In July, leaders of BRICS+ convened in Rio de Janeiro for their annual summit with a banner theme that captured the moment: “Strengthening Global South Cooperation for More Inclusive and Sustainable Governance.” With its expansion to Egypt, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE, BRICS+ now represents roughly 45 percent of humanity and 35 percent of global GDP – a constituency that no longer sees itself as peripheral to the international system.
The shift coincides with a period of strain in established institutions as Western cohesion has been tested by domestic polarization and skepticism toward globalization. Yet, as long-standing powers hesitate, emerging economies are prioritizing representation and responsiveness. Their goal is not to abandon the rules-based order, but to become full participants in shaping it. As Professor Obiora Okafor notes, “the struggle(s) waged by Global South countries…to be equitably included in the governance and benefits of the international system has been a long and arduous one.”
Confidence in legacy bodies such as the United Nations, World Bank, IMF, and WTO has declined amid persistent structural barriers to reform. IMF quota negotiations remain stalled, leaving voting shares largely tethered to 20th-century economic distributions. The WTO’s Appellate Body has been inoperable for nearly five years, and the United Nations continues to struggle to advance its Sustainable Development Goals as geopolitical divides widen. Across these institutions, governance arrangements and veto powers preserve a hierarchy that no longer reflects global economic realities – constraining adaptation where it is needed most.
Faced with limited avenues for change, many emerging economies are developing complementary mechanisms. China’s Belt & Road Initiative (BRI) has provided critical – if at times coercive – infrastructure to nations long underserved by Western lenders. The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) now includes 110 members and now rivals the World Bank as a source of development finance.
The New Development Bank (NDB), established by BRICS, has expanded its capital base and ambitions, while local-currency trade arrangements seek to reduce vulnerability to financial shocks and sanctions risk – largely by decoupling from the U.S. dollar. What binds these initiatives is not ideological unity, but pragmatism: cheaper capital, fewer political strings, and recognition where none was offered before.
These efforts do not represent a rejection of multilateral cooperation; they reflect a demand for greater inclusivity within it. BRICS+ leaders emphasized this point in Rio, calling for “comprehensive reform” of global governance, beginning with the UN Security Council. Their argument is straightforward: institutions claiming global legitimacy must more accurately represent the global community. As Okafor notes, “change will definitely occur, over the longue durée” – raising the question of whether existing leaders will shape or resist it.
The challenge for the West is that time no longer works in its favor. As Global South economies continue to drive global growth and shape supply chains essential to the energy transition, their leverage increases. Access to markets and resources is increasingly linked to institutional voice. If adaptation remains slow, power will simply migrate elsewhere – to forums where Washington and Brussels hold less influence, or none at all.
The consequences would not be profound. Fragmented standards in digital governance, climate finance, and debt restructuring would make global coordination slower and costlier. Sanctions – historically the West’s preferred coercive tool – would lose potency as more economies diversify away from the dollar. And Western claims to moral leadership would continue to erode as long as representational inequity remains built into the system.
To avoid that future, the West must recognize that reform is not a generosity play – it is the price of maintaining influence. Three forces are already redefining the cost of inaction.
Firstly, growth and resources are shifting southward. Emerging economies are expected to drive more than half of global growth over the next decade, and they control the minerals and energy the West depends on. Access to these markets is no longer guaranteed. Major democracies – India, Indonesia, Brazil, South Africa – increasingly treat institutional reform as a condition for deeper commercial integration. If Washington and Brussels want to compete with China’s appeal as a development partner, they will need to recognize that voice and vote share matter as much as capital.
Secondly, in the realm of diplomatic optics, legitimacy itself has become currency for negotiation. The Global South’s neutrality on Ukraine and its resistance to Western sanctions was not indifference – it was a pointed signal that Western leadership no longer carries automatic legitimacy.
Majoritarian geopolitics has emerged inside the UN General Assembly, the G20, and climate negotiations, where Western states now rely on cooperation from countries they have long underrepresented. Reform becomes essential not only to broaden burden-sharing, but to avoid moral isolation. Power today is measured in who can convene – and who others will follow.
Third is strategic rule-setting. If the West fails to adapt, others will define the rules. New governance regimes for AI, digital trade, currency clearing, and critical infrastructure are emerging in forums where the U.S. and EU are participants – not architects. The more BRICS+ and regional bodies shape norms, the more Western institutions risk becoming procedural relics: still standing, but with less that stands on them.
The choice facing the West is not whether to protect its interests or include new powers. Those imperatives are now the same. A world where institutions remain exclusive is a world where they become optional – and eventually irrelevant. In this sense, reform is not a concession, but a strategic adaptation.
It is an investment in institutional credibility – preserving the system’s authority by expanding the community that sees value in it. As Okafor concludes: “Those who currently exercise the most global power will thus have a lot to gain in the future by helping create a more just world today.”
The international order is not being abandoned. It is being renegotiated. Ensuring that process remains cooperative, and not competitive, depends on adapting institutions to the world that now relies on them.
Edited By: Ana-Maria-Elena Radu