to challenge the US-dominated world order, it has failed to reach a common position on Washington. That is because its members have divergent interests when it comes to dealing with the US.
India illustrates the dilemma most clearly. New Delhi sees BRICS as a vehicle for strategic autonomy, not as an alliance against the US. It is deepening its relationship with Washington, participating in the Quad and maintaining extensive defence and economic ties with Western partners. At the same time, it remains deeply engaged with Russia and China.
For India, the value of BRICS lies partly in preserving room for manoeuvre between competing centres of power. Turning BRICS into an anti-American bloc would undermine precisely that strategic flexibility.
China and Russia also have reasons to avoid transforming BRICS into a mechanism for direct confrontation with the US. For Russia, BRICS is unquestionably an important platform for reducing the political and economic impact of Western economic pressure.
Yet, pursuing more aggressive policies through military alliances could push Moscow into a conflict with the US and NATO – something it wants to avoid at all costs.
For China, the calculation is even more complex. Beijing wants a stronger multipolar order and greater influence for the Global South. It also wants to reduce the structural advantages enjoyed by the US in global finance, trade and international institutions.
But China has little reason to turn every BRICS dispute into a binary confrontation with Washington. The US remains an important market for its exports and an important factor in global trade.
Brazil and Indonesia add another layer of complexity. Brasilia wants a more representative international system, greater development finance and stronger bargaining power for developing countries, but has little incentive to turn BRICS into an instrument of Chinese or Russian geopolitical strategy. Similarly, Jakarta sees BRICS as a way to widen its strategic and economic options rather than as a vehicle for choosing sides.
The polycentric trap
BRICS is caught in what appears to be a polycentric trap. Its greatest strength is its diversity. That diversity gives the group legitimacy across regions that have historically had little influence over the architecture of global governance.
But the same diversity makes collective geopolitical action difficult. Every new member adds economic resources, diplomatic reach and political legitimacy. It also adds another set of national interests that must be accommodated. This explains why BRICS is more likely to become a powerful bargaining coalition than a coherent geopolitical bloc.
Its members can agree on reforming international institutions, increasing representation for developing countries, strengthening South-South trade, expanding development finance and reducing excessive dependence on Western financial infrastructure. They can also cooperate on local-currency payments, development lending, energy and food security.
But agreement becomes harder when cooperation requires members to choose sides in an actual geopolitical confrontation. The war on Iran makes that contradiction unusually visible.
That does not mean BRICS is irrelevant. Quite the opposite. Its influence may ultimately come from doing something less dramatic but more sustainable: changing the bargaining environment in which the existing international order operates.
BRICS does not need to destroy the current global system to challenge the US. It can push for greater representation in the IMF and the World Bank, strengthen alternative development institutions, expand non-dollar payment mechanisms and give developing countries more diplomatic options. That may prove to be its most consequential role.
Therefore, the limits of its geopolitical action could also be a blessing. Avoiding hard confrontation could allow for more space for gradual change and a shift in the balance of power.
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.
