But do you remember the BRICS?

It is almost touching to think that just over ten years ago, the Five Star Movement organised a conference in the Chamber of Deputies – attended by Andrey Klimov, then vice-chair of the Russian Duma’s Foreign Affairs Committee – on the ‘new world with the BRICS’. It must be said that the acronym, which at the time stood for the economies of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, had no international resonance and was known mainly to anti-Atlanticist groups, the anti-establishment elite – in short, the early phase of ‘red-brownism’. Ten years on, pages upon pages have been written – particularly in Italy – about the fabulous world of the BRICS, and about how this group of major alternative economies would crush the evil, colonialist West. Behind this lay a precise communication strategy from Beijing, which sought to establish itself as the leader of the so-called Global South by multiplying the number of associations and groups united by a single objective: to reduce Western influence over the rules of the world.

Tomorrow in New Delhi, India, the 18th BRICS summit of heads of state will open, attended even by Chinese leader Xi Jinping (who has not visited India for seven years due to the crisis between the two major powers) and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian. Iran has been a member of BRICS since 2024 and is a guest of India, whose Prime Minister Narendra Modi has brought his government much closer to Israel. The United Arab Emirates, a BRICS member since 2024, have been struck by Iranian missiles in recent months and have severed ties with Tehran; even the Kremlin has admitted that the differences between Abu Dhabi and Tehran risk derailing the summit’s final declaration. In short, the BRICS were supposed to change the world, but the New Delhi summit opens already burdened by an almost comical disconnect between the rhetoric of ‘Global South unity’ and the reality of a table full of guests who barely speak to one another.