Professor Oliver Stuenkle interacting with journalists after the round table discussion.
The Institute of Economic Affairs, (IEA), has held a round table meeting with Professor Oliver Stuenkle, to discuss the effects of new emerging economic giants, namely, Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS) on international relations and economic affairs.
Prof. Stuenkle, an associate professor of International Relations at the Getulio Varga Foundation, Sao Paulo, Brazil took participants through the change in global economic powers, its consequences on development and its impact on Africa.
Laying the foundation for his presentation; “Africa through the Eyes of BRICS,” Prof. Stuenkle said the BRICS’s share of global GDP has risen faster than expected in the last 2 decades with China alone adding $2 trillion to global GDP, creating 120 million jobs and helping 400 million people escape poverty.
“China’s rise is much faster than that of Great Britain or the US; leading to a global sense of unpreparedness,” he said.
Prof. Stuenkle said this new trend has resulted in geopolitical consequences where the West is slowly losing the capacity to determine the global agenda.
However, he said majority of Western observers believe non-Western actors have only rarely played a constructive role in global affairs, the provision of public goods and the creation of rules and norms.
“We tend to overlook the contributions non-Western powers have made in the past, currently make and are likely to make in the future,” he said.
BRICS Power Strategy
Prof. Stuenkel explained that BRICS strategy to maintain its position and move up in the global economic ladder was not to present fundamentally new ideas about global order, or their African strategy, but to create new institutions to reduce their dependency on the West.
“Once it becomes the world’s greatest economy, China will be able to build alliances far more quickly than we think possible today,” he added.
The International Relations Professor further noted that the phenomenon of the Trump Presidency can be expected to negatively affect US’s power. “The rise of ‘post-truth’ and identity politics will weaken the West’s key advantage vis-à-vis a rising China: it’s noisy but ultimately moderate and stability-producing democracy.”
BRICS African Strategy
He said non-Western institutions will engage in the global agenda-setting process far more often indicating that the key challenge will be how the emerging global competitions between Washington and Beijing can be used to Africa’s advantage.
He thus suggested the increase number of sinologists for equal representation of diplomats at the Embassy in Beijing as at the Embassy in Washington.
“Key is to establish regional standard, regional think tank and civil society networks, to assess how to deal with China’s growing role; example requires Chinese investors to engage in joint-ventures with local companies for knowledge and skills transfer,” he suggested.
In 2010 China also overtook the United States as Africa’s largest trading partner, while Brazil and India currently rank as Africa’s 6th and 10th largest trading partners while Russia is returning to the African continent seeking geopolitical status through partnerships in security and energy.
By Jamila Akweley Okertchiri