About 120 countries make up the non-Western world. They represent more than half of humanity and, for the most part, share a colonial past. They were victims of exploitation and racism and for several decades they shared the same anti-Western and anti-capitalist strategy.
Today, however, we cannot speak of a global south, although most of these countries are south of the equator. They do not form a collective. They do not share the same economic interests, nor the same political traditions, nor the same development objectives nor the same concerns for their security.
During the Cold War these countries were called the third world, then they became developing countries, and if today we call them the Global South it is due in part to the geostrategists of the Western North and in part also to India and China, the two giants who fight to lead them. Grouping them into a single category helps herd them.
Competition in New Delhi and Beijing for the favor of the south is increasing. It is a crucial pulse for the future of international relations.
India aspires to reform the order that emerged from World War II and is led by the United States. Base institutions such as the IMF, the World Bank or the United Nations Security Council do not function to benefit the interests of a south, drowned by sovereign debt and various endemic conflicts.
Instead of reforming these institutions, China aims to eliminate them. She does not need them for the world she prefers, that is, one based on bilateral relations, dominated by economic force and military might, and without a framework of universal values.
China attempts to lead the south through “global initiatives” on development, security and values. Last March, he launched the Global Civilization initiative to emphasize that if the world is to be “a community with a common destiny,” each country must interpret human rights in its own way. 130 countries attended, most of them more interested in doing business with China than in discussing respect for human dignity.
India hosted the G-20 meeting in September. Chinese President Xi Jinping, however, did not go. He did not want to participate in India’s presentation to the international community. In November, Prime Minister Narendra Modi hosted a conference he called “the voice of the Global South.” 125 countries participated, including seven from Eastern Europe, but China was not invited.
The Indian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, said that the West is not always the bad guy in the movie and disgraced that China, after having become the great factory of the world thanks to Western capital and technology, now uses this economic strength as a weapon in your favor. Modi wants India to be “the shoulder” on which developing countries jump to achieve higher development and, at the same time, “the bridge” that unites them with the countries of the north.
While China’s rhetoric is clearly anti-Western, India’s is more moderate. After having been a pillar of the Non-Aligned movement during the Cold War, as well as a client of the Soviet Union’s military industry, today it is approaching the United States. It is evident that, following the Chinese roadmap, it also wants to attract more Western capital and technology, but, at the same time, it needs greater complicity with Washington on security issues. In this way it aims to counteract China’s influence in Pakistan and Southeast Asia.
That India wants to lead the Global South while strengthening its relationship with the United States and the European Union is not a contraction, but an example of the pragmatism that dominates international relations.
Even the smallest of countries has room for maneuver to decide with whom they make agreements. The Sahel states, for example, have disengaged from France, the former colonial power. Vietnam seeks its identity by moving closer to the United States, not China, even though it is also a communist and capitalist country.
The world of blocs has been replaced by one a la carte because ideology has lost weight and the south is emancipated from everything, even the south itself.
There is no south-south solidarity. There has not been one, at least, since the oil crisis of 1973 and the creation of OPEC a few years earlier, the cartel that works to ensure that the price of a barrel is always the highest possible, even at the expense of the development of the south.
There is also no uniform solidarity in the south with the climate crisis. India and South Africa insist on burning coal because they need more energy to grow, and this is the cheapest for them and many other countries. Oil producers, for their part, will not give up squeezing the wells without heavy compensation either.
India still does not have the economic power or political influence of China to dominate the south, but thanks to a low-cost, high-tech economy, as well as pragmatic and less warlike diplomacy, it is on its way to achieving it.