Three months after its expansion decision, BRICS convened in November 2023 an extraordinary joint summit on the Gaza situation with leaders of invited members, as well as UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. That was a first-of-its-kind meeting for the group. The meeting, as Chinese President Xi Jinping said, marks « a good start » for greater BRICS cooperation following its enlargement.

Commenting on this summit, Al Jazeera said that leading countries of the Global South are looking for « a greater say in a global order dominated by the West. » Steven Gruzd, an analyst at the South African Institute of International Affairs, said: « It does reflect on the growing assertiveness and confidence of the BRICS grouping, not waiting for the West. »

BRICS is an important force in shaping the international landscape. Advancing a more just and equitable international order has been a consistent theme in Xi’s remarks on BRICS cooperation.

Effective coordination between BRICS members and other Global South countries is « adding more bricks to the global governance architecture, » said Wang Lei, the Chinese expert with Beijing Normal University.

The New Development Bank (NDB) exemplifies this effort. « The establishment of the bank serves as a beneficial supplement and improvement to the existing financial system, » Xi said, « which can encourage deeper reflection and more active reforms in the global financial system. »

During a meeting with Dilma Rousseff, former Brazilian President and incumbent NDB chief, in Beijing in 2023, Xi called on the NDB to help with the modernization of more developing countries. Rousseff shares Xi’s vision. « It is a vision that we don’t want BRICS to speak just for a few countries. What we want is for most countries to be part of BRICS, » she told Xinhua.

As Xi has observed, strengthening global governance is the right choice if the international community intends to share development opportunities and tackle global challenges.

« Economically, non-Western nations — with BRICS at the vanguard — are pushing the globe into a new reality: An emerging economic, social, and monetary status quo that is upending what the world has accepted as normal for nearly eight decades, » Jeff D. Opdyke, a global investment expert, has observed.

To Guan Zhaoyu, a research fellow with the Eurasian Studies Institute at Renmin University of China, BRICS cooperation « is neither anti-Western nor aimed at overthrowing the existing global order, but rather constructively reforming its unfair aspects to give more opportunities to the developing world. »

Xi maintains that development is an inalienable right of all countries, not a privilege of a few countries. Under his grand vision to build a community with a shared future for mankind, China has been joining hands with other developing countries in advancing their respective modernization.

China will always be a member of the Global South and the developing world, Xi has said on various occasions.

« President Xi has sent out a very clear message: China will unite with other emerging markets and developing countries in the process of global modernization and make sure no one is left behind, » said Guan.■