A expansão dos BRICS e a reforma das instituições internacionais

Abstract

The BRICS, a group composed of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, has been gaining increasing prominence in international relations by suggesting reforms in the main international institutions as the United Nations Security Council, the World Bank (WB), and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). In this way, through the 2023 Summit in Johannesburg, the BRICS invited countries like Egypt, Ethiopia, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Argentina, and Iran to join the group, marking its first significant expansion, as previously only South Africa had been accepted as a new member in 2011. Therefore, the objective of this research is to identify whether the entry of new members into the BRICS is a strategy by the group to gain more allies in its goals of reforming international institutions, analyzing the historical development of BRICS' institutionalization and the expansion of the bloc, as well as the group's role within international institutions, such as the convergence or divergence of votes of BRICS countries in the United Nations, in order to compare their common interests and foreign policy positions, using a qualitative-quantitative approach methodology based on bibliographic research on the subject, without excluding the use of quantitative techniques for data analysis. Furthermore, the research uses the contributions of authors from critical and institutionalist theories in international relations to analyze the institutionalization of the BRICS and its expansion in the face of Western countries' hegemony, considering South-South cooperation. The result shows that BRICS Plus aims to reform international institutions, however, the group’s expansion is not only about political and institutional reform, but also about the countries interest in strengthening their economic and trade cooperation.