The South and Geopolitics: From Bandung to the BRICS?

Abstract

This chapter shifts the focus from political economy to geopolitics, and addresses the question of whether the ‘new South’is transforming the international order, and if so, in what ways. It does so by first examining the ‘rise and fall’ of the Third World since 1945, discussing as background to the current period the Bandung Conference in 1955 and formation of the Non-Aligned Movement in 1961, the formation of UNCTAD in 1964 and the oil price rises of 1973–74 and calls for a new international economic order in 1974–75. While the mid-1970s are often regarded as being the height of the period of Third World solidarity, this argument is treated with some scepticism and it is shown how this supposed apex quickly gave rise to the decline of ‘Third Worldism’ in the context of the debt crisis of 1982, neoliberalism and the lost decade of development in the 1980s. The chapter then moves on to discuss the rise of what has been called the ‘new South’ (Alden et al 2012), which is associated with the rise of new international organizations and summits, including the BRICS. Finally, the chapter then addresses the question of what the transformation of the international order might actually mean, whether it be the rise of new hegemonic challengers, a new era of multi-polarity, or simply a new era of South-South cooperation.