BRICS emerged on the stage of international relations in the early 21st century as one of the foundational institutional structures symbolizing the structural transformation of the global economic system and the shift of the geopolitical center of gravity from the West to the East. The expansion process, officially announced and enacted at the 2024 BRICS Summit, has opened an entirely new geopolitical chapter in the historical evolution of BRICS. The inclusion of countries such as Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) into the bloc under the BRICS+ concept has positioned the organization as the “Macro-Spokesperson of the Global South”. Specifically, the integration of strategic, energy-rich, and geopolitically critical actors from the Middle East and Africa has endowed the bloc with unprecedented geo-economic power concerning the control of global energy markets, the security of maritime trade routes, and the diversification of supply chains. For Western policymakers, this reality constitutes a structural challenge that can no longer be dismissed by merely preserving the status quo, thereby necessitating a rapid renegotiation of the normative framework of the international system.[i]
In light of the rapidly shifting dynamics of contemporary geopolitics, the BRICS Summit, scheduled to take place in New Delhi, India, on September 12-13, 2026, is regarded as a historical threshold for the organization’s internal consolidation in its expanded format and the design of its future institutional architecture. The overarching theme of this summit centers on optimizing the integration processes of its broadening membership profile and anchoring the collective voice of BRICS in global affairs within a more institutionalized and action-oriented framework. By hosting this event, India is reinforcing its traditional claim to leadership within BRICS while projecting to the international community its vision of serving as the moderate, reliable, and balancing leader of the Global South. The subcommittees, which have been shaping the summit’s agenda months in advance, are concentrating on critical 21st-century imperatives. Most notably, the resilience of global supply chains that grew fragile in the post-Covid-19 era, the integration of digital infrastructures, equitable financing for the green transition, and cooperation in space technologies.[ii]
The most critical factor that will determine the geopolitical backdrop, the political atmosphere, and the strength of the final declaration at the BRICS Summit in New Delhi is, undoubtedly, the trajectory of the normalization process between Asia’s two nuclear giants, China and India. The border clashes that occurred between these two Asian powers in past years, along with their fierce struggles for influence in the Indo-Pacific region, have been the greatest challenge undermining the internal cohesion of BRICS, often characterized as the ‘soft underbelly’ of the bloc. However, the move by both Beijing and New Delhi in 2026 to set aside regional tensions in pursuit of a pragmatic and geo-economic consensus is a development that will directly and dramatically enhance the decision-making efficiancy of BRICS. The normalization of this bilateral relationship signifies the consolidation of the Asian axis within the bloc, thereby paving the way for the synchronized utilization of China’s industrial capacity and India’s immense human capital.[iii][iv]
China’s 2026 BRICS vision and its strategic approach toward the bloc are built upon the three-pillar foundation of the “Global Security Initiative, Global Development Initiative, and Global Civilization Initiative” which have become increasingly prominent and assertive in Beijing’s foreign policy in recent years. The Beijing administration presents the BRICS platform as an inclusive partnership model that is free from ideological impositions and rooted in the economic win-win principle, serving as a counterweight to the United States’ alliance-oriented foreign policy, which is constructed upon a Cold War mentality and driven by an ‘us’ versus ‘them’ dichotomy. Intensive diplomatic statements from Chinese state media and official authorities argue that BRICS serves as a global shield against Western-centric hegemonic policies, unilateral sanctions, and military interventionism in the new multipolar world order. China’s strategy here is to transform economic interdependence into an asymmetrical tool, gradually drawing the countries of the Global South into a common technological and financial ecosystem.[v]
In contrast to these highly proactive tendencies of China, the fundamental existential function of the host, India, within BRICS is to play the role of a balancing actor in the international system. In its meticulous diplomatic preparations, the New Delhi administration persistently opposes the transformation of BRICS into a purely anti-Western revisionist alliance bloc, defining the organization instead as a non-Western platform that advocates the principle of multidimensional connectivity. As is evident from field reports regarding the summit preparations, India is walking a tightrope in its grand strategy; while deepening its maritime security and strategic partnership with the West in the Indo-Pacific within the framework of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (QUAD), it is simultaneously integrating geo-economically with the East and the Global South axis through the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) and BRICS. The doctrine of strategic autonomy championed by the Indian Ministry of External Affairs constitutes the most successful academic model in modern international relations for developing countries, illustrating how to maximize national interests without taking sides in great power competition.[vi]
One of the most heated topics of debate in the economic and financial realm at the 18th BRICS Summit will be the acceleration of the ‘de-dollarization’ process and the establishment of local financial infrastructures as alternatives to the SWIFT system. The United States’ weaponization of the dollar, stripping it of its status as a global public good to utilize it as a foreign policy tool, along with the unprecedentedly severe financial sanctions imposed on Russia particularly following the Ukraine Crisis, has generated profound distrust and existential anxiety throughout the Global South. BRICS countries have elevated the rate of utilizing their national currencies in bilateral trade to record levels in recent years, and at the 2026 summit, the transition of joint payment systems based on blockchain and central bank digital currencies, such as BRICS Pay, from pilot phases into the mainstream is on the table. The New Development Bank’s objective to increase the share of loans disbursed in local currencies within its total portfolio is a revolutionary step, indicating that the unipolar dollar hegemony in the global financial architecture has begun to fracture.[vii]
Viewed at a macro level through its ideological, normative, and theoretical dimensions, BRICS, as of 2026, presents a new narrative of cooperation that respects absolute sovereignty against the liberal democracies of the West and the neoliberal free-market impositions of the Washington Consensus. Academic studies rightfully emphasize that BRICS is not a homogeneous ideological anti-Western camp; the sole characteristic binding its members together is the “discomfort felt toward the double standards and institutional inequality of Western hegemony”. While the G7 countries attempt to consolidate their economic weight through the rhetoric of a “rules-based international order”, BRICS members legitimately question who historically established these rules, under what conditions, and in whose economic favor. The 18th BRICS Summit will set the stage for the drafting of a more assertive, diplomatically unified political manifesto directed at the West concerning fundamental issues such as the urgent reformation of the United Nations Security Council, the revitalization of the World Trade Organization, and the equitable updating of quotas in international financial institutions.
In conclusion, the turbulent yet consistently ascendant evolution of BRICS over more than two decades offers a perfect empirical laboratory for understanding the tectonic shifts in the power distribution of the international system and hegemonic transition theories. Having transformed from a mere financial acronym coined to attract investors into a massive geopolitical bloc that now dominates the global economy and demographics with its own development bank, BRICS stands today, undeniably, as the most concrete and defining reality of the multipolar world. The 18th BRICS Summit will be a turning point where the fragile pursuit of consensus between China and India is tested, the vision of de-dollarization translates into concrete steps, and the organization fully proves its multilateral maturity alongside the integration processes of its new members. Having long surpassed the stage of merely offering a rhetorical objection against the normative and institutional supremacy of the West and having now reached the phase of presenting a practical ‘alternative’ on the ground, BRICS can play a leading role in the polycentric rewriting of the 21st-century global governance architecture.
[i] “XVI BRICS Summit Kazan Declaration STRENGTHENING MULTILATERALISM FOR JUST GLOBAL DEVELOPMENT AND SECURITY”, Президент России, http://static.kremlin.ru/media/events/files/en/RosOySvLzGaJtmx2wYFv0lN4NSPZploG.pdf, (Date Accessed: 10.09.2026).
[ii] “BRICS INDIA 2026”, BRICS, https://www.brics2026.gov.in/brics-india-2026/, (Date Accessed: 10.09.2026).
[iii] Ibid.
[iv] “The India–China reset will continue at the BRICS summit”, Chatham House, https://www.chathamhouse.org/2026/09/india-china-reset-will-continue-brics-summit, (Date Accessed: 10.09.2026).
[v] “What does China’s approach mean for BRICS?”, CGTN, https://news.cgtn.com/news/2026-09-09/What-does-China-s-approach-mean-for-BRICS–1QiEkOWLaJa/p.html, (Date Accessed: 10.09.2026).
[vi] “Preparations underway in New Delhi as BRICS Summit 2026 approaches”, İlkha, https://ilkha.com/english/world/preparations-underway-in-new-delhi-as-brics-summit-2026-approaches-56052, (Date Accessed: 10.09.2026).
[vii] “India To Pitch RBI Backed Cross-Border Digital Currencies For BRICS Payments: Report”, NDTV, https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/india-to-pitch-rbi-backed-cross-border-digital-currencies-for-brics-payments-report-12026672, (Date Accessed: 10.09.2026).
