International Symposium

On 6 March 2024, the Institute of Developing Economies (IDE-JETRO), the World Bank and Asahi Shimbun Company co-hosted an international Symposium titled “Emerging powers in the 'Global South' and the restructuring of the world order.” The symposium explored questions such as whether the ‘Global South’ could form a new ‘pole’ in the international community, the leadership roles of emerging powers, and the implications of their rise for global cooperation and tackling global challenges.

On this page, you can access videos of the keynote addresses and panel discussions delivered at the symposium.

Synopsis of the Symposium

Date and time: Wednesday, 6 March 2024, 14:00-16:50 (Japan Standard Time)

Venue: The World Bank, Tokyo Development Learning Center

Organizers: Institute of Developing Economies (IDE-JETRO), The World Bank, Asahi Shimbun Company

Keynote Speech I "The Rise of India and Its Influence on the World Order”

Prof. Harsh V. Pant (King’s College London, and Vice-President, Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi)

　 Presentation material

India has long been seen in the world as a country whose potential has not been realized, but recently the perception on India has shifted. Changes in both the global order and India have created a space for it to proactively engage in shaping the global order. Indian policymakers have taken advantage of this and entered into a number of mini-lateral and multilateral partnerships with like-minded countries in order to increase India’s strategic autonomy and promote further economic development. India has emphasized the strategic importance of the Indo-Pacific region, where India is centrally located, and has formed many partnerships with countries in the West, South-East Asia and the Middle East.

India’s foreign policy used to be discussed in relation to Pakistan, but today, the issue of Pakistan has retreated to the periphery and the China factor has become central. The Indian government now sees that over-reliance on one country for supply of materials is problematic. India has many problems with China ranging from economic dependence, border disputes and democratic regimes to information controls. Managing China’s rise requires much more than diplomatic negotiations. This has led India to form stronger partnerships within the South Asian region and beyond. India also needs support from western countries to curtail China’s advancement and promote India’s further economic development. India's foreign policy has changed from non-alignment to multi-alignment.

How does India position itself in the multipolar global order where the existing organizations like UN and WTO are malfunctioning? There is a significant shift in the global order where the Global South is taking over multilateral platforms. India wants to play a significant role in shaping the global order through multilateral platforms such as the G20. India does not want to be seen as disrupting the global order. Instead, India wants to be a responsible stakeholder and a voice representing the Global South in the multipolar global order, advocating matters of importance to the countries of the Global South.

Keynote Speech II "The Expanding Role of Emerging Economies in Global Development”

Akihiko Nishio (Vice-President of Development Finance, The World Bank)

　 Presentation material

In recent years, not only have emerging and developing economies expanded their presences in inward and outward direct investment, but also in the matter of development finance, emerging countries such as China, India, and Saudi Arabia have emerged as some of the top official loan providers. At the same time, these countries have increased their voices in various fields around the world by, for instance, hosting international conferences discussing the global agenda and playing roles in creating frameworks for global aid architecture.

Although the increase in development finance due to the rise of emerging donors is good news for developing countries, it also brings some concerns to the global aid architecture. In recent years, global aid architecture has witnessed four mega trends: the proliferation of donors and donor agencies; the fragmentation of aid with more, smaller-sized projects; the circumvention of aid bypassing the recipient governments; and increasing official finance flows into unleveraged vertical platforms, focused on a narrower scope of themes, and often accompanied by earmarking resources.

Concrete measures are needed to address these concerns in the global aid architecture so that developing countries could benefit from increased development finance from traditional and emerging donors. With 59 donors, including traditional and emerging donors, who come together to leverage their contributions to secure more funding resources and channel more than 90% of them to the governments of 75 poor countries, IDA (International Development Association) has played an important role in addressing these issues in the global aid architecture.

Panel Discussion

Presentation by Dr Ing "Asia's Economic Transformation: A Half Century Journey"

The changes in the global economy over the 50 years from 1970 to 2022 are characterized by a decrease in the share of the G7 countries and an increase in the share of developing countries such as India, South Korea, Indonesia and Thailand. This trend is confirmed in all three major economic indicators: nominal GDP, global trade value and global value-added manufacturing. The share of the latter countries is, however, not significant in any of these indicators and they all remain below three percents. China's share in both global trade value and global value-added manufacturing has increased rapidly since it joined the WTO in 2001.

There are two challenges for Asian countries to realize further economic development. One is the escalation of the US-China tensions and rising anti-globalization and protectionism in several countries. The other is how Asian countries can increase their value-added manufacturing. Indonesia and Malaysia’s exports are still dominated by commodities such as palm oil, while Bangladesh and Nepal remain a source of cheap labor. Asian countries need to further deepen trade and investment ties with existing and potential partners, improve trade and investment climate, optimize the use of digital technologies, and pursue sustainability in all aspects.

Presentation by Prof. Takeuchi "Africa, Global South and the International Order"

Africa is economically weak, but it has a large number of countries, which gives it a certain degree of presence and influence in the UN General Assembly and elsewhere. Just as the Global South contains diversity, Africa is made up of a diverse range of countries in terms of political regimes and income levels. As seen in their voting behavior in the UN resolution against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the responses of African countries were diverse. Even some countries with strong democracies like South Africa abstained from all resolutions.

The issues on which African countries can act together are limited to those that have historical connotations such as anti-colonialism. Nonetheless, as long as the memory of anti-colonial movements exists, Africa can potentially be critical of the international order led by the western countries. For African countries, the Global South works as the ‘amplifier’ of their claims. They will use this framework for claims that can unite them. However, there are many issues, such as LGBTQ, on which African countries cannot unite themselves. The question we should be asking ourselves is the nature of the international order we create in an increasingly multipolar and polarized world. We should also discuss how we create a more just and impartial international order.

Presentation by Dr Konta　"Brazil is Back: The Diplomacy of Returning President Lula "

Brazilian President Lula, a leftist from a pro-poor background, has emphasized multilateral alliances based on Latin American countries and frameworks such as BRICS and IBSA (India, Brazil, and South Africa). Brazil achieved impressive economic growth and poverty reduction under President Lula in the first decade of the 21st century, which was dubbed the ‘New Brazil’. However, by the mid-2010s, the level of political, economic, and social chaos deepened, and right-wing Bolsonaro was elected president in 2018.

Lula, who returned to the presidency for the third time in 2023, actively promoted the idea at home and abroad that ‘Brazil is back’. Is Brazil really back? On the economic front, the country is on the road to recovery, with GDP rising to ninth place in the world. The same trend can be seen for government approval ratings in opinion polls as at the time of the ‘New Brazil’. Lula won the election on a platform of ‘defending democracy’, but in the context of the changing global situation triggered by conflict, he has not necessarily developed a pro-Western foreign policy. His statements and actions, such as defending the dictatorship in Venezuela, have been seen to promote polarization of domestic public opinion.

Presentation by Prof. Kitano "China’s Development Cooperation with Global South "

In the international development cooperation architecture, China is a recipient of aid while simultaneously being a provider of aid to developing countries. An important framework for China’s development cooperation has been the ‘One Belt, One Road’ Forum (BRF). With the debt problems of recipient countries coming to the fore, China has been shifting towards developing a high-quality BRF. Furthermore, China is also trying to actively engage in the Global Development Initiative (GDI) proposed at the UN General Assembly in September 2021 through the China International Development Cooperation Agency (CIDCA). However, due to the stagnation of the Chinese economy, total amount of China’s foreign aid has not increased much since 2019, with the exception of Covid-19 related projects.　

How do developing countries proactively interact with China? While the case of Laos shows that the agency of the recipient country differs from the project planning to implementation stages, the case of the Philippines shows that its relation with China is shaped by domestic politics and geopolitical considerations. The key issues of China’s future development cooperation are the following three questions: how developing countries proactively make use of China’s development cooperation; how China increases its aid; and how China makes loan conditions as concessional as possible to developing countries.

Discussion and Q&A

Moderator: Many speakers highlighted the diversity of the Global South and the problem of defining it. Nevertheless, I dare to ask the panelists whether the Global South can exist as a cohesive entity. Which country will take its leadership? What do they assert on the international platforms by using this term?

Pant: There are various objections to the concept of the Global South. The Global South is attracting attention because the current global governance structures are unable to respond to the challenges coming from a large part of the world. As geopolitical rivalry between major powers intensifies, an increasing number of countries feel alienated. From the viewpoint of these countries, there is a desire to see the issues they care about brought onto the global governance agenda. For example, while Russia has created a lot of problems especially for Ukraine and for Europe, it is not the only problem in the world today. Developing countries are facing many challenges such as food crises, debt crises, and broader economic development crises. In this context, who is going to shape the global narrative? Perhaps this is the moment when the global governance agenda needs to be restructured and the various issues need to be viewed through a new lens.

There is a lot of debate about who should take the leadership of the Global South. Speaking from India’s vantage point, India hosted the ‘Voice of the Global South Summit’ before assuming the G20 presidency. The idea was that the Indian policy makers wanted to first hear the views of the Global South and learn what kind of issues the Global South would like the Indian government to take up to the global governance agenda and G20 agenda. Many of these issues were ultimately reflected in the G20 communiqué. However, if several countries in the Global South were to seek a leadership role and, for example, China and India were to compete as rivals who are not necessarily on good terms, what it could mean for the Global South as a whole will be an interesting question.

Nishio: The world today is not the bipolar division of the Cold War era, but a multipolar and confused one. The Global South is a grouping of countries that has emerged in a way that reflects this current world. What does the Global South assert in the future? The first thing that comes to my mind is the issue of climate change. At COP28 last December, the Global South argued for how they get compensation for the damage done by climate change. They argued that the problem of climate change has been created by developed countries for a long time, and therefore they have a right to demand compensation for it. In the end, developed countries generally agreed to this demand and started to make contributions to the Loss and Damage Fund. USD 600 million have already been gathered. For the Global South, this figure is too small, and they will demand dozens or hundreds of times this figure loudly as the voice of the Global South.

Ing: Personally, I am not happy with the terms Global South and Global North as they don’t have clear definitions. The group of countries should be better defined using economic indicators such as income per capita. I have two points. The first is that in today’s multipolar world, where there is no hegemonic power, it is necessary to listen to the voices and needs of middle power countries like Japan, Australia, South Korea and other developing countries. Second, the question is not about who is the mega-power or which mega-powers are completing with each other, but about the need for the US, China, Europe and other middle power countries to sit together in order to address many important issues in which the viewpoints of the Global South have been neglected, such as climate change, growing inequality, and robots and AI, on a global level.

Takeuchi: I agree that there is a need to rethink the global governance agenda. Some countries are competing for a global leadership position by using an ambiguous concept of the Global South. That is because the term Global South has a certain degree of legitimacy. The geographical scope of the Global South is so diverse that there are very limited elements that can unite them together. If they were to become united, it would be on issues where they are collectively disadvantaged as a group, such as the issue of reparations for past colonial rule or the environmental issues mentioned earlier. When it comes to the issues that can unite them, this group will emerge as a pressure group.

Kitano: It is only recently that China has officially started using the term Global South. China has made statements that it is clearly a member of the Global South and it will remain a developing country. However, in the not-so-distant future, China will join the high-income countries. It will then cease to be a developing country. The Global South is a useful concept for China to promote solidarity with developing countries. The UN has the G27+China. China has organized meetings of friendly countries at the UN to promote the GDI and recruited member countries. How to strengthen solidarity with developing countries in order to act as their leader is an important consideration for China.

Konta: One point on Brazil from a slightly different perspective with regard to the Global South. Since his election to the presidency in 2022, President Lula has had a strong presence on the world stage. This is because Lula and his ruling Workers’ Party government have strong interests in global issues. However, as a democratic country, Brazil could change dramatically with a change of government. The previous Bolsonaro government was conservative and right wing, the exact opposite of the current government. Lula won the presidential election by a narrow margin and domestic public opinion is polarized. President Bolsonaro rarely went to the diplomatic arena and had a friendly relationship with US under Trump administration and Russia. Neither Russia nor China is democratic, and their regimes can claim their leadership as the Global South for a long time. Regarding countries such as Brazil, however, the possibility of regime change needs to be closely monitored.

Moderator: Let me ask the panelists three questions individually.

First, to Prof. Pant and Prof. Kitano. Regarding the leadership competition in the Global South, India and China are strong candidates. How does India see China? And how does China see India?

To Dr Ing. You said that Southeast Asian countries have achieved economic development, but there are still challenges. In order for middle-income countries in the Global South to achieve further economic growth, is it important for them to have relationships with countries in the Global North? Can their economic development be achieved by building closer relationships with developing countries in the Global South?

To Mr. Nishio and Prof. Takeuchi. One of the premises of today’s discussion is that the current multipolar world may be stirring up our insecurities and causing instability. However, there were proxy wars during the Cold War, and there were many destabilizing factors during the period of US hegemony including the Gulf War and the war on terror. Therefore, I would like to ask what are the destabilizing factors in the current multipolar world, and what kind of advantages or disadvantages exist in the current multipolar world in tackling environmental and other global issues, compared to the Cold War and the US hegemony eras?

Pant: First, I want to say that we should not be too hard on the attempt to term the Global South. We know that it is a nebulous concept, it is very difficult to define. However, the fact that we are sitting here and talking about the Global South today, and that major emerging powers like China, India and Brazil have incorporated the Global South perspective into their foreign policies, means that the Global South has, in a sense, already achieved its objective of becoming relevant. It means that there is a space for this grouping, and there is a space for this idea in global governance.

The issue of who will lead the Global South will be shaped by how individual countries, such as India, China and Brazil, want to engage in the global order. It will depend on what emerging countries can achieve in addressing the poverty and development problems of the countries of the Global South, and how this will be accepted by developing countries. So far, the result is ambiguous because China is the only country that has consistently pushed a certain kind of agenda over the past decade or two, and that is where a lot of problems have emerged. India, Brazil, and other emerging economies are just now coming in. From India’s perspective, certainly if India can provide an alternative to China in the development space, that will be a good thing for India and even for the developing countries themselves. Because one of the problems is that the debate has been so determined by China. The final decision will depend on whether India in partnership with other countries like Japan can provide alternatives and deliver results. This will be an important marker in this competition over the leadership of the Global South.

Kitano: China has established regional fora around the world in order to strengthen economic relations between the region and China. For example, there is the China-Africa Cooperation Forum for Africa. However, no such framework exists in South Asia. The reason for this is the presence of India. Recently, a China-South Asia Forum was held in Yunnan province and invitations were extended to India, but India did not come. Hence, China’s approach is to individual countries in South Asia, excluding India, such as Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, the Maldives, and Nepal. For example, the volume of concessional loans to South Asian countries had increased a lot before declining significantly in recent years. Using these tools, China has strengthened its bilateral relationships with India’s neighboring countries.

In his keynote speech, Prof. Pant talked about India’s strengthening relationship with neighboring countries. In Sri Lanka, for example, this means that India is increasing its support to Sri Lanka, while China’s presence is very prominent in that country. In South Asian countries, I think it is very important how India strengthens its relations with neighboring countries and further builds trust with them.

Ing: From the ten ASEAN countries’ point of view, for the past two decades we grew at 5.2%, and the reasons are twofold. One was good policy, and the other was good luck. On the policy side, ASEAN countries were able to maintain low fiscal deficit to GDP at 1.9%, and relatively low debt to GDP at 60%. This kind of macroeconomic indicators make ASEAN economy relatively sound even during Covid period. As for good luck part, for many ASEAN countries, especially big ones such as Malaysia and Indonesia, the rise in commodity prices including coal, oil and palm oil was an advantage but it was only an advantage in the short run. What I want to highlight is that in this kind of global economic context, ASEAN is not a self-contained region. The ASEAN countries still rely on Japan, South Korea and China in terms of investment, trade and technology. For the ASEAN countries to increase in value-added manufacturing and achieve long-term development, ASEAN cannot move alone, ASEAN needs to move forward with East Asian countries. It is very important for ASEAN countries to make the development of the East Asian region a priority agenda.

Nishio: The disadvantage is that the Global South can be described as a pressure group without principles. They can make it harder for the discussion to converge, and this is not just on the issue of climate change. Climate change is an issue where the Global South can work well as a vessel, but on other issues like LGBTQ, as mentioned earlier, the discussion can keep spinning and spinning, which could lead to fatigue, a situation where people would say, ‘I’ve had enough of this kind of discussion’.

I have another point. The Non-Aligned Movement was powerful for a while because of good leadership. Statesmen like Tito in Yugoslavia and Nasser in Egypt showed very strong leadership, which made the position of non-alignment very powerful in its early days. There are no such leaders in the Global South today and I have a feeling that one day the thrust of the Global South will fall.

Takeuchi: To me, asking the question about global governance in a multipolar world is similar to the question of how to overcome the ‘theory of hegemonic stability’ in international relations. The theory of hegemonic stability, created with the US in mind during the Cold War, argued that the world is stable thanks to the hegemonic state providing public goods. Today, such thinking is clearly no longer valid. The trend for the US to be reluctant to provide public goods has led to a multipolar world, and we are faced with the question of how to manage global governance in a situation where no country actively provides public goods. I am rather pessimistic about this. If you ask me if there is any advantage in the current multipolar world, I must say that we are in a very difficult situation.

I have looked for what is called an advantage, and what I have just come up with is that, from a different perspective, we could say that this is the democratization of world politics. We no longer live in a world where, as in the past, hegemonic power provides public goods and decides everything. This could mean that world politics has been democratized, and perhaps there is hope there. However, this is a big deal. It means that each country must engage in the global governance structures with a certain amount of responsibility and discipline. The question is whether we can do that.

Moderator: Finally, I would like to invite questions from the audiences.

Question 1: How do ordinary countries in the Global South view the leadership of India and China? (To Dr Ing and Prof. Takeuchi)

Question 2: In what way can the Global South form a global order in a significant way? How can the Global South form a global order, especially when they have different interests and concerns? (To Prof. Pant)

Question 3: Why is South Africa taking tough action against Israel, by taking them to the International Court of Justice, while South Africa just abstained from voting on the Ukraine issue at the UN resolution? (To Prof. Takeuchi)

Question 4: As the Global South has become increasingly influential economically and politically, is Japan updating its perception of such regions and countries? How should Japan, including private companies, deal with the Global South? (To Mr. Nishio)

Question 5: Does China ultimately want to become the leader of the Global South by exercising influence through foreign aid and other means? What are the responses of the aid-receiving countries? (To Prof. Kitano)

Moderator: May I ask final words from the panelists, including your answers to the questions.

Pant: On the question of the Global South shaping the global order. There is the possibility that the Global South could shape the global agenda, because there is a real lack of the global governance architecture at the moment. This is why the Global South has come to feature so frequently in international discourses in the past few years.

One of the reasons why India used the Global South framework in addressing its global governance agenda is because it enabled the discussion of the global governance issues and global governance agenda without falling into the problem of fragmentation. The outbreak of war between Russia and Ukraine in February 2022 led to a rapid fragmentation of the global order. In this context, India’s G20 presidency in 2023 necessitated the use of a framework for discussion that would not fragment the G20 countries. Otherwise, India’s G20 presidency would have been unsuccessful. We saw the same thing for example in Indonesia’s case. Indonesia’s presidency [G20 chair before India] also tried to use the Global South in framing the discussions on the joint communiqué. Russia versus Ukraine, China versus the West, in order to avoid these kinds of fragmentation, countries including India tried to promote global governance using the term “Global South”. Moreover, India also had an intention to make a clear statement that it is ready and willing to contribute to the global order.

Nishio: On the question of whether Japan is updating its image of the Global South and how Japanese companies should face the Global South. Japan should see this rise of the Global South as a wake-up call. Japan provides a large amount of ODA, but on the other hand, the share of FDI in developing countries by the private sector is small. Nearly 70% of outward FDI from Japan is destined for developed countries. Limited number of advanced economies such as Canada and Australia have a higher proportion of FDI in developed countries than Japan. Korean has a higher share of FDI in developing countries than Japan. Of course, the risk could be higher, but I hope that this rise of the Global South will encourage the Japanese private sector to actively venture into developing countries in search of more dynamic, high-return projects.

Ing: I totally agree with all the panelists here that becoming a world leader is not a self-proclaimed achievement. It comes with responsibility, it comes with how much the countries can provide public goods in terms of peace, global governance, and their contributions to poverty alleviation, climate change as well as better development in the world of digital transformations.

From an ASEAN perspective, we see China as important as India, and we see India as important as Europe, US, UK, and other G7 countries, as well as other developing countries. This kind of competition is good for developing countries. For example, we get new opportunities from rising tensions between US and China, such as relocation of FDI to South-East Asian countries. But this is just a short-term opportunity. What we want is for all these countries to work together to build a better world.

Takeuchi: What Dr Ing said about how India and China look from an ASEAN perspective is exactly the same as the perspective from Africa. For African countries, India and China are one of the cards, and they are just like the US, Europe, and Japan. They use the cards in examining what they can achieve and to the extent that they can achieve it. Whether it is the Global South or not is not relevant here.

There was a question about South Africa behaving inconsistently on the issues of Ukraine and Israel. On the contrary, South Africa’s position is consistent. In the case of Ukraine, there is an aspect of proxy war between the West and Russia, and South Africa’s position is to distance itself from the UN resolutions submitted by the West. In the case of Israel, South Africa sees Israeli action as colonialism and criticizes it. In both cases, South Africa’s criticisms are towards the colonial rule that the West used to exercise and the apartheid regime in Gaza as an extension of colonial rule. Therefore, from the South African point of view, their responses are consistent.

I mentioned earlier that the West, especially the US, is rather reluctant to provide public goods. But I would like to conclude by saying that although the world has become multi-polar, the role and influence of the West, including Japan, is still very significant, and therefore, the responsibility is also significant. World politics may have become more democratic, and it has become very important for us to act responsibly in this context.

Kitano: China wants to remain a leader in the Global South. On the other hand, it faces many challenges, like the accumulated debt problem it encountered in One Belt One Road. The reason why China launched the GDI is because it believes that it needs to show its commitment to developing countries in order to remain its leader. On the perspectives from developing countries, I agree with what Dr Ing and Prof. Takeuchi said. In the case of Bangladesh, for example, there is the presence of India. Japan also provides a variety of development cooperation. There is also the presence of China. Bangladesh is taking a deft and thoughtful approach on how to utilize resources from outside for their development. However, I also believe that there is a great variation in their responses depending on the governance capacity of the developing countries.

Konta: Speaking from Brazil’s perspective, although it has not shown the same degree of leadership as China and India, it is important as a regional power in Latin America, and it will make good use of the Global South. The Lula administration will assert its national interests and those of the South American region at this year’s G20 chairmanship and next year’s COP. As negotiations between Mercosur and the EU have been difficult, an experienced President Lula is likely to make use of the Global South as if it has common interests, in opposition to the developed countries. From this point of view, I agree with the phrase ‘pressure group without principles’ mentioned earlier. Brazil and other countries may also make good use of the Global South to advance negotiations.

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