Author: Stephan Keukeleire, Bas Hooijmaaijers.

Over the past decade the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) and other emerging power alliances (such as BASIC [Brazil, South Africa, India and China] and IBSA [India, Brazil, South Africa]), as well as multilateral organizations in the Asia-Pacific and the global south, have become increasingly important players on the world stage. None of the variations on Asian regionalism and emerging power alliances is in itself very influential. Taken together, however, they are not inconsequential for the European Union (EU) and its position on multilateralism. Their views on multilateralism differ from the EU's vision with regard to contents and methodology. Problematic for the EU is that their views not only structure the relations between the emerging powers themselves, but that these powers also increasingly try to promote them as the basic principles for structuring international relations and regimes on a global level.