Between Opportunity And Constraint: ASEAN's Engagement With An Expanding BRICS - Analysis

Key Takeaways:

• The 18th BRICS Summit in New Delhi under India’s “non-Western, but not anti-West” chairship expanded the platform’s weight, with 11 full members and 10 partners representing roughly half the world’s population and about 45 percent of global GDP at PPP, while inviting ASEAN and other regional bodies to amplify Global South priorities on technology, supply chains and inclusive growth.
• Philippine President Marcos Jr., attending as ASEAN Chair and outreach participant, restated the region’s principles of sovereignty, international law, peaceful dispute settlement, maritime cooperation and supply-chain resilience, securing symbolic visibility inside a forum shaped by China, Russia and other emerging powers without formally aligning the Philippines with BRICS.
• ASEAN’s internal divisions over Myanmar, border and maritime disputes (including the South China Sea), and divergent approaches to China and the United States prevented a unified negotiating position; the article concludes that presence yielded modest hedging value and a seat at the table, but lasting leverage requires greater internal cohesion so that ASEAN can speak with one consequential voice.

Introduction and background

Hosted under India’s Chairship, the BRICS (Brazil, Russian Federation, India, China, and South Africa), an informal intergovernmental organization composed of major emerging and developing economies that acts as a geopolitical and economic counterweight to Western-led institutions like the G7 (world’s major advanced economies composed of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan United Kingdom, and the United States), International Monetary Fund (IMF), and World Bank (WB), held its 18^th Summit of Leaders (1) in New Delhi, India on 12-13 September 2026.

Expanding to 11 members from the original four (4) in 2006, with the official inclusion of South Africa in 2010, transitioning the group’s name from BRIC to BRICS, and further enlarging its members in 2024 with Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Saudi Arabia (2) joining, followed by Indonesia in 2025, it aims to challenge the dominance of Western nations in global governance and create a more equitable, multipolar world order. Collectively, BRICS’s has outperformed the developed blocs like the G7. The former’s GDP, adjusted for Purchasing Power Parity (PPP), is over US$88 trillion in 2026 in contrast to the latter’s US$62 trillion). This corresponds to 40% of global GDP,

In addition, BRICS’s 10 partner countries participated in the Summit – Belarus, Bolivia, Cuba, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Nigeria, Thailand, Uganda, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam – with a combined GDP at PPP of approximately US$10.46 trillion, hence a total contribution of US$98 trillion GDP at PPP (approximately 45% share to world’s GDP) to global wealth coming from less developed countries. The combined population of these 21 countries – which together comprise the full expanded BRICS alliance of 11 full members and 10 partner nations – is approximately 4.60 billion people in 2026. According to official UN demographic data and Worldometer estimates, this block accounts for roughly 48.5% to 50% of the entire global population.

Moreover, major regional developing blocs – including the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), Eurasian Economic Union (EEU), the African Union (AU), the Latin America and the Caribbean (CELAC), the Gulf Cooperation Council, (GCC), and the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) (3) – similarly took part in the Summit’s Outreach/Plus sessions. Apart from these groupings, heads of international organizations like the UN’s General-Secretary, Directors-General of the World Health Organization (WHO) and the World Trade Organization (WTO), and Presidents of the New Development Bank (NDB) and Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) respectively were invited to engage and respond to common developing-world challenges.

India framed its chairship theme as “Building for Resilience, Innovation, Cooperation and Sustainability,” with the central objective to deepen cooperation among the expanded BRICS membership in three broad areas: political and security cooperation; economic and financial cooperation; and development, technology and people-to-people cooperation. Its 140-paragraph “New Delhi Declaration,” explicitly reaffirmed BRICS’s objective of strengthening a more representative and multipolar international order and increasing the voice of emerging-market and developing countries in global governance.

Importantly, BRICS Chair and Indian Prime Minister Modi clarified that BRICS 2026 “is non-Western, but not anti-West.” India particularly sought to keep BRICS as a platform for cooperation among developing and emerging economies rather than turning it into a military or ideological bloc. This was evident in the declaration’s emphasis on sovereignty, consensus, multilateralism and cooperation.

ASEAN at BRICS Summit: Potential and Limits

As ASEAN Chair of the 2026 48^th and 49^th Summits, Philippine president Marcos Jr. was requested to be present at the BRICS Summit as well as asked to attend its open sessions (4) as an “outreach country,” i.e., a non- member nation in BRICS’s dialogues. ASEAN, together with other regional organizations of developing countries and multilateral development agencies were entreated to join the open sessions to amplify the voice of the Global South in advancing technological cooperation, including emerging fields like artificial intelligence, fintech (financial technology), and digital public infrastructure. Sessions were also trained to discuss strategies for reducing vulnerability to external economic shocks, strengthening supply chains, and promoting an inclusive approach to global growth for the developing world.

Marcos Jr. on his part presented himself primarily as the representative of ASEAN with a population of almost 700 million people, rather than as a leader attempting to move the Philippines toward BRICS. In his short speech at the BRICS’s open session, he described ASEAN as an open, inclusive and outward-looking community. What is more, he emphasized the region’s three (3) main priorities: peace and security; prosperity corridors; and people empowerment. He argued for: ASEAN centrality; peaceful settlement of disputes; international law; maritime cooperation; disaster preparedness; climate security; supply-chain resilience; food and energy security; responsible use of new technologies; and fairer global governance. This was quite significant politically because it allowed Manila to put an ASEAN voice into a forum increasingly dominated by China, Russia and other emerging powers.

On the positive side, ASEAN’s participation through Marcos Jr’s chairship, he was able to articulate ASEAN’s long-standing principles: respect for sovereignty, adherence to international law, and the importance of consensus-based diplomacy. They subtly counterbalance the assertive behaviour of some BRICS members – particularly China – while avoiding direct confrontation. In this sense, Marcos exemplified ASEAN’s normative framework that is anchored in stability and predictability, even as the region navigates intensifying geopolitical competition.

In an era of fluid alignments, smaller and middle powers must navigate a complex geopolitical landscape without being subsumed by great-power competition. ASEAN attendance to the BRICS summit is an exercise in strategic autonomy and pragmatic engagement; it was utilized to safeguard regional economic interests and advance ASEAN’s core priorities. It is a strategy rooted in hedging. (5) It is also in recognition of the evolving institutional architecture of the Global South. And ASEAN must be present in the rooms where new norms are being shaped. Indeed, the 2026 BRICS Summit was a stage for emerging powers to articulate the vision of a fairer global order. Marcos Jr.’s presence did not transform that vision, but it ensured that ASEAN’s voice was part of the conversation.

Nonetheless, aforesaid positive outcomes must be weighed against the structural limitations that define ASEAN’s position at BRICS. ASEAN’s internal divisions – over Myanmar’s military junta, border dispute between Cambodia and Thailand, territorial claim between Malaysia and the Philippines, maritime and border overlaps between Indonesia and Malaysia, dispute over the South China Sea involving five (5) Southeast Asian countries, China, and Taiwan, over how to balance relations with China and the United States – are not incidental; they are constitutive of ASEAN’s identity as a consensus-based organisation.

The ASEAN is not a monolithic region. In 2026 its fault lines are more visible than ever. These are not abstract disagreements; they shape how member states approach external partners. Indonesia, for instance, is now a full BRICS member, while Malaysia and Vietnam participate as BRICS partners. Their decisions to engage with BRICS reflect a calculated strategy of balancing power and maximising economic opportunities in an increasingly polarised global system – a strategy that does not necessarily align with Manila’s more confrontational approach toward China. When ASEAN speaks at BRICS, it does so with a voice that is fractured, and potential interlocutors know it.

The Philippines’ ASEAN chairship, rather than transcending these divisions, has accentuated them. Manila’s assertive posture toward China may resonate with some member states, but it alienates others who prefer a more conciliatory approach. Undeniably, Southeast Asian states have different security interests, economic dependencies and historical relationships with Beijing, Washington, Moscow and New Delhi. For some ASEAN members, China’s economic importance is indispensable. For others, particularly the Philippines, China’s military and maritime behaviour represents a direct security challenge. This produces what might be described as strategic asymmetry within ASEAN.

Furthermore, the domestic political “word wars” between President Marcos Jr. and Vice-President Sara Duterte, and between Philippine lawmakers and the Chinese embassy, have transformed what could have remained a manageable diplomatic challenge into a public spectacle that undermines Manila’s credibility. For ASEAN partners and China alike, such visible divisions raise doubts about the durability of Philippine commitments. The country’s reputation as an outlier in China-ASEAN ties – perceived as isolating itself through an assertive, confrontational approach – further erodes its ability to rally the broader ASEAN consensus needed to speak with authority at BRICS.

The broader lesson is that ASEAN’s effectiveness in any external forum – whether BRICS, the G20, or the United Nations – depends on its internal cohesion. A divided ASEAN cannot speak with one voice, and a chairship that is itself politically fractured cannot forge the consensus needed to make that voice heard. The Philippines’ participation in the BRICS Summit will likely produce a handful of bilateral deliverables and a series of well-crafted statements about ASEAN’s priorities. It will not produce a breakthrough on the South China Sea Code of Conduct, nor will it fundamentally reshape ASEAN’s relationship with BRICS.

ASEAN certainly achieved visibility and symbolic representation, but not a collective diplomatic weight that a unified ASEAN would command. Marcos Jr.’s message at BRICS’s open session are worthy aspirations, but they are also broad enough to accommodate the divergent interests of ASEAN’s member states – which is precisely why they are unlikely to produce concrete results.

The Philippines’ chairship, for all its ambition, has become a case study in the limits of leadership without cohesion. ASEAN as an institution gained little more than it brought: a seat at the table, a voice that is heard but not always heeded, and the enduring challenge of finding unity in a region defined by its diversity.

It is argued therefore that a divided ASEAN cannot transform regional geopolitics through attendance at the BRICS Summit. But it can extract diplomatic value, expand strategic options, and signal ASEAN’s continued relevance in a fragmenting global order. The gains are modest, incremental, and largely symbolic – yet they matter for a region navigating greatpower rivalry and internal disunity.

Conclusion

ASEAN’s participation in the 2026 BRICS Summit demonstrates both the opportunities and limitations of engagement with the emerging architecture of the Global South. The Summit confirmed that Southeast Asia’s place in the emerging multipolar order is real but circumscribed. Through Marcos Jr., ASEAN secured a platform to restate its core normative commitments – sovereignty, international law, and consensus-based diplomacy – inside a forum increasingly shaped by China, Russia, and other rising powers.

Such participation reflects a pragmatic strategy of hedging: maintaining engagement with different centres of power while avoiding alignment exclusively with any one major bloc. it allows the region to protect its economic and diplomatic options without formally aligning with a bloc that several member states view differently, from Indonesia’s full membership to the Philippines’ more confrontational posture toward Beijing.

Yet visibility is not the same as leverage. ASEAN’s internal fault lines – over the South China Sea, Myanmar, territorial and border disputes between ASEAN member states, and divergent ties to Beijing and Washington – meant its BRICS appearance produced symbolism rather than a unified negotiating position. The experience underscores a fundamental reality: ASEAN’s relevance in an increasingly fragmented international system depends not simply on its presence in emerging multilateral forums, but on its capacity to build sufficient internal cohesion to speak with a credible and consequential voice. Until that cohesion is built, ASEAN will keep gaining seats at the table without gaining a single voice to fill them.

Endnotes:

• The BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, and China) summit was held in 2009 in Yekatenrinburg, Russia (without South Africa then). South African joined BRIC, eventually re-named BRICS in 2010. The mathematical breakdown confirms the timeline: 2026 (current year) – 2009 (first BRIC meeting) + 1 = 1 8^th BRICS Summit marks the 18^th consecutive annual gathering of the bloc’s leaders.
• Saudi Arabia’s membership status in BRICS is currently disputed and ambiguous, as the country participates in summits but has held back from formally signing the bloc’s official agreement. Saudi officials maintain that they are still evaluating the invitation. At the 2026 summit, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan attended but state media explicitly described their presence as a “representative of an invited country” rather than a formal member.
• Bangladesh’s Prime Minister Tarique Rahman had been invited in his capacity as chair of BIMSTEC, but Bangladesh announced on 10 September that it would not send a government representative to the summit. (see https://www.thedailystar.net/news/bangladesh/diplomacy/news/no-scope-bangladesh-join-brics-summit-pm-wasnt-invited-humaiun-kobir-4269451).
• Refers to BRICS plenary meeting where member states, partner countries, and outreach invitees gather publicly to discuss core global themes, economic cooperation, and sustainable growth.
• Hedging in politics is a strategy where a state or politician avoids choosing a single side, instead mixing cooperative and confrontational actions to reduce risk and protect their future options

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