Chapter 4: The BRICS potential Role in Appeasing Sino-Indian Tensions
4.3 BRICS impact on member states foreign policy
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In addition, during the 8th BRICS Summit in Goa in October 2016, the member states discussed the opportunity for addressing new dispute resolution mechanism. The idea of an institution dedicated to dispute resolution was mentioned. Indeed a BRICS Center for Dispute Resolution already exists since 2015 initiated by the Shanghai International Economic and Trade Arbitration Commission but it is dedicated to business level disputes among BRICS countries. Therefore an institution specialized in dispute resolution between governments of the BRICS member states has to be established. According to Medha Srivastava and Ameen Jauhar (2016), this would have a positive impact on cooperation and lead to sustainable growth for the BRICS Organization. (Srivastava, Jauhar 2016)
4.3 BRICS impact on member states foreign policy
Assessment of the BRICS present and future role
The BRICS Organization is not sovereign and strong enough to serve as a mediation platform in a context of third party conflict resolution. It might contribute to the reduction of the possibility of a conflict outbreak as it provides more information and therefore reduces the uncertainty and the “shadow” of the future as theories state. In addition the Organization is not focused enough on “regional security” to give a proper perspective on conflict management. Thus, the BRICS cannot be considered as a pusher for conflict management but rather be a motive for conciliation from Sino-Indian perspective. The role of the BRICS will be indirect in managing Sino-Indian tensions in the future. As the last standoff in Bhutan showed, the two countries were motivated to solve or at least stop the conflict escalation because of the BRICS Summit in Xiamen. The development of the Institution is important from both China and India side which lead the BRICS to be a strong motive to avoid escalation. In fact if the BRICS member states show tensions or bilateral cooperation failure, the legitimacy of the BRICS cannot rise. In order to achieve BRICS’s goal to become an international rule maker and be a common voice for non-western countries unity is essential.
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Furthermore, BRICS member states could play a role as a potential third party conflict manager. However, the weakening of Brazil and Russia is an issue for playing a role in conflict management (Cabestan 2015, p 434).
Regarding the development of BRICS in the future, this chart below shows the growing institutionalization and decision making of the Organization which forecast a positive dynamics in the future with a growing power of the Organization.
Figure 4.3: Dynamics of global governance functions in BRICS documents and commitments adopted by the leaders, 2008-20140-3(Larionova, Shelepov 2015, p. 48)
Source : Larianova M. and Shelepov A., “Is BRICS Institutionalization Enhancing Its Effectiveness?”, 2015, p 48.
Direction setting share has been reduced to let decision making share increased. More and more commitments have been signed over the years which show the growing change in the BRICS institutionalization process. Indeed, the commitment rate from 2009 to 2015 has known an increase of 353.33%. This is a significant evolution.
The BRICS institutionalization has taken huge steps and will grow stronger in the future. The organization now focuses more on economic issues but there is hope that security could take also an important place in the BRICS Agenda and member state compliance.
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Political recommendation
According to Larionova and Shepelov (2015), the agenda of the BRICS is too broad and vague which leads to moderate success. Indeed as the author explained in Chapter 3, an Institution needs to have a clear defined scope to lead as conflict manager. Therefore, the fact that the BRICS agenda is not clear enough will generate a problem in the future. Moreover, the BRICS need new model and principles in order to consolidate intra-BRICS economic cooperation. (Larionova, Shelepov 2015)
Nevertheless in 2013, the BRICS led a trade meeting where member state trade ministers stipulated that economic cooperation should go further: “this could be achieved by identifying complementarities in key growth sector and to cooperate to build the industrial capacities of their respective economy and advanced by further exchanges between industries, trade and investment promotion event and enhanced investment and technical cooperation”.
(BRICS Trade Minister, 2013) This statement is very important in the case of China and India relations as it can be a solution to unbalanced trade. The institutionalization of their economic relations through proper third party analysis could reduce the shadow as well as the trade deficit of India. Indeed, economic cooperation remains bilateral for now and national interests are put first. These interests depend on the domestic economic situation and the traditional hostile ties between the two countries. Therefore, the institutionalization of economic cooperation is the solution to BRICS intra-cooperation.
Moreover, the fact that the BRICS is not focused enough on macroeconomics and security makes it complicated for the Organization to address the two main problems of Sino-Indian relations. In addition, despite regular meetings on security, the effectiveness responding to regional conflict or terrorism is very low; the author concludes that there is a limited top-down impact on Sino-Indian relation. The third parties option is also limited due
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to the lack of legal status of the organization and the weakness of Brazil and Russia. Lastly, the scope is not focused enough on security to become a conflict manager for the Sino-Indian case.
4.4 Conclusion
The author assesses that BRICS remains too weak as an institution to directly promote conflict management. The Organization is not yet equipped to encourage dispute resolution and resolve Sino-Indian territorial dispute. The fact that the BRICS do not have a proper Charter and conflict resolution mechanism naturally limits its role. Thus, the need for the BRICS to establish a proper legal status and further BRICS institutionalization and sovereignty is urgent.
Nevertheless, the establishment of the BRICS and the process of institutionalization have an indirect impact on Sino-Indian relations. Indeed the BRICS culture development requires effort to make it stronger on the international arena and seems to be a sufficient motive for the two countries to constrain their tensions. Therefore, the BRICS prevent conflict outbreak. Moreover, the information asymmetry is reduced in many areas and leads to positive consequences. If we focus on theories, the state’s preferences alignment could occur in a repeated game and institutions do not promote bilateral cooperation but multilateralism.
As such, the BRICS could impact China and India and align their preferences. This would lead to less strategy differences. In that sense, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization could also contribute to this effect.
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