The futile search for a US dollar rival
The Kazan summit’s communique calls for greater use of Brics members’ currencies in trade among themselves, but the writer sees no progress on the part of the group to challenge America
AS PHOTO opportunities go, the one offered by the Brics summit in Kazan, Russia, was not particularly inspiring: five autocrats and three democratically elected leaders lending their support to a dictator who cannot leave his country because of an International Criminal Court arrest warrant for war crimes.
When launched in 2006, the Brics (Brazil, Russia, India and China, with South Africa joining in 2010) had a fair claim to representing the world’s emerging economic powers.
Last year, the group could have cemented its status by inviting large, democratic (albeit imperfectly so) emerging economies like Mexico, Nigeria and Indonesia. Instead, its ballyhooed expansion included four autocracies (Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran and the United Arab Emirates), three of which do not play in the top league of the world economy.
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