THE YEAR 2025, THE YEAR OF A RECONFIGURATION OF GLOBAL ARCHITECTURE

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THE YEAR 2025, THE YEAR OF A RECONFIGURATION OF GLOBAL ARCHITECTURE
https://ioncoja.ro/anul-2025-anul-unei-reconfigurari-a-arhitecturii-globale/

MECHANICALLY TRANSLATED FROM ROMANIAN

Today's world is shaped by a tension caused by two opposing paradigms that pull humanity in two opposite directions.
One is unipolar and based on the organizing principle "Might makes Right", the other is multipolar and shaped by a principle of "win-win cooperation",
Right has/makes Might".

Where one defines imperial "value" around the material extraction of land and labor (or outright theft through usury, war, and speculation), the other defines value around the creative powers of human thought driven by long-term projects that harmonize individual profit with the General Welfare.

One is shaped by the words of Tony Blair and Kissinger, who called for a "post-Westphalian era" of R2P humanitarian interventions in nation states, the other is based on the defense of national sovereignty, as enshrined in the Treaty of Westphalia and later crippled in the UN Charter.

The Westphalian Principle of 1648 put an end to the 30-year religious wars, with roots in universal history from the days of Plato's Republic, to Cicero's fight to save Rome, to the rise of Charlemagne's dynasty and many others, and up to the present day events in Ukraine.

R2P – Responsible to Protect – The Responsibility to Protect Doctrine is an international norm that states that countries have a responsibility to protect their citizens from mass atrocity crimes. The doctrine was adopted by the United Nations in 2005, in response to the genocides in Rwanda and Serbia. So Russia's intervention in Donbas is legal under the UN Charter.

R2P is a "Trojan horse," a "redecorated colonialism" set up to fail. At the heart of the principle is an unresolved geopolitical tension. There are five permanent members of the UN Security Council: the US, Russia, China, the UK, and France. Each can refuse UN military action or R2P.

R2P was designed for pragmatists rather than purists, with a full knowledge of the messy reality of real-world motivations and behavior. It was designed not to create new legal rules, but rather just a new compelling sense of moral and political obligation to enforce existing ones.

It was initially proposed that the five permanent members of the Security Council enter into a voluntary self-restraint agreement not to exercise their veto power in cases of mass atrocities, following a proposal by the so-called Responsibility Group. An Act of Coherence and Transparency (ACT) was proposed for a Code of Conduct that would oblige all UN Security Council Members to refrain from vetoing when faced with atrocities. Together, these parallel initiatives have been signed by over 120 governments, but are not being implemented.

For this reason, the member and partner countries of the BRICS want realistic implementation of the articles of the UN Charter, as well as the disappearance of the Veto Right in decision-making by the UN and its bodies.

The reestablishment of alliances in the Middle East on a more stable basis that transcends sectarian jealousies and religious divisions will bring a more determined front in the development and implementation of the basic articles of the UN Charter.
Let us hope that the new state of Syria will become a sovereign state with a government capable of overcoming certain religious favoritisms and capable of beneficially harmonizing the country's great ethnic and religious diversity, which the Assad regime has failed to do.

A more complex and exhaustive analysis, as well as pertinent discussions, can only be done after the true intentions of the future Syrian government and its alignment are known.

Are we moving towards an alternative international order?
What are the strategic advantages of BRICS+?
Can they embody the voice of the Global South?

With Egypt, Ethiopia, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Iran joining BRICS in early 2024, the group now embodies a group of influential states on the international stage, representing 46% of the world's population and 29% of global GDP. While
2024 is synonymous with a major election year for several BRICS members, further expansions could take place in the coming years as new governments take shape. All it takes, as we saw in Argentina, is for a pro-American liberal like Javier Milei to be elected and leave the group.

The BRICS+ countries are a fairly heterogeneous group, but what is interesting to see is that, even with the Indian elections, which brought back Narendra Modi with a small majority, most countries of the so-called Global South are fundamentally united, with a strong internal consensus to finally free themselves from the Western international order known as Bretton Woods.

So, with one or two exceptions, there can be changes of government without undermining this very strong consensus. And while some would like to see BRICS+ as an anti-Western confrontational club, in reality it is clear that with the recent addition of countries like Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt, the consensus is more along the lines of multi-alignment, as India, which has recently moved closer to the United States without breaking off relations with Russia, for example.

The BRICS+ countries are not a marginal phenomenon in the evolution of the world economy. What we can see is that the BRICS+ countries are rather a fairly flexible grouping, born out of the political will of countries from the Global South to be taken seriously in international forums – which are still largely dominated by the West.

In a way, this ensures that, instead of heading towards a world of confrontation between two blocs, we are heading towards a South-North confrontation, but within the existing international architecture and especially around institutions that need to be reformed, such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, which are still largely dominated by Western countries, unlike the United Nations, where countries from the South are much better represented.

It should be noted, however, that the entry of Saudi Arabia, Iran and the United Arab Emirates tends to consolidate a certain "cartelization of the world" under the BRICS umbrella in the key areas of raw materials, food, energy and metals.
Some countries in the South now have strong political leverage over the critical raw materials they claim. This poses a problem, since most of the so-called countries in the South are not actually producers of these raw materials.

There is therefore a risk that within the BRICS+ club there will not be a confrontation for the time being, but a difficulty in finding a balance between the interests of producing countries and the interests of consuming countries.
For example, Africa, one of the giants of tomorrow in terms of raw materials, is being courted by China, but also by Russia and the Gulf states, a situation from which it has only to gain and no longer has to accept humiliating offers from Western concerns.

Thailand recently applied to join BRICS+ and many countries such as Mexico, Algeria, Indonesia and Turkey are likely to join the group, can they embody in a homogeneous way the voice of the so-called "Global South"?
BRICS+ can become not only a solidly structured organization, but the club can be the "VOICE" of the countries of the Global South. The reason for this is that most countries tend to adopt multi-alignment, double bargaining positions between Western countries and the emerging or re-emerging powers of the Global South in the broad sense of the term, including Russia.

BRICS expansion will continue – though most likely at a moderate pace for now – to prevent the dilution of structural cohesion.
This explains why progress has been so slow on the issue of a monetary alternative to the dollar or on actual payments from the BRICS bank, which is now headed by a Brazilian, Dilma Rousseff.

Therefore, we would move more towards what could be described as a meeting forum and, in particular, a forum before the G20 – as the BRICS have taken up the habit of meeting before each G20 or other major international summit, with the aim of harmonizing the positions of the South and decisions of collective influence on the global level.

It is therefore quite positive that BRICS is expanding to include countries that represent visions and interests that are different from those of the five founding countries, and countries like Algeria, Indonesia, Vietnam and Thailand seem serious about applying the principles of multipolar, win-win collaboration.
It will be interesting to see whether the election of Mexico's new president changes the country's thinking about joining the club at a time when the United States is completely opposed.

French researcher Julien Vercueil tells us that we are heading towards a scenario of continued expansion of the BRICS, rather than its disintegration and decline, as some believed or hoped. And its influence on the global level will become much stronger, especially since they can constitute a viable alternative to several international organizations, including the UN.

But in this expansion scenario, rather than the world economy being divided between South and North, we are moving towards a growing contestation that progressively leads to reforms of the global economic order.

This seems the most likely scenario, given the way the first expansion was carried out. The second expansion does not take place in 2024, so the countries that applied will certainly have to wait until 2025.
But 2025 is a year when there is talk of reforming the world architecture under the gentle but sustained pressure of the Global South.
After this reformation, states can align more easily and on better defined lines.

Atlanta 12/09/2024