BRICS Moves to 'Competitive Coexistence', Leaves West Behind | Prof. Anuradha Chenoy

## BRICS and the SCO in a changing world The past months have shown a rapid consolidation of non-Western plurilateral spaces. A cluster of summit meetings — notably a Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) gathering in Bishkek followed within days by the BRICS summit in New Delhi — signaled an energetic effort to translate diplomatic presence into institutional capacity. The SCO, long seen primarily as a security forum born from counterterrorism cooperation after 9/11, is visibly shifting toward economic integration: discussions in Bishkek produced explicit language on ports, logistics, trade agreements, and proposals for an SCO Development Bank. BRICS, for its part, continues to expand its geopolitical footprint by absorbing new members and deepening programmatic aims beyond mere rhetorical weight. This proliferation of forums is not accidental. The contours of global trade and finance are being reshaped by deliberate moves to create alternatives to Western-dominated institutions. While the SCO and BRICS cannot match the balance sheets of the IMF or World Bank, they create parallel architectures — development banks, currency settlement mechanisms, and alternative payment infrastructures — that underpin a multipolar geoeconomy. Taken together, these fora illustrate a shift from isolated bilateral hedging to coordinated, institutionalized diversification among states outside the traditional Western core. ## India, Russia and Western pressure One of the most striking dynamics emerging from these meetings is how states manage competing pressures. India’s diplomatic posture toward Russia illustrates that balancing act. New Delhi’s purchase of Russian energy and fertilizer has increased even as it has faced pressure from Western partners to distance itself from Moscow. Public instances — such as an appeal from India urging Russia to pursue peace, voiced in the SCO — should be read through this prism of constrained autonomy rather than as a sign of rupture. Prof. Anuradha Chenoy emphasized the transactional nature of these interactions: Russia has made clear that any unilateral ceasefire would carry strategic costs from its perspective, and India must manage its security and development needs while navigating Western incentives and disincentives. The outcome is not a binary alignment or defection; it is strategic hedging. India and other Global South states simultaneously court Western markets and technology while deepening ties with China, Russia, and regional partners to protect economic and political space. Such hedging can cause momentary tensions among partners yet also produces a form of pragmatic diplomacy. Leaders and foreign ministers are learning to couch language carefully — “deplore” instead of “condemn,” for example — so that statements can be both inclusive and acceptable across diverse geopolitical positions. This linguistic subtlety allows continued cooperation without forcing members into categorical choices that would be costly at home. ## The BRICS declaration and diplomacy The BRICS summit in New Delhi produced a dense, consensus-based declaration — some 45 pages long — that is revealing less for its specific policy breakthroughs than for what its form and content signify. The declaration avoided naming or singling out specific powers even while calling for multipolarity, responsible state behavior, and the peaceful resolution of disputes. It deplored “all forms of unprovoked aggression,” a formulation intentionally broad enough to cover different interpretations of what constitutes provocation. Equally significant was the leadership’s ability to create diplomatic space for rival actors to engage directly. The summit hosted Iran and the UAE — parties embroiled in regional hostilities — and facilitated bilaterals framed around de-escalation and navigation of regional tensions. BRICS functioned as a neutral table where warring or adversarial actors could meet, exchange positions, and issue joint language emphasizing coexistence. That is a political achievement: not a treaty or military pact, but a platform that sustains channels of communication and a shared vocabulary for restraint. This model stands in contrast to alliance-centric Western frameworks where the absence of unanimity can collapse cooperative outputs. BRICS’ approach is practical: consensus achieved through inclusive phrasing and a focus on shared economic and developmental priorities. The political logic is to maximize engagement while minimizing the risk that any one member can veto the platform’s basic existence — a form of institutional resilience suited to a plural and contested world. ## Bandung and the legacy of nonalignment A recurring theme across both BRICS and SCO dialogues is the invocation of Bandung and the broader nonaligned heritage. The New Delhi declaration explicitly linked BRICS’ project to the Afro-Asian Bandung Conference, reclaiming a mid-20th-century legacy of solidarity among decolonizing states. That historical lineage is not mere rhetoric; it supplies moral and political currency for contemporary multipolarity, anchoring present alliances in an older narrative of resisting domination and asserting collective agency. Prof. Chenoy pointed out that Beijing has long invoked Bandung in its discourse on the Global South, despite China’s later alignment choices during the Cold War. For newer BRICS participants and aspirants across Africa, Latin America, and Southeast Asia, the Bandung reference functions as an inclusive signifier: a high-ground claim that this grouping speaks for a heterogeneous majority seeking development, respect for sovereignty, and alternatives to unilateral coercion. This return to Bandung-era motifs also signals a widening coalition. BRICS’ expansion to include countries from the Gulf and Southeast Asia, and the SCO’s outreach to ASEAN and Gulf Cooperation Council observers, reflect a conscious effort to craft a pan-regional, Afro-Asian, and Latin American architecture that channels the political energy of nonalignment into concrete economic and diplomatic mechanisms. ## Sanctions, tariffs and financial reform Economic coercion has catalyzed reform discussions among BRICS and SCO members. Sanctions, tariffs, and trade restrictions imposed by Western actors have highlighted vulnerabilities in global trading networks, prompting alternative financial arrangements. The SCO’s declaration on finance and the BRICS’ discussions about a new financial architecture aim to blunt the effectiveness of punitive measures and to create fallback instruments that preserve trade flows among participating states. These proposals encompass several tracks: reform of existing international financial institutions to better reflect emerging economies; creation and capitalization of new multilateral banks; and operational innovations that reduce dependence on dominant Western systems. While none of these moves will overnight displace the dollar or the IMF, they lower transactional friction and provide insurance against unilateral financial pressures. There is also a normative dimension. Reform rhetoric frequently framed grievances in terms of fairness and representation, arguing that current institutions fail to mirror the geopolitical and economic realities of a multipolar 21st century. That framing resonates with populous Global South constituencies and gives political legitimacy to institutional experimentation. ## National currencies and alternative payments One of the most concrete policy areas where alternatives are being developed concerns currency settlement and payments infrastructure. Dialogue in both SCO and BRICS spaces has increasingly focused on national currency settlements, bilateral swap lines, and the architecture for an alternative payments system. These proposals are not simply technical adjustments; they are strategic attempts to make trade less vulnerable to third-party controls. Prof. Chenoy outlined how such me

BRICS Moves to 'Competitive Coexistence' | Anuradha Chenoy Professor Anuradha Chenoy joins Pascal Lottaz to examine BRICS, the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, and their evolving role in a multipolar world. They discuss India’s relations with Russia, diplomatic engagement between rivals, and the legacy of Bandung and nonalignment. Chenoy explains proposals for national currency trade, alternative payment systems, and financial reform. The conversation explores sanctions, strategic autonomy, and the differences between military alliances and cooperative forums, asking how diverse countries can pursue competitive coexistence while maintaining engagement with the West. Anuradha's Links: Articles at Scroll: https://scroll.in /author/27251 India’s Foreign Policy and the Luxury of Strategic Autonomy: https://www.epw.in /journal/strategic-affairs/indias-foreign-policy-and-luxury-strategic.html The BRICS Plan for a New Financial Architecture (article record): https://pure.jgu.edu.in/id/eprint/8836/ Transnational Institute profile: https://www.tni.org/en/profile/anuradha-chenoy Neutrality Studies Links: Neutrality Studies Substack: https://pascallottaz.substack.com Support Neutrality Studies: https://neutralitystudies.com /donate Neutrality Studies shop: https://neutralitystudies.com/shop Time Stamps 00:00 BRICS and the SCO in a changing world 06:52 India, Russia and Western pressure 10:13 The BRICS declaration and diplomacy 17:00 Bandung and the legacy of nonalignment 23:25 Sanctions, tariffs and financial reform 25:27 National currencies and alternative payments 28:40 Coexistence beyond military alliances 40:29 Iran, sanctions and international law #Pascal Welcome back, everybody, to Neutrality Studies today with an update by Anuradha Chenoy, Professor Emeritus at the Jawaharlal Nehru University in India. Anu, welcome back. #Anuradha Chenoy Thank you. Thank you for having me. #Pascal Thanks for coming online, because there's a very important meeting going on, or was going on over the weekend, the BRICS meeting in New Delhi. We're very close to where you are now. You want to put that into a bit of a larger context, right? Can you give us the context first, and then we go into the BRICS meeting? What happened? #Anuradha Chenoy -- 1 of 16 -- Right. So I think this was a very significant BRICS meeting. But the fact is that just 10 days before, there was another important meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, which was on August 31st and 1st September in Bishkek, where, again, President Xi Jinping, President Vladimir Putin, Prime Minister Modi, plus the Central Asian leaders, plus the President of Iran, all met in Bishkek. And I think they came out with some very important points. And just a week, 10 days after that, they again meet in the BRICS meeting and have the New Delhi Declaration, which we'll discuss. But the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, which has not really caught the attention of strategic thinkers and analysts and just those, you know, our viewers, that itself was a very important meeting because it also showed the strength and the strategic relationship between Russia and China and their advance into Central Asia. Central Asian countries. And this meeting, the SCO, as we call it, Shanghai Cooperation Organization, it started as a security grouping just after the time of 9/11, but it's moved into a very strong economic grouping. So this meeting had a very clear declaration on ports and routes, and it indicated how important these ports are and the logistics. It had declarations on finance, where the SCO countries exceed trade of billions of dollars also between themselves. And they have proposed an SCO Development Bank. So that is passed, and that would come up. So it will be a second, like the New Development Bank that the BRICS countries made. So this will be a Shanghai Cooperation Organization Development Bank. And they proposed national currency settlements and an alternative payment system infrastructure. So, in sum, SCO is becoming an economic bloc, and it's diversifying. And a large number of trade agreements were signed here also. And they also had members of ASEAN and the Gulf Cooperation Council come as observers and potential partners. So what I'm saying is that countries outside the West, because, you know, of course Russia is also West, but this huge global collective outside the West is actually coordinating and getting together, and they're doing it fast, and it's happening every year. Of course, BRICS is the most important forum, but the Shanghai Cooperation Organization is yet another. So there are several plurilateral groupings coming together. #Pascal And may I just ask you, you know, BRICS always was centered around the economy, and I think it will stay like that. But the Shanghai Cooperation Organization was always more about, you know, this issue of terrorism that many of these countries had to grapple with in the early 2000s. And it always had that security component. I mean, it's even in the name. But now it seems that also that one, they are trying to attach a very strong, even stronger economic component with that development bank. So probably development financing for security purposes, but probably not in the way the West does it with its alliance systems, but probably more kind of local capacity-building kind of initiatives. But I guess the SCO has had a lot of those initiatives. Where do you see that new development bank in the SCO go? Because I don't think these countries have a big interest in duplicating structures very much, or do they? -- 2 of 16 -- #Anuradha Chenoy No, you're absolutely right. Terrorism was an aspect. Intelligence sharing remains an aspect, and they've already established methods of doing that between SCO countries. Disaster management, early warning—you know, these things which matter between states on the issue of threats and security. But now it is shifting dramatically to economics and focusing on trade, because Russia, India, China, I think they're very clear that their way forward is through global trading, especially when the West is making barriers. They're sometimes violating the WTO. There's the issue of tariffs, of sanctions. So they're making these fallback options of their own. Of course, these banks, whether it's the New Development Bank of BRICS or the bank which is proposed by the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, they're very minimal compared to the IMF and World Bank, etc. But these are new initiatives, and they show the trend in which geoeconomics is moving. So for a multipolar world, you have a multipolar economic system and multipolar economic structures which support this multipolarity. That's where they're moving towards. #Pascal Right. So several initiatives for a diverse new setup of the global system. But just on the SCO, before we move to the BRICS, there was this moment when, during the SCO, Narendra Modi actually publicly said Russia should move toward peace. You know, India is the country of Mahatma Gandhi and so on. Peace, peace, peace. Please, Russia, go to a peace agreement with Ukraine. And Vladimir Putin was visibly annoyed. And in my corner of the internet, some people interpreted that as the United States putting pressure on India to put pressure on Russia, and this kind of sowing divisions, because you could see also Turkey and Kazakhstan actually doing something similar with Russia. How did you interpret that episode? And do you think it is relevant for the Russian-Indian relationship? #Anuradha Chenoy Hey, just a very quick note. #Pascal The best way to support this channel is by signing up for my free Substack. You can also help with a paid subscription there, or you can get some of our new merch on neutralitystudies.com. Links below. See you there. #Anuradha Chenoy -- 3 of 16 -- Well, yeah, you're right about that, because Russia has explained to India very clearly that now suddenly they cannot have a ceasefire or go in for peace unilaterally, because that will mean that Ukraine, as a proxy of the West and NATO, will rearm, and it will only be a bit of a frozen conflict. This is a stage where Russia is moving fast and it's escalating. And most analysts believe that there's going to be a victory maybe in six, seven months. So they want a definite peace, and their red lines are clear. And I think they made it clear to India. But India has been under tremendous pressure from the U.S., you know, on Ukraine. And in fact, they've been threatened again with sanctions and tariffs—not sanctions, but tariffs—if they continue purchasing Russian oil. But Indian purchase of Russian oil has actually increased. It's providing 50% of India's needs. Plus, we are importing—out of every three tons of fertilizer, one ton is from Russia. And then Ukraine was not mentioned at BRICS, nor was Iran, though there was a critique of Israel's policies in support of Palestine and the two-state solution, etc. So Ukraine as an issue was dropped at the time of the BRICS, but it did come up in SCO because the foreign minister went to Ukraine and then the prime minister went to the SCO meeting, and they did raise it in terms of, very generally, peace. And I think President Putin was very cool about it, and he thanked them for, you know, talking about peace. But he said, we will move according to, you know, how history unfolds this special military operation. #Pascal Yeah, but at the same time, it's clear that Russia does take into account what its partners in the Global South are saying. And you pointed out just before we started that this is now the third time these leaders are meeting within 10 days, right? So there's a lot of coordination going on. How do you think that this impacted the actual BRICS meeting? And what came out of it? I mean, what is in that declaration, and what of it is significant for the future? #Anuradha Chenoy Well, look, I think as everyone knows now, 40% of the world population is represented in the BRICS countries, a quarter of the global economy, one third of global GDP in purchasing parity terms, 20% of global exports, and now 35 to 40% of global oil production because Iran and UAE are now members of BRICS. So they do have heft. And though the international structures—the Bretton Woods institutions, IMF, World Bank, the Security Council—do not represent this voice, yet their decisions can and do have an impact. And these meetings now are leading to, they're signaling more coordination, compatibility, and different methodologies. The methodology is different than that of NATO. These are non-military alliances, and they're not even alliances. It's a platform where they get together. #Pascal -- 4 of 16 -- I mean, it's so significant that at the BRICS meeting, you had Iran there. And correct me if I'm wrong, but the leader of the UAE was there as well, right? And they're basically in a war state, right? The UAE is the staunchest supporter of the United States. However, at the BRICS meeting, they were both there. I didn't see exactly what they did, but did you follow how they mingled? #Anuradha Chenoy Well, they had a bilateral relationship. It was facilitated by India. They had a bilateral, and the readout was that it was positive. They both expressed what their views and what their positions were. And I'm sure Iran kind of reassured them that they weren't attacking UAE, but they were attacking U.S. bases. And they have been cornered to such an extent that they were. And the BRICS states also had a statement saying that they did want this kind of, you know, freedom of navigation, where they said about seafarers, their safety. But Iran also explained that they were in a, you know, kind of a situation where they had to defend their interests. So there was a very anodyne statement about... The BRICS statement didn't mention... But the fact is they provided space for these two countries involved in kinetic, almost conflict, space to meet, as opposed to different