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<p>BRICS has become an increasingly visible forum through which major emerging powers seek a stronger voice in global governance, especially in the context of enlargement and deepening South–South cooperation. Yet its significance remains contested. Existing scholarship has variously portrayed BRICS as a loose consultative forum, a reform-oriented Global South platform, or an emerging alternative to a Western-dominated order. This article addresses that ambiguity by distinguishing between global governance and a multipolar world order and by examining how the institutional evolution of BRICS has shaped its capacity to act within global governance. Particular attention is given to the Russia–India–China (RIC) triangle, which serves both as a principal source of momentum and as a major internal constraint. Methodologically, the article combines document analysis, interpretive textual analysis and focused comparison, drawing on BRICS summit declarations, policy and institutional documents issued between 2009 and 2025. The findings show that BRICS has moved beyond symbolic summit diplomacy and developed a limited, meaningful but uneven degree of institutional capacity through mechanisms such as the New Development Bank, the Contingent Reserve Arrangement, ministerial coordination, and BRICS+ outreach. These developments, however, have not produced a coherent alternative order. BRICS is best understood as a heterogeneous and internally contested platform within global governance that generates selective but non-trivial reform pressure. The RIC triangle lies at the centre of this process, providing much of BRICS’ geopolitical weight and agenda-setting capacity while also reproducing asymmetries and strategic frictions that constrain deeper cohesion. Enlargement has broadened BRICS’ representational reach, but it has also increased heterogeneity and raised coordination costs. The article concludes that BRICS functions less as a consolidated post-Western order than as a limited and internally contested corrective platform within global governance.</p>

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BRICS institutional evolution and the Russia-India-China triangle in shaping global governance

  • 期刊论文

  • 出版模式：

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  • 发表日期：

    2026年8月5日

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  • Alina Naumenko,
  • Jingcheng Li

摘要

BRICS has become an increasingly visible forum through which major emerging powers seek a stronger voice in global governance, especially in the context of enlargement and deepening South–South cooperation. Yet its significance remains contested. Existing scholarship has variously portrayed BRICS as a loose consultative forum, a reform-oriented Global South platform, or an emerging alternative to a Western-dominated order. This article addresses that ambiguity by distinguishing between global governance and a multipolar world order and by examining how the institutional evolution of BRICS has shaped its capacity to act within global governance. Particular attention is given to the Russia–India–China (RIC) triangle, which serves both as a principal source of momentum and as a major internal constraint. Methodologically, the article combines document analysis, interpretive textual analysis and focused comparison, drawing on BRICS summit declarations, policy and institutional documents issued between 2009 and 2025. The findings show that BRICS has moved beyond symbolic summit diplomacy and developed a limited, meaningful but uneven degree of institutional capacity through mechanisms such as the New Development Bank, the Contingent Reserve Arrangement, ministerial coordination, and BRICS+ outreach. These developments, however, have not produced a coherent alternative order. BRICS is best understood as a heterogeneous and internally contested platform within global governance that generates selective but non-trivial reform pressure. The RIC triangle lies at the centre of this process, providing much of BRICS’ geopolitical weight and agenda-setting capacity while also reproducing asymmetries and strategic frictions that constrain deeper cohesion. Enlargement has broadened BRICS’ representational reach, but it has also increased heterogeneity and raised coordination costs. The article concludes that BRICS functions less as a consolidated post-Western order than as a limited and internally contested corrective platform within global governance.