o counter American financial dominance, the recently expanded BRICS+ group has explored potential means of de-dollarization. This would entail reducing the number of transactions made in dollars by lending in local currencies to member countries.

However, rather than seeking to be a geopolitical counterpoint to the U.S.-led “rules-based world order,” the BRICS+ grouping was initially conceived as an economic bloc in 2001 when Goldman Sachs economist Jim O’Neill proposed that Brazil, Russia, India, and China would dominate the global economy by 2050. In the early 1980s, the combined economies of the five BRICS+ nations represented 16 percent in terms of purchasing power parity (PPP), and by 2022, this figure had increased to 32 percent of global GDP.

In contrast, the G7 declined from 46 percent of global GDP to 30 percent during this period. As a result, global governance would have to incorporate the world’s largest emerging economies. The question is whether the recent additions to BRICS+ reflect a shift in global economic dynamics to incorporate manufacturing countries such as India, China, and South Africa and oil producers such as Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE. Alternatively, is the Global South attempting to replace the Western rules-based order?

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