Aovious : BRICS And India’s Ideology

Wednesday, 6 September 2017

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What is the issue?

India being an active participant in BRICS forum, feels harder to address Chinese led globalisation.

Building a multipolar world has been one of the central themes of India’s foreign policy.
The construction of a “multipolar Asia” or balancing China is turning out to the search for a “multipolar world”.
BRICS has been the main forum for the pursuit of that objective.
India was tempted to privilege the BRICS over the partnership with the West.
Many in India see the BRICS forum as a continuation of the past attachment to non-alignment and third worldism.
China sees BRICS as an instrument to expand its own global economic influence.

The willingness of both Russia and China to cut deals with the US makes the BRICS less about ideological posturing, more about repositioning India in changing great power equations.
The internal changes within the BRICS and external environment altered the dynamics of the BRICS and posing new challenges for India’s engagement with the forum.
India seems more inclined towards judging BRICS by implications for its national interest rather than the metric of a presumed ideological correctness.

China’s rapid rise has compelled India to rethink the virtues of a multipolar world.
It becomes a lot more assertive in the bilateral disputes.
China’s economic weight in BRICS is nearly $12 trillion is now more than twice that of the other four members put together.
Rise of China dramatically altered the orientation of the BRICS, the internal favour of the nation within the forum has elevated.
B&RI has become the main vehicle for Beijing’s economic power projection, has added to India’s concerns about China’s rise.
India has a hard time endorsing the free market, due to a massive annual trade deficit of nearly $50 billion with China.
How the issues can be addressed?
India should conscious of the fact that the BRICS is not about North-South politics.
Nor is it about staying away from the great powers and maintaining equidistance between them.
India should stand up to China where necessary and cooperating with it where possible.
Retrieving the essence of the long-standing partnership with Russia and recognising its own imperatives is needed.
Deepening the strategic ties with Washington and acknowledging its sharp internal divisions is important to counter china.