Russian Views on BRICS and the Future World Order

Summary

Russian officials and analysts present BRICS and the SCO as pillars of a multipolar, Eurasia-centred order, tie the Ukraine war to a century-long Western crisis and Russia's "World Majority" pivot, and frame it as driving a Russian cultural and spiritual renewal.

What it argues

1. Pillars of a post-Western orderPolitics

   Lavrov says BRICS launched its expansion process to help build a more just, polycentric world order. Karaganov traces the liberal order's crisis from World War I through decolonisation, Soviet nuclear parity and the USSR's collapse, urging parallel institutions within BRICS and the SCO rather than scrapping the UN, IMF and World Bank outright. Russian officials cast BRICS's growth as a deliberate, long-building step toward a non-Western global order.

2. Confrontation with the WestPolitics

   Galuzin says the Russia-West confrontation predates 2022 or 2014, rooted in NATO enlargement and disregard for indivisible security, and aims at Russia's strategic defeat. A Russia-Belarus Treaty on Security Guarantees, in force since March 2025, commits both states to mutual defence by all means, including nuclear weapons, amid rising NATO activity. Moscow frames the Ukraine war as part of a long Western effort to strip Russia of great-power status.

3. BRICS-SCO Eurasian pillars, not a blocPolitics

   Bordachev argues BRICS should avoid imitating power-based blocs like the EU, G7 or NATO, building cohesion around shared goals instead. Panova argues BRICS and the SCO can act as complementary pillars of a "Greater Eurasia," sharing core members and eventually drawing in regional blocs like the AU, ASEAN, Arab League and CELAC. Analysts propose multi-speed, non-bloc cooperation between BRICS and the SCO as the route to a Eurasian order.

4. De-dollarisation and paymentsEconomics

   Panova says 67% of intra-BRICS trade is now conducted in national currencies, with work ongoing on an alternative payment system. The SCO's planned bank, agreed at Tianjin, remains inoperative; non-BRICS states may instead join the New Development Bank. BRICS currency and payment initiatives are advancing but have not yet produced a working alternative system.

5. Energy and resource chainsEconomics

   Panova cites the SCO Energy Club and BRICS Energy Research Platform as venues to align producer and consumer interests. She says combining energy with critical-minerals cooperation could build joint value-added processing chains. Russian analysts see energy and critical minerals as a concrete area for BRICS-SCO economic coordination.

6. Sustainable development agendaEconomics

   Bordachev says BRICS states share an interest in advancing UN Sustainable Development Goals that Western-dominated institutions block. He proposes BRICS begin with a joint development initiative for West Africa. Development cooperation, not bloc politics, is proposed as BRICS's route to global governance.

7. Cultural and spiritual renewalSociety

   Karaganov says the war has pushed Russia to shed "Westernism" and return to its "true self," producing what he calls a multidimensional economic, cultural and spiritual Renaissance. He points to growing Russian interest in the cultures of Eastern, Latin American and African countries, citing Pushkin's African ancestry as a symbol of historic openness. Karaganov frames the war's domestic and cultural effects as a deliberate renewal of Russian identity.

8. Russophobia and European declineSociety

   Karaganov attributes European hostility to Russia partly to a historic "cultural racism" rooted in centuries of Russian military victories over Europe. He says today's wave stems from European elites' domestic failures and what he calls "post-human" or "anti-human" values spreading in Western societies. Karaganov presents hostility to Russia as both centuries-old and, in his telling, a symptom of Europe's own decline.

Open questions

• Whether BRICS's alternative payment system will move from technical fine-tuning to an operational breakthrough.
• Whether the SCO's planned bank, agreed at Tianjin, will become operational or be bypassed via the New Development Bank.
• How BRICS will maintain cohesion after its 2024-2025 expansion while avoiding closed-club dynamics.
• How the outcome of the Ukraine conflict will shape Russia's relations with its Near Abroad neighbours.
• Whether Karaganov's proposed parallel institutions within BRICS and the SCO will replace or merely supplement the UN, IMF and World Bank.