On 12 February 2024, the Hungarian Institute of International Affairs (HIIA) held an open panel discussion entitled “BRICS enlargement and post-Davos: is a new world order emerging?”. The participants of the discussion were Péter Rada, International Vice Rector of Budapest Metropolitan University, Béla Soltész, Senior Lecturer at Eötvös Loránd University, and Júlia Szivák, Assistant Lecturer at Pázmány Péter Catholic University. The event was moderated by Péter Goreczky, Senior Research Fellow at HIIA.
The discussion on the relationship between the developing and the developed world was inspired by the recent BRICS enlargement and the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos. Regarding these summits, Péter Rada noted that although the Global South is not united, the assumption that developing countries are unable to cooperate seems to be challenged – the BRICS enlargement on January 1, 2024 is an example of the opposite. The speakers agreed that the West was visibly caught off-guard by alternative visions of world order, the more active representation of developing countries’ own interests and the gradual emergence of a multipolar world order. Turning to the possibility of the Davos Forum emptying out, the experts stressed that the WEF is now more relevant as a business and image-building platform than as a political meeting.
In relation to the transformation of the world order, Béla Soltész mentioned the concept of hybrid anti-hegemonism, whereby the Global South strives for only reforms in some areas, however, in other areas, it creates alternative structures such as the New Development Bank. Péter Rada pointed out that although the countries of the Global South criticise the current world order, they cannot yet offer a clear alternative, while Júlia Szivák stressed that the West needs to realise that the Global South also has its own well-understood interests, which are not always coinciding with those of the developed world. Accordingly, it is not in the economic interests of the Global South to take sides in the rivalry between the United States and China, and it is not worth interpreting doing business with China as anti-US behaviour. The situation is similar in the case of Hungary: the legitimacy of seeking and building alternative relations can be questioned less and less, and the changes of the world order can be turned into an advantage with pragmatism, as long as there is not too much of a rupture in the international system.