Post on 28-Mar-2023
The rise of Brasil, India, China and Turkey (BRICT): which
implications for global security and for Europe?
Introduction
Framing such a complicate and vast issue is a challenging work to
do. Brazil, India, China and Turkey are 4 different powers of 4
different continent (if we consider Indian Subcontinent as a
continent) each of one are rising in the last decades following
dissimilar roads with diverse objectives and expectations. To
compare them properly we need to frame the issues. On security
aspects we can divide our research in micro and macro themes. In
my paper, I am going to analyze exclusive the macro area of the
security looking at the foreign policies of this State and how
they can implicate global security. I will on purpose not going
inside micro problems as for example illegal drugs trade. I will
analyze the main characteristic of each single state starting from
basic information as population. My research will then develop
with a quick review of economic power, passing through social
aspects as identities. The final part of my work will focalize on
the relations with Europe and World Community and I will end my
research with a sum on the possible factors of instability both
inside and outside the countries.
Population pyramids
The population of the entire world has already turned the 7
billion stage and previsions expect that in 2040-2050 it will
raise up to 9 billion of people. Population pyramids are graphic
illustration used to show the distribution of various age portion
of population in one state. They result to be a very good way to 1
compare the kind of population a state is going to have in the
following decades, it can help also to individuate the possible
labour force and military force of one state.
The shape of the pyramid change in order to how many people of
that age are in the society, the following pictures shows the
different combination of a population pyramid.
A stage 2 pyramid is the best expected for a developing country
and shows a great amount of working (and possibly warfare)
population age with the majority of people aged between 15 and 65.
A dangerous stage for the future of a country is the 4th one, this
happens when after some decades of declining birth rate the
population birth rate can not grown up to 2.2 that means the
renovation of species. This form of pyramid is the one present in
a vast majority of European states and it is caused by different
factors as the condition of the woman or the delay in the first
marriage. A common example regarding women conditions is that
birth rate in Italy started to decline speedily after 1971 the
year in which the Italian “Corte di Cassazione” cancelled the
article 553 of penal code that banned the contraceptive pill.
A first compulsory step in my research is to compare and describe
the pyramids of our states.
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China:
China’s population as showing by the graph already has
encountering some problems regarding his population. The one-child
policy of 1979 produced a gap between the actual generation and
the past one. A drastic fall in the birth rate in the ’80’s and
90’s it is producing an absence of young people and this will hit
the future economy of China. In fact if we look at the 2050
prediction the number of people in working age is extremely
decreasing in comparison with people aged over 60 that should
(theoretically) not work anymore in 2050. This population gap will
not be filled in the next decades even because the one-child
policy seems to have caught even the minds of the medium Chinese
people. Always remembering that China is a big power a future of
difficult with population management should not be forget.
India:
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India is actually the second largest population country in the
world with an estimated population of 1.200.000.000 people just
some million people lower than China with 18.3% of the total of
the world. If we analyze its population pyramids of 2015 and 2050,
we can simply note that India is shifting from a dimension of the
first stage to the second stage of population growth. Its
demographic window is opening in the next decades and India is
going to have an huge number of working (or warfare) age
population for many years to go.
Brazil:
As for China, Brazil population is going to reduce strongly in the
next decades, but in contrary to Chinese situation this is caused
not by planning policies of the government but by education of
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population and transition from a developing country to a developed
one. Brazil will suffer a gap between generation but not so big as
Chinese one, its demographic window by the way is opening right
now and Brazil could not waste this opportunity in terms of
working age rate of its population.
Turkey:
Turkey’s pyramids show a great opportunity for the Euro-Asiatic
country that will continue to produce progeny in the yet to come
years due to his big birth rate that is actually around 2.8 child
per couple.
Economic power (with GDP)
Graphs showed below are really interesting to compare different
GPD and economic power. We do have to pay attention to the scale
on the right and left of the images to not forget we are
discussing about countries of unequal dimensions. Even if they are
countries with economics that are distant in term of GDP our
interest is to focalize in trends of the countries’ business. As
we can see China is growing very fast in relation with the others
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countries examinated. Its growth is reducing from the 10% annual
growth of the last decade but it’s still really high with 7.30
annual rate and representing the 14.90% of the world economy.
Indian growth is increasing from 4.70 annual rate of 2012 to 5.30
of 2013 and we can see from the graph that its grow is constant.
One thing to underline in Indian economy is that in relation of
its huge population it produce just the 3.03% of the world
economy.
Brazilian economy is in danger following the expectation of the
graph and according to a vast majority of economist. Its main
problem is that how occurred in Italy in the 70ies and 80ies the
government is spending great amount of money in unproductive
policies as welfare but without well planning it. This can be
showed by the actual period of recession that Brazil is facing
that started in 2012 and it is just in a minimum part linked with
the recesssion in OCSE countries.
A country that experienced the problem of recession but fighted it
well thanks to its demographic window and even to productive
policies of the government is Turkey. As we can see from the graph
below Turkey’s economy faced the crisis in 2008-2009 restarting to
grow at 3% of annual rate from 2011.
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Identity issues
As identity issues we can divide among religious issues,
nationalistic issues and social issues. China for example as the
cradle of Taoism, Buddhism and Confucianism has a vast majority of
people that follow these teachings of religion-philosophical
traditions in folks religion. Religion in the society seems to be 7
important but not in a political way. An exception in this
exposition is the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region where the
majority of people are Sunni Muslims and this creates some
problems in the region that will be discussed in the following
paragraph. Nationalism in China can be a decisive factor regarding
the possibility of danger that China can cause at the
international Community. Nationalism when unifies with irredentism
and chauvinism can took the worst of the man being and reverse on
war. China’s nationalism nowadays fortunately seems to not be
oriented to chauvinism. Irredentism is always present with the
question of Taiwan (official Republic of China) that seems to have
been frozen since the recognition of People’s Republic of China by
the US in 1979. The islands issue of the China’s sea will be
developed in the paragraph regarding international issues of
instability.
Summing, we can conclude that nationalism not seems to be
dangerous as it is growing in China, especially because of the
residual of the polity of criticize Han chauvinism of Mao Zedong
in 1956 that is always present in the communist party in China.
Even in constitution of China of 1982 is underlined that China is
a "unitary multiethnic state created jointly by the people of all
its nationalities" and that "it is necessary to combat big ethnic
group chauvinism, mainly Han chauvinism, and to combat local
ethnic nationalist chauvinism." China’s social issue can result to
be a dangerous problem in the future according to politics
analyzers. The gap between rural and cities areas is highly
deepening and it is calmed just thank to the unity of the
Communist Party that rules over China. Another social problem in
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the future of China would be the already mentioned Uyghur issue
that will affect for sure the future of the Red State because of
its combustion between religious, social and identity issue.
Even India’s religious issues can be discussed as Chinese one, in
fact even if in Indian history religion always played a
fundamental role, religious diversity and religious tolerance are
both established in the country by the law and costumes.
Polytheists’ religions in India have always accepted even
monotheists religion as Christians and Muslims, freedom of
religion is also a fundamental right according to the Indian
Constitution. Religion so does not seem a danger for the future of
stability of the country. Indian nationalism as religion issues
seems to be present in everyday life of Indian citizen but can in
future be a problem in international context as represented by the
Marò case involving 2 Italians marines. This case can be viewed in
fact as a form of nationalism and was used even as political arm
from both the candidates of R. Modi and R. Gandhi in their speech
for the Indian general election of 2014. With the win of Modi and
his Bharatiya Janata Party (Indian People’s Party) the nationalism
appears as one of the main way to achieve the goals of the party.
At the moment nationalism in India seems to be just a protective
one with defensive measures of nationalism as the last anti-
terrorism law of 2012, if it will turn in a more offensive and
irredentist movement this would create a serious factor of
instability especially in the northern borders with China and
Pakistan. Even India as a serious problem in social gap but this
will not affect by now the international area of policies of
India. International trade, commerce and remittance of Indian
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emigrated in other countries helps to reduce this gap, and it will
be strength the link with other countries more than affect them.
Brazil has a high adherence level of religion people but the 80%
are Christians, just a few percentage of people profess another
religion with the Brazilian Republican Constitution that protects
other religion. Brazil is also famous for its inclination to
syncretism, due to this factors we can assume that religion is not
a matter for security in Brazil. Nationalism too seems to be just
defensive.
Even though Brazil passed through many decades dictatorship, this
dictatorship never appeared to be irredentist nor to use
nationalism as a weapon outside the country. The last war to
redefine borders in Brazil results to be the Acre
War in 1899-1903. In social context Brazil has showed the entire
world the danger of having a huge social gap during the last FIFA
World Cup organized in the country in June 2014. The protests
started in 2012, continued until the end of the manifestation, and
have been guided by economics impulses. Social integration in
Brazil seems to be a major issue of danger for the country and can
bring to internal problems that nowadays however does not appears
to be related to international context.
Turkey’s relations with religion in the lasts years has been
enough complicated. Being a secular state, since it was founded by
Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, in 1923 results not enough to be considered
a laic state. With an official population of the 90% of Muslims,
according to the Turkish government, and only 3 other religions
recognized Turkey until now did not have significant cases of
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discrimination that can led by reflex an instability in the
region. The unity of the religion and the relative secularization
of the faith brought to the marginalization of the extreme
fraction of the religion and even though Turkey has a border in
common with the ISIS new state until now seemed to be enough
resistant to the penetration of possible Islamic jihadists.
Another pillar of the secular Turkish state founded in 1923 was
the nationalism that used to be intended as a defensive one to
keep unified the new state after the fall of Turkish Empire.
Nowadays the nationalism risks to confluence in a Neo-Ottomanism
or a Pan-Islamism vision of the international relations. The new
premier Ahmet Davutoglu in fact as a former Minister of Foreign
Affairs in his speech mentioned a new role of Turkey in its area
to get finally a “Pax Ottomana”, he also poke of developing a
closer union between former Ottoman lands, though stated that
territorial claims would never rest on historical borders. Turkey
can be a stabilization arm in the area if the moderate Islamic
parties will continue to keep it unified and to exclude the
extremist Sunni fraction as Isis militant. Social issue in Turkey
is highly related with the Kurd ethnic people that since centuries
are demanding for independence or at least more autonomy. It is
not simple to judge how this will affect the foreign policies of
the country but it will be for sure a determinant for the future
of stability of the region, especially now with the Isis-Kurd
conflict at the southern border.
International issues of instability
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The main question we have to ask ourselves before starting
discussing about international security of this group of state is
the following one. Do they contest the status quo?
A question like this can serve to better underline the position of
each State.
China is the main power contesting the status quo in Asia. Its
growing power is focusing its attention on South China Sea waters
and Japan. As the summary of dispute shows below China has many
maritime dispute with all its neighborhoods all concerning islands
and territorial waters in South China Sea waters. These waters are
important for what is under it, it assumed in fact that South
China Sea is plenty of oil resources and would be even a good area
where practice fracking. China policy at regard seem to be clearly
passed from the victim mentality (shouhai zhe xintai) to the great
power mentality (da gou xintai). The other state in the region
seems to have just few possibilities to face the expansion of
China in South China Sea, the key pass through the position of
United States of America that will decide how to act. Until now
the position of United States seems to be attendant, US itself
still views China as more an opportunity than a threat. Some
American authors see the perception of a stronger China for a
stronger Region as the best possible future.
China is modernizing its army but numbers show that its defense
spending remains at the 8% of its total government spending. Its
total defense spending in 2007 was 139$ billion slightly less than
just the budget for the US Navy of 147$ billion. China can not be
a competitor for USA in military strength by now but it is of sure
the major power in the region. In an international context China 12
can continue on its path to a complete socialization in the world
community, it must be remembered that China has since 1979 a
permanent seat in the Security Council of the United Nation. Even
thought China prefers to act by bilateral by tradition in the year
2014 two important agreements seems to have changed the position
of China in the international context. The first one regards the
International Community itself: by the Climate Accord of November
17th, 2014 the PRC and USA agreed on one critical issues of
international community, the reduce in emission of CO2. This
agreement show the wills of China of not be out of the major
international decisions and its will to collaborate in every
important question of the world. A collaboration between USA and
China seems possible by this minor step that will lead in the
future to important historical changes.
The second critical episode that shows a will in the intention of
China to collaborate in an international context is the strategic
partnership signed in 1985 with the UE and that is strengthening
in this year. Even though the human rights issue slows it, the
strategic cooperation led this year to an important meeting, the
1st EU-China Dialogue on Defense and Security held in Beijing in
October 2014. Chairman of the EU Military Committee General
Patrick de Rousiers visited China and how declared at the press
statement “It was agreed on that occasion - based on the good
cooperation so far - to raise the level of EU-China dialogue and
cooperation on defense and security". The implementation of the
EU-China 2020 Strategic Agenda for Cooperation agreed by both
sides at the 2013 EU-China Summit is a sure path towards good
relations between China and UE.
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Summary of dispute in South East Asia
Area of dispute
Brun
ei
Chin
a
Indone
sia
Malays
ia
Philipp
ines
Taiwa
n
Vietna
m
The nine-dash line area ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
Maritime boundary along
Vietnamese coast✔ ✔ ✔
Maritime boundary north of
Natuna Islands✔ ✔ ✔
Maritime boundary north of
Borneo✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
Maritime boundary off Palawan
and Luzon✔ ✔ ✔
Islands in southern South
China Sea✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔ ✔
Islands in northern South
China Sea✔ ✔ ✔
India’s relation with international community are stable since 15
years, the UN withdrew the sanction for the military nuclear
program on September 2001. Despite being the world’s third-largest
military power in the world with 1.325.000 active military, it
must to be remember that this number has to be compared with the 14
demography of this sub-continent. If we compare it the number of
active military per 1000 capita fall to 1.1 very low compared to
US 4.4 and Russian 5.3. Even China has a major number of troops
compared to inhabitants with 1.7 military per 1000 capita. The
percentage of GDP that goes on defense budget is low comparing to
the other States analyzed, in fact just the 2.4% of GDP has been
used for military reasons as shown by the table below.
% of GDP spent in defense from 2010 to 2014
China 2.1 2.0 2.0 2.1
India 2.7 2.6 2.5 2.4
Brazil 1.6 1.5 1.5 1.4
Turkey 2.4 2.2 2.3 2.3
The scaring number in Indian figures is the number of paramilitary
forces that stables around 2.3 million overlapping the Chinese
forces of 1.1 billion. Despite this huge amount of military
forces, the Indian government seems to be well integrated in the
International Community. The Indian government after having
participate at “The War on Terror” actively entertain nowadays
well relations with all states of international community. In his
maiden speech in front of the United Nation Modi called again for
the reform of the Security Council and for a siege for India. In
the last G20 summit in Australia, the Prime Minister of the UK
David Cameron underlined that India is the top priority State to
entertain relations for the UK. At the last BRICS summit held in
Fortaleza on July 2014 Brazilian and Indian government put the
base for the New Development Bank.
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All these events in which India participated, show a great will in
Indian democracy to participate in the future global government of
the World.
Indian foreign policy is not just agreements and victories. 3
important cases impact on the future relations of the biggest
democracy in the world. The first one is the so-called Marò
dispute with the Italian government that discredits the Indian
diplomacy towards Italy and even towards EU.
The second important case is Kashmir dispute with Pakistan, in
fact talking about status quo we can not forget this issue.
Kashmir conflict dates back at the first day of independence of
India and collected yet three wars the last of one in 1999. The
last events are really recent, in October 2014 in fact Indian and
Pakistani troops traded gunfire killing at least four civilians
and highly the tension level at the border. A new conflict between
the two power could be a great danger for the entire International
Community and could destroy all the efforts that India did to
being fully accepted. The government of India does not seem to act
not rationally on this delicate question but for a conflict that
least since 67 years a new breakdown at the moment with two states
that are now nuclear armed would be a catastrophe for the
International Community.
The same can be said for the third ongoing dispute at the border
of India, the Sino-Indian conflict in the northern border appears
just to be frozen from 1996 with the signing of the Sino-Indian
Bilateral Peace and Tranquility Accords, agreements to maintain
peace and tranquility along the Line of Actual Control. Even
though a war between India and China does not seem to be possible 16
for the economic link that strengthen the partnership. The
relationship between India and China has never been too strong in
modern times, though the bilateral trade is expected to touch $1
Trillion by 2050. There have also been speculations on Indian side
on how to tackle the rising trade deficit with China, which
currently stands up at $40 Billion.
Brazilian situation and relations with the International Community
appears similar to the Indian one. As one of the major emerging
power in the world, even Brazil is pushing the international
community to change some rules in it. Brazil is asking for a
permanent seat at the Security Council of the UN and is dealing
for the reform inside the World Bank Group. Indian-Brazil
bilateral relations are an example of BRICS cooperation to achieve
goals. In the last decades, Brazil presented itself to the
international community as a trustable partner for multilateral
decisions. It hosted many important summit as the Rio Summit on
the Earth of 1992 and 2012 and international sports event as the
Fifa World Cup in 2014 and the Olympic Games in Rio in 2016.
Brazil, as already said, did not enter in an armed conflict
(except for the two world wars) since Acre War in 1899-1903. It is
actually not involved in any conflict; the only two actual
disputes are frozen and are about two small section of the border
with Uruguay on the Quaraì River, and an Antartica area dispute
that dates back on 1986 with UK and Argentine but it never created
diplomatic problems.
Brazil has never contested the status quo geographically but just
officially within the international organizations. Economically it
is an important import-export partner for both Europe and US even 17
though is trying to close some lux wealth with local import taxes.
The lessening in the budget % of the GDP from 1.6% to 1.4%
demonstrate that Brazil is trying to context the status quo just
from a legal and diplomatic point of view not arming is troops
even for deterrence.
A most problematic relation with the International Community is
the Turkey’s one. Turkey as a member of NATO since 1952 is the far
eastern state inside the NATO and the only one that does not have
a majority of Christians in its population. Turkey also is trying
to put the issue for a reform of the UN Security Council as the
principal theme in ONU and is part of almost all the International
Convention of the UN.
Security issues with Turkey are always on the agenda
unfortunately, it are caused principally because Turkey is located
in a geographical position between Europe and Asia. This near east
position takes Turkey in a cultural conflict both with the Arab
world and the Europe one.
Starting for the Security implications in the European Union it
has to be underlined that EU blocked the accession of Turkey after
years of negotiates. EU in fact express its concern regarding
human rights and the Cyprus question. The island of Cyprus has
been occupied by Turkish troops since 1974 and negotiation lasting
since 40 years did not bring to a change of the status quo. The
Northern Cyprus Republic is not recognized by any state in the
World Community and make the negotiation not going anywhere.
Cyprus conflict is a serious danger for the future of Turkey’s
relations with EU.
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On the other front, as already described, the new premier Ahmet
Davutoglu wants to follow the old principles of Pan-Islamism and
Neo-Ottomanism. It will not be simple to strength solid links with
the neighborhood for Turkey. After the civil war in Syria in fact
the south eastern border of Turkey is menaced by the ISIS fighting
in these days in Kobane at just few meters from Turkey’s
territory. Turkish government put its tanks just in front the
border but did not moved against ISIS. This is happening because
the major preoccupation of the Turkish government is related to
the possible claims of the Kurdish ethnic group now fighting for
Kobane and living among the borders even in Turkish territory.
Kurds in Turkey organized since 1978 an armed force called PKK to
create a Kurdish state in the south-east area of Turkey. The Kurd
situation actually is the most sensible one for the future of the
Turkey Security. Turkey can be weapon in the hand of Europe that
can use it as a key to conquer the hearts and the minds of middle
east. But as all the weapon it can even rebound on and create
Security matters and complication in a delicate area.
Conclusions
The international security is based on the way states see the
international arena. The 4 states we analyzed act every day in the
international arena in various ways and with many goal to achieve.
The national security dilemma is present more in Turkey and India
than in China or Brazil.
Threat to the international security after all that I said can
come from a revisionism of the maritime borders of China, the
islamisation of Turkey or the radicalization of the conflict in
the Kashmir region for Turkey. Brazilian case does not seem to be 19
a danger in proper international macro security issues, even if
the persistent social gap in some areas could bring effect in the
future even outside the country especially regarding trade and
commerce.
The growth of these four ascending powers can be, with the due
efforts, absorbed by the International Community with the proper
measures of each single case.
Every single claim of these State should not be neglected by the
major actual powers and for sure the power in the future should be
a little rebalanced to at least meet some of the expectations of
this emerging powers. Honors and charges have to be shared in the
future to continue on the path of the International Cooperation
already shown by this text.
To conclude, Europe has to take care of Turkey and possibly to
restart negotiation even not for the membership but at least for a
stronger cooperation. Turkey in fact that can be the bridge for
normalizing the relations with the hot core of the Islamic part of
the world.
Cristian Barbieri
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