It is generally assumed that the BRICS are so-called ‘sovereignty hawks’: they take far-reaching measures to harness globalization and limit the economic and political adjustment costs to ensure domestic stability.[7] Since their interests focus on sovereignty and stability, they are reluctant to participate fully in the existing Western international order, and are generally only prepared to provide global public goods if it serves their domestic needs. The BRICS’ penchant for classical Realpolitik is at loggerheads with the EU’s approach to its strategic neighbourhood (that is, Eastern Europe and the MENA region). China’s quest for raw materials in Africa and Russia’s arms sales to the Middle East keep repressive regimes in power, and India’s pursuit of energy deals with Iran has long undercut the Western policy of sanctions towards the mullahs; meanwhile, Brazil and South Africa are mainly regional players.

It is clear that the BRICS’ strategic egotism affects the EU’s strategic vicinity in several, sometimes contradictory ways. The obstructive role of Russia and China – the two ‘global players’ within the BRICS group – merits special concern. As Niall Ferguson observed, ‘Russia, thanks to its own extensive energy reserves, is the only power that has no vested interest in stability in the Middle East’.[8] China’s role is more ambiguous, but Beijing’s growing presence in the MENA region as well as the Western Balkans offers economic and political opportunities for these countries to ‘look East’ for alternative partners than the EU and United States (US).[9] More and more, the BRICS do not just offer an economic alternative to the EU, but also act as so-called ‘norm entrepreneurs’ [see Box 1: BRICS and R2P].

Most recently, China launched the concept of Responsible Protection (RP), building upon the earlier Brazilian notion of ‘Responsibility while Protecting’ (RwP). The Chinese proposal calls for the establishment of ‘mechanisms of supervision, outcome evaluation and post factum accountability’ for future (military) interventions.[11] If accepted, these alternative concepts will have major ramifications for NATO’s prospects to intervene in Europe’s volatile strategic vicinity.

Against this background, the EU faces three security-related questions in its strategy towards the BRICS. First, are the BRICS able and willing to use their growing economic power in support of their foreign policy goals in Europe’s neighbourhood? Second, are the BRICS – individually, or as a (more or less) cohesive group – using their economic and political clout to influence the decision-making in, and the reform process of, relevant multilateral forums? And third, does the very existence of the BRICS (as a group) change the strategic playing field in Europe’s vicinity, offering countries (economic, political and security) alternatives to what used to be the only attractive and credible ‘game in town’: the EU and NATO?

BRICS: From Economic to Political Clout

The only strategic document on EU foreign policy towards the BRICS was published by the European Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee (AFET) in February 2012. This so-called BRICS Report suggests that ‘with the emergence of new economic and foreign policy powers, the EU will not see its leverage reduced but has an important role to play in promoting a common understanding on policy choices […] through constructive interaction with the BRICS’.[12] In a related speech, the EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Baroness Ashton, touched upon the key question by stating that ‘what matters most is that the economic clout [of the BRICS] is translated into political clout, into self-confidence and ambition for the role that can be played’.[13]

For the EU, the emerging economic statecraft of the BRICS is particularly important because of the EU’s own dwindling economic and financial power. The global economic crisis that erupted in 2008 has seriously undermined the political confidence of (and in) the EU. For the Global South, the 2008 crisis has been a paradigm shift (akin to what 9/11 was to the West), since it seemed to confirm that the Western model (embracing neo-liberalism) was gradually giving way to the Chinese model (where a strong state manages a vibrant market). After 2008, the BRICS were well positioned to weather the global crisis, since they had preserved the capacity to manage their economic, financial and monetary policies. Meanwhile, the globalized West proved to have been weakened by relinquishing such controls. More recently, high-income (Western) countries have been resuming their role as drivers of international economic growth, whereas the BRICS (with India being the exception) are suffering from a structural slowdown.[14] Still, four BRICS nations remain in the top ten of the world’s largest economies (China, India, Russia and Brazil), and there is little doubt that all of the BRICS will expand their interests and ambitions as their economic power rises.

Source: World Bank, IMF, Wikimedia Commons

The EU’s economic troubles go hand in hand with doubts about the wisdom and effectiveness of its foreign policy towards Eastern Europe and the MENA region. The EU’s preferred foreign policy tools (trade and finance) have proven to be ineffectual in encouraging democratization on its southern and eastern borders. The Arab Spring of 2010 has now been rebranded the Arab Revolts; the EU’s attempt to tie Ukraine to ‘Europe’ through the signing of an ambitious trade deal with Kiev has kindled an on-going civil war in eastern Ukraine (and given Russian the opportunity to grab the Crimea). In both regions, the EU has failed to reach its main foreign policy goals (democracy and the rule of law). Indeed, on the contrary, both regions have become more volatile and crippled by civil wars, the rise of extreme nationalism and religious extremism, as well as suffering general economic malaise. In the light of these developments, the EU is evaluating its strategy with a view to recouping its lost influence.[15]

Source: World Bank

Although the BRICS are now experiencing an economic slowdown and significant political crises, it is nevertheless clear that their dynamic economies and state-led government styles challenge the EU’s influence.[16] The newly established AIIB and NDB indicate that the BRICS are consolidating their preferred style of consensual decision-making through increased institutionalization. This comes after more than five years of building up a network of coordination meetings of BRICS leaders, ministers and civil-society actors. The new banks will not just lend money to the Global South, they will do so without the strings of conditionality (such as human rights and sustainability, etc.) that the West usually attaches.

As Baroness Ashton rightly argued, it is not ‘merely’ a matter of economic power, but also an issue of growing self-confidence and ambition among the BRICS as an emerging bloc. The EU’s strategy towards its neighbours (mostly organized within the European Neighbourhood Policy of 2004) is based on the assumption that the EU can draw these countries into its strategic orbit, even though the prospect of EU membership is denied. This was expected to apply to the Eastern Partnership (EaP) as well as the EU’s Southern Mediterranean partners. [17] In both cases, the EU’s self-confidence and ambitions have been dealt a series of severe blows, offering opportunities for the BRICS to extend their influence into the EU’s traditional strategic backyard.

This obviously applies particularly to the global players within the BRICS: China; and Russia. China is actively increasing its engagement with the MENA region, mainly guided by its own energy needs. Over the past few years, the EU and the US have reduced their crude oil imports from the MENA region, offering China ample opportunity to turn itself into a major economic partner for the Middle East and North Africa. The region is also gradually becoming a growth market for Chinese products (mainly affordable consumer goods), which explains Beijing’s support for the region’s many autocratic governments. Given that MENA is a high-risk and volatile region, China remains reluctant to become a real strategic player, especially in the Middle East where the stakes (and risks) are highest. However, since China’s economic interests in the MENA region will continue to rise (oil exports to China are expected to double by 2035), a more active political and strategic role seems almost inevitable. As Kerry Brown says, ‘Beijing’s growing economic stakes in the Gulf will necessarily go hand in hand with an increasing need to take securing of those stakes in its own hands’.[18] The Arab Spring and the on-going civil wars in Syria and Libya offer the same challenges to China as they do to the West. And although China has retained a neutral stance on most issues (apart from siding with Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood in 2011), its support for Russia on the Syria crisis indicates that the BRICS as a strategic factor are on the rise.[19]

China’s continued rather low-key approach and political profile in the MENA region stands in stark contrast to Russia’s active and brash policies. As the strategic successor of the Soviet Union, Russia lacks China’s geopolitical inhibitions, and it actively uses the BRICS group to expand its global role. Since its institutional inception (in 2006), Russia has been the principal driving force of the BRICS group. Moscow sees the BRICS as a ‘new model of global interaction built outside the context of the old dividing lines of East and West’.[20] Given its own brittle economic position, Russia benefits greatly from China’s economic strength within the BRICS; conversely, China uses the BRICS as a cover to defend its national interests within a hospitable multilateral setting.

This does not imply that Russian and Chinese interests always coincide (see Ferguson’s remark above, at the beginning of chapter 1). Russia is most keen to gain status in the eyes of MENA leaders, mainly by energy and arms deals, as well as by obstructing Western strategic initiatives (Syria offers the best example), and conducting overall truly independent and assertive ‘great power’ policies in Eastern Europe and the MENA region. Probably because of its economic weakness and post-imperial insecurity, Russia is the most ‘revolutionary’ among the BRICS members, whereas the ‘BRICS’ preferences – singly and jointly – for global governance turn on reform and evolution, not revolution’.[21] Russia’s aggressiveness in Ukraine has been condoned by the other BRICS members, but only reluctantly (especially in the case of Brazil and South Africa). The recent joint Russian–Chinese navy exercise in the Mediterranean (around Syria, in May 2015), was flaunted by Moscow as a demonstration of their common understanding of the ‘challenges and threats’, as well as ‘the need to restructure the current world order’.[22] Still, Putin’s military escapades in Ukraine make it less likely that Russia will engage forces anywhere in the MENA region. Since Russian trade ties with the MENA countries are modest and Russian arms’ sales do not seem to give Moscow much political leverage, the overall strategic influence of Russia remains limited to Eastern Europe, as well as its ample power of obstruction imbued in its UN Security Council veto.

The security impact of the BRICS also extends to the Western Balkans

It should be pointed out that the security impact of the BRICS is not limited to Eastern Europe and the MENA region, but also extends to the Western Balkans, an area that is ostensibly on the road towards EU membership. Since European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker has made it clear that these six Western Balkans countries will not join the EU before 2020, political leaders in the region have cast their hopes on attracting financial investment and trade with three emerging geopolitical players: Russia; China; as well as the Gulf states.

Russia uses its dominant position in the energy sector to extend its strategic influence in the region. The Western Balkans is an important transit route for Russian natural gas to Europe, which explains why Russia now has strategic partnerships with Serbia (which includes military and intelligence cooperation as well as coordinating positions in international forums), the Republika Srpska in Bosnia-Herzegovina (which briefly considered secession after Russia’s annexation of the Crimea), Macedonia (which did not join the EU’s sanctions against Russia) and Montenegro (whose economy is strongly dependent on Russian investors).[23]

China is equally strengthening its position in the Western Balkans region by financing the construction of infrastructure projects (mainly power plants and roads) in Albania, Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Montenegro. A major China–South-East Europe Summit was held in Belgrade in December 2014, highlighting China’s strategic interests in the region. This is part of China’s strategy towards Central and Eastern Europe (the so-called ‘16+1’ platform), which saw the light in September 2012. This new initiative offers Central and Eastern Europe access to a US$ 10 billion special credit line from China, an investment cooperation fund, and a forum for cultural cooperation and the promotion of tourism and research.[24]

Meanwhile, with regard to the Gulf states, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) seem especially keen to strengthen their ties with the Serbian defence industry.[25]

The case of the Western Balkans bears out three conclusions. First, even in a region where the EU is supposed to have political leverage because of the existing prospect of accession, emerging powers like the BRICS are extending their economic and strategic presence and influence. Second, the growing influence of the BRICS in the Western Balkans has been facilitated by the EU’s euro crisis, which has detracted from the EU’s economic appeal and political pull. Third, Russia and China (as well as the Gulf states) are using their distinctively non-Western societal norms (based on support for authoritarian democracy) to cater to corrupt political elites in the region.[26]

BRICS Security Cooperation: Real or Imagined?

Jacek Saryusz-Wolski, the rapporteur of the EU’s BRICS Report, argued in 2012 that the ‘BRICS group, as a cross-continental foreign policy actor, does exist [and] in most cases, the BRICS’ positions are opposed to the policies and objectives of the EU’.[27] Similarly, Susan Rice, then the US Permanent Representative to the UN, lambasted the voting record of the three democratic BRICS members (Brazil, India and South Africa) as not always being ‘consistent with their own democratic institutions and stated values’.[28] These are strong and even somewhat hurried statements that need to be examined.

An argument can be made that the BRICS are less ‘revolutionary’ and even less obstructive than is often assumed, and that they (merely) want to be recognized as equal partners at the highest forums of international decision-making. Apart from demanding a larger ‘voice’ in global governance and all its main institutions, they seem satisfied with its present functioning and therefore cherish a conservative, rather than revolutionary, vision of the global economy.[29] Even during the height of the global economic crisis, the BRICS have offered no real, alternative proposals and no new ideas for how to reorganize existing international forums (apart from the recalibration of voting rights in their favour). The BRICS cherish the values of the Westphalian international order, which is why the EU (as a post-modern power) may consider this new coalition to be a challenge, and occasionally even a threat.[30] It should, however, be noted that the most vocal challenge to Western hegemony often does not come from the BRICS, but from ‘revolutionary’ states like Iran and Venezuela, whose collective geopolitical weight remains modest.

Still, Saryusz-Wolski is right, of course, that the BRICS are starting to constitute a new strategic alliance to gain influence in global governance institutions, mainly through so-called ‘soft balancing’ (against the West), and through increased South–South cooperation. Whether the BRICS are always opposed to the EU’s values and interests is up for debate and remains to be seen. All BRICS nations benefit greatly from globalization and free trade, and most of them are marching upwards on the so-called ‘global value chain’.[31] As a result, they have a vested interest in maintaining major parts of the world’s institutional infrastructure, and (as in the case of China) would benefit from the regeneration of global free-trade negotiations (such as the now defunct Doha Round) under the aegis of the World Trade Organization (WTO). It should be noted that the rise of the BRICS has encouraged free-trade initiatives such as the (US-led) Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the (EU–US) Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP). These ambitious endeavours are part of a Western strategy anticipating a post-Western world, a world in which the BRICS will play a political role that is commensurate with their growing economic weight. For the moment, however, the key question remains whether (and if so, how?) the BRICS can use their economic and political clout to influence decision-making in, and the reform process of, the relevant multilateral forums.

It is clear (and becoming communis opinio) that the Western model (of liberal democracy and market economy) is not necessarily universal, and that the world will be more pluralist than hitherto envisioned. Led by Russia, the BRICS have (since 2006) increased their institutional presence by organizing informal caucuses on the sidelines of meetings of international organizations, such as the opening of the UN General Assembly, the semi-annual meetings of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and during the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) review conferences. The BRICS showed off their coherence by their congruent voting behaviour in the UN Security Council, where all five members were represented in 2011: the BRICS cast identical votes on 37 of the 38 resolutions that were voted upon in that year (until 1 September 2011).[32] Other examples of the BRICS thinking and voting alike are the many climate change negotiations, as well as policies towards Iran and Syria.

The BRICS also regularly meet at their permanent representations of the UN in New York and Geneva in order to coordinate their positions and policies. On top of the already mentioned regular meetings of BRICS government officials, think tanks, mayors and academics, the ‘grouping has been an important element in slowly adjusting each country’s overall perspectives to a more multi-polar world’.[33] The flurry of BRICS meetings thereby not only aims to coordinate policies among its members, but also to strengthen the BRICS’ political presence and global brand. Oliver Stuenkel argues that the BRICS nations air a ‘sense of entitlement […] which makes them articulate [their] visions with a sense of naturalness that often baffles Western observers. The underlying message is: We should have a key role in global affairs not because of what we do, but who we are’.[34]

The discourse around the BRICS has been predominantly economic, and has only recently shifted into the domain of security. Starting off with the BRICS’ call to have a greater voice on global economic and financial governance (in the IMF and World Bank), the on-going war in Syria proved their growing role in security matters. In October 2011, Russia and China (backed by abstentions from Brazil, India and South Africa) blocked a European-drafted UNSC resolution that called for an end to Syria’s crackdown on protests. The BRICS acted in concert and as a strategic grouping to prevent a Western call for ‘regime change’ in Syria. For the West, this was an eye-opener, and the start of an enduring strategic headache. The January 2013 BRICS New Delhi Summit seemed to corroborate this development, since (for the first time) national security advisers of the five BRICS countries held a stand-alone meeting to discuss joint actions in vital security areas such as cyber-security, piracy, counter-terrorism and regional security (particularly in West Asia and North Africa), as well as the Syrian conflict.[35]

The BRICS’ claim to more global responsibility comes to the fore in the area of international peacekeeping operations. As permanent UNSC members, Russia and China obviously have major influence on the UN’s peacekeeping agenda. However, within the BRICS context, they play a rather modest role, whereas Brazil, India and South Africa are actively engaged in the peacekeeping debate and tend to contribute personnel to UN peacekeeping operations. Russia’s reticence can be explained by its understanding of UN peacekeeping operations as instruments of Western influence. As Jaïr van der Lijn and Xenia Avezov argue:

China, which has increased its participation dramatically and continues to evolve when it comes to participation in robust operations, remains highly cautious. In Brazil, India and South Africa – all of which are major contributors – debates have begun about how to participate more strategically, in line with their national interests.[36]

This implies that all BRICS have their own, quite different stakes in (UN-led) peacekeeping operations, ranging from India’s and Brazil’s attempts to gain recognition of their growing global role to strengthen their claim for a UNSC seat, to South Africa’s ambition to be acknowledged as the African continent’s primus inter pares. Most notably, Brazil aims to make itself indispensable to the international community as a credible mediator between the West (or ‘North’) and the Global South. This is also reflected in the concrete contributions of the BRICS to UN peacekeeping operations: India regularly deploys attack helicopters; China tends to contribute engineering and medical units; Russia is the UN’s sole supplier of heavy-lift cargo planes and helicopters; and South Africa is the key participant in UN and African Union (AU) peacekeeping missions in Africa.

Source: UN peacekeeping statistics (accessed 31 August 2015)

In the short term, Russian intractability is unlikely to change, whereas China is gradually moving (since 2003) towards greater involvement with global peacekeeping issues, making it the ‘largest financial contributor to UN peacekeeping operations outside the West/Japan’.[37] China currently contributes more than 3,000 police experts and military troops to UN peacekeeping missions. In December 2014, a Chinese infantry battalion (of some 700 combat troops) joined the UN flag in South Sudan, which was a new experience.[38] China had earlier sent engineering and medical staff to Haiti, Rwanda and Mali, but the South Sudan mission was the first time that China demonstrated, in very practical terms, its commitment to ‘peaceful development’ as a benign ‘responsible power’.[39] China’s current contributions to the UN’s Mali mission (MINUSMA) offer another learning opportunity, and are part of China’s efforts to build local, regional and international strategic partnerships. This will inevitably give China more influence over future UN peacekeeping operations and the way in which they will be conducted.

All of the BRICS agree that without a UNSC mandate, no peacekeeping operations may take place. They also agree that regional organizations should play a central role in the deployment area, not only to legitimize the operations, but also to boost the influence of the Global South to the detriment of the West. Most interestingly, China’s growing involvement in global affairs and its commensurate increased engagement with UN peacekeeping have somewhat softened its sovereigntist stance on non-intervention. This comes at a time when Western countries have curtailed their participation in UN peacekeeping operations.

Frans Paul van der Putten suggests that ‘BRICS influence is unlikely to lead to major changes in the near future regarding the way in which peacekeeping operations are conducted’.[40] Most other academic analysts agree. Oliver Richmond and Ioannis Tellidis, for example, claim that ‘[n]o clear alternative model, ideology, or model of the state or peace is offered by the BRICS and/or other emerging powers’.[41] Benjamin de Carvalho and Cedric de Coning argue that the:

[…] rising powers have a strong incentive to be cautious in their approach [to peacekeeping], because disruptions in the global order would harm their own economic growth […T]he reform of the international peace and security system is not a high priority for the rising powers, in the short to medium term, bar exceptional cases like Libya and Syria.[42]

Yet, of course, eppur si muove. Today’s Western neo-liberal approach to peacekeeping will inevitably change because of growing BRICS engagement. The BRICS’ sovereigntist approach will result in more caution, strengthening the trend to empower local (and regional) ownership and contextualized solutions based on models that may differ depending on region. More concretely, four of the five BRICS countries have been actively engaged in counter-piracy operations in the Gulf of Aden, but have not explored the possibility to do so under the BRICS banner.[43] The BRICS have also committed themselves to the training of peacekeepers, with Brazil (in 2005) launching its own Training Centre for Peacekeeping Operations. The Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) is also used to strengthen security ties among (some) BRICS members. In August 2014, an SCO anti-terror drill took place (called Peace Mission 2014), officially aimed at ‘countering terrorism, separatism and extremism, safeguarding regional peace and stability and improving the militaries’ coordinated ability to fight terrorism’.[44] These SCO exercises were at least partly aimed at preventing ‘external forces’ from ‘trying to provoke a new wave of colour revolutions’.[45] Clearly, the political aims of (at least some) BRICS nations are at odds with those of the EU. Moreover, especially China’s budding global engagement is likely to be self-serving, extending China’s global (political and military) presence and using participation in UN peacekeeping missions to gain experience for Chinese troops.

Since 2011, the BRICS have only occasionally flexed their strategic muscle, most notably by opposing restrictions on the participation of Russian President Putin at the 2014 G20 Summit in Australia. Although symbolic, it undermined the West’s attempts to isolate Russia. This was reinforced by the abstention of Brazil, China, India and South Africa from the UN General Assembly resolution criticizing the referendum on Crimea’s status in March 2014. Taken together, the BRICS’ line on Syria and Ukraine was interpreted as a possibly momentous precedent, since the BRICS’ predilection for blocking major Western security initiatives was considered a harbinger of things to come. This commitment will, however, be curbed by the fact that within the BRICS, only China and Russia (and, to a much lesser extent, India) are interested in military cooperation and global security. China and Russia aim for a global power status, and are willing to invest in their capabilities and reputation to reach that goal, if needs be at the West’s expense. As Russia’s President Putin argued in 2014, ‘We [that is, Russia and China] have agreed on closer coordination of our foreign policy actions, including those made within the framework of the UN’.[46] The other three BRICS countries only occasionally pay lip-service to this anti-Western agenda.[47]

It remains difficult to predict whether this ostensible Sino–Russian strategic partnership will materialize. Still, some American observers fear that ‘[i]nto the 2020s, as China and Russia develop more naval, air transport and space power-projection capabilities, their military cooperation could extend to other regions’ than their current involvement in Africa.[48] The Joint Sea 2014 military exercise by China and Russia in the East China Sea may well be an indication of things to come.

For the time being, the ‘most likely scenario for the BRICS is its performance as a global veto-power, but not so much as a proactive force in international relations or an internal common interest alliance’.[49] Vyacheslav Nikonov, the Vice-Chairman of Russia’s State Duma Committee on International Affairs, therefore concluded in 2013 that the BRICS are unlikely to become a ‘security alliance’, mainly because they ‘are situated on different continents and their security threats often do not coincide’.[50] As Gordon G. Chang suggests, ‘despite appearances, China and Russia are weak states. […] Neither China nor Russia stands for anything more than its narrow self-interest’.[51] This diversity also implies that the BRICS do not gain much collective leverage within multilateral forums, and are particularly ineffective in presenting a cohesive bloc on military and security matters.

Diversifying the Institutional Landscape

Although Western strategic concerns are real and realistic, the BRICS remain conservative in their approach towards the institutional infrastructure of global governance. All BRICS members realize that the escalation of security tensions will negatively affect the world economy, and hence their own growth prospects. Rather than directly undermining existing (and Western-dominated) international forums, the BRICS are developing a so-called ‘parallel order’ (including the AIIB, the NDB, as well as the SCO and other South–South cooperation endeavours). This offers all of the BRICS the opportunity to engage in ‘competitive multilateralism’, by choosing the preferred institution on a case-by-case basis (see below).

Rather than directly undermining existing (and Western-dominated) international forums, the BRICS are developing a so-called ‘parallel order’

A case in point is the initiative to strengthen the UN’s International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in order to compete with, and gradually even replace, the US government as the supervisor of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).[52] This call (which, most interestingly, is not supported by Brazil) would challenge the existing free and open approach to the internet and would increase opportunities for more state control.[53] The political and security implications of such a move may well be profound. Numerous so-called ‘colour revolutions’ in Eastern Europe and Central Asia in the early 2000s, as well as the ensuing Arab Spring, have highlighted the role of the internet and social media as a platform for popular protest and a means of communication and organization. Moscow has labelled these ‘colour revolutions’ a new form of warfare employed by the West.[54] Bolstering state control on the internet under the guise of ‘digital sovereignty’ would also strengthen the hand of autocratic regimes in Eastern Europe and the MENA region and would hence undermine the EU’s overall strategic objectives.[55]

The progress made in South–South cooperation also opens a new menu for choice for developing nations. Within the BRICS, China is clearly the biggest and most influential actor in the area of development cooperation. Africa is the biggest recipient (receiving 46 per cent of Chinese foreign aid), followed by Asia (33 per cent) and Latin America (13 per cent). Only a small part of China’s foreign aid goes to Eastern European countries. With the launch of the AIIB, we will undoubtedly see an upsurge of China’s development assistance, probably following the so-called ‘Angola model’, where projects are financed with Chinese credit, which is then repaid by future oil and raw materials’ supplies. The surge of South–South cooperation implies that the EU’s influence in the developing world will decline, and that Europe’s approach of conditionality will lose out to China’s so-called ‘rogue aid’. China uses the AIIB and the NDB as multilateral forums to channel its aid, thereby reducing the often intense scrutiny of the West. As George Yin observes, ‘Chinese support for the NDB reflects its desire to create an organization that it can control to launder its aid and reduce international scrutiny of its growing influence in the developing world’.[56] China’s dominance in the AIIB and NDB implies that most aid will go to its allies, and that (inevitably) the appeal of credit with a minimum of conditionality will draw more countries into China’s orbit.

This will have only modest consequences for the EU’s strategic vicinity. The Chinese principle of non-intervention in the domestic affairs of other countries (including those receiving Chinese aid and investment), will solidify established regimes, whether (more or less) democratic or not. Yet given the EU’s own dwindling economic power, the growing role of China (and, to a lesser extent, Russia) in the MENA region and the Western Balkans owes more to a strategic horror vacui resulting from the West’s political impotence and/or strategic neglect than it is the result of Beijing’s careful planning. Observers who assume the latter often refer to Deng Xiaoping’s strategic maxim of tao gung yang hui, which is said to mean ‘hide one’s capabilities and bide one’s time’.[57] Although this may well (occasionally) apply to China, it has little to do with the rising role of the BRICS as a group, and stands in stark contrast to Russia’s often brazen attempts to raise its profile as a global actor and regional power broker.

One may conclude that the three strategic challenges facing the EU from the rise of the BRICS (as identified above) remain pertinent, but should not be exaggerated. The BRICS clearly use their economic power and rising status to reach foreign policy goals, which include decision-making in international forums. They also develop alternatives to Western initiatives and institutions. Yet political cohesion within the BRICS is brittle, and there are many opportunities for the EU to develop constructive security relationships with the BRICS as a group, as well as with individual players.[58] For example, the EU’s concern about the rise of radical Islam and Jihadism is shared by Russia as well as China. The new front line against Islamic militancy is likely to be at Russia’s borders in Central Asia, as well as in China’s Xinjiang region.[59] Although their preferred policies to address this shared strategic challenge may differ, the obvious necessity to work together requires open channels of communication, as well as chances to avoid the unwelcome rupture dividing ‘the West versus the rest’. For the EU, the key (and still unanswered) question is how future engagement with the BRICS should be envisaged, and whether Brussels should develop its strategic partnerships with the BRICS as a group, or with (most) of its members individually.