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BRICS Offers More Progressive World Order, South African Expert Says

© Sputnik . Evgeny Biyatov / Go to the mediabankChief Director of the Institute for Economic Research and Innovation at Tshwane University of Technology in South Africa Dr. Rasigan Maharajh
Chief Director of the Institute for Economic Research and Innovation at Tshwane University of Technology in South Africa Dr. Rasigan Maharajh  - Sputnik Africa, 1920, 26.10.2024
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BRICS is an intergovernmental organization established in 2006. Russia's 2024 presidency of BRICS began with the joining of new members. Adding to Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, it now includes Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, the UAE and Saudi Arabia; the latter yet to formalize membership, although participating in BRICS meetings.
BRICS offers a model for a more progressive world order, one that supports cooperation and development over confrontation and dominance. This approach, the speaker suggests, is characterized by diversity and "plurality" – a distribution of power not only vertically but also horizontally, Chief Director of the Institute for Economic Research and Innovation at Tshwane University of Technology in South Africa Dr. Rasigan Maharajh told Sputnik Africa.

"I think the BRICS opens the doors, but those doors need to be flooded by all of us representing the global majority to make sure that we transform, not merely reform these institutions inside the straitjacket that created them," he said.

Africa's historical marginalization and underdevelopment by Western powers is a key factor driving its current economic and political realities, Maharajh noted.
BRICS nations role in supporting Africa's development, particularly through infrastructure projects, as a counterweight to the West, is very significant, the speaker said.

"Russia is involved in mining operations a whole range of ways in which we are improving the capacities, the capabilities and the competencies of Africans to do this as ourselves," the interviewee added, noting Russia's input in Africa's self-reliance development.

Ultimately, the BRICS can be a platform for the Global South to share its unique knowledge and perspectives on the world stage, the researcher stated.

"We are bringing the wealth of experience of the Global South into world systems itself. And for me, that's the strongest element that comes through our indigenous, our traditional knowledge is our ways of seeing the world now have a chance to not only be resuscitated, but brought, updated and made available to all of us," Maharajh stressed.

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