＜いまなぜ「グローバルサウス」という概念が重要なのか。有力国の現状と中国の影、そして日本が取るべき道とは――米ジョージタウン大学教授サム・ポトリッキオが、イアン・ブレマーに聞く＞
「グローバルサウスは冷戦時代、当時のソ連が欧米に対抗するためにつくり出した概念だ」あるロシア人ジャーナリストは、私との対話の中でそう語った。「植民地主義や帝国主義と戦うのだと駆り立てるのが、彼らと連携するには最良の方法だった」
彼は母国ロシアのウクライナ侵攻を痛烈に批判する一方、グローバルサウスという古くて新しい一大勢力に注目していた。グローバルサウスの国々は、ウクライナ戦争で必ずしもロシアを批判しなかった。グローバルサウスが力を増した現在、それ自体が「大国」と化した──このロシア人ジャーナリストが言外に示したことは明らかだ。
グローバルサウスとは大まかに、アジア、アフリカ、中南米、オセアニアの途上国を指す。その台頭を最も体現している国はインドだろう。S&Pの時価総額の15％近くを占める欧米の優良企業に加え、グーグルの親会社アルファベットやスターバックス、IBM、マイクロソフトなど世界的企業のトップ、それに世界銀行の新総裁もインド出身だ。
6月下旬に訪米したインドのナレンドラ・モディ首相は、ワシントンで熱烈な歓迎を受けた。9月9～ 10日の20カ国・地域（G20）首脳会議では議長国も務めた。
ロシアがウクライナにいわれなき攻撃を開始した昨年2月24日以降、グローバルサウスのかなり多くの国がウクライナからもロシアからも中立を維持しようとした。昨年3月のウクライナからのロシア軍の即時撤退を求める国連決議の採択では、インドや中国、アフリカの国々の3分の1など35カ国が棄権した。現在ニューヨークで開催中の国連総会でも、グローバルサウスの動向が注目されている。
ウクライナでの戦争は、西から東への人口的・経済的シフトを国際安全保障への影響力に転換する地政学的チャンスをグローバルサウスに与えている。これらの国々は経済力の向上と人口増加を背景に自信を増し、よりバランスの取れた世界情勢を構築したがっている。単にどちら側に付くかを選ぶのではなく、外交の調停・交渉役として新たな世界秩序をつくり出す可能性を歓迎している。
中国はグローバルサウスを率いることで超大国として有利な立場に立とうとし、ロシアはいまだに冷戦時代の「非同盟」国の名残を享受している。アメリカも国益拡大のため、グローバルサウスへの対応に本腰を入れるだろう。覇権を争う大国の論理で世界は分断に向かっている。
揺れ動く国際秩序のカギを握る存在ながら、まだ明確な定義のない、グローバルサウスとは一体何なのか。パワーバランスの変化により国際秩序が大きく揺れ動くとき、地政学について頼れる解説者となるのが、国際政治学者のイアン・ブレマーだ。リスク分析・予想を得意とする頭脳集団ユーラシア・グループの創設者で、Gゼロ世界（G7の影響力が低下し、真に指導者的な大国が存在しなくなった世界）の概念を提唱した人物だ。そのブレマーに、米ジョージタウン大学教授のサム・ポトリッキオが聞いた。（以下は英文インタビューとなります）
What is Global South?
Speaker: Dr. Ian Bremmer, President of Eurasia Group
Interviewer: Prof. Sam Potolicchio, Founding Executive Director of American Councils For International Education's Center for Global Leadership, Lecturer at Georgetown University
◇ ◇ ◇
Potolicchio: Dr. Bremmer, it's turning into an annual tradition to consult you as the world gets more uncertain and unstable. Your top risk for 2023 was a "Rogue Russia". The Global South is becoming an increasingly influential player in mediating this conflict. So I ask you, how do you define the term "Global South" and why does it matter how we analyze this concept now?
Bremmer: You go back to the collapse of the Soviet Union and you have this presumption of a couple of things. First, that democracy is going to be the true North of the Globe, and it's just a question of how you get folks integrated. Globalization - same thing, you're creating a global middle class over 50 years, which means that emerging markets, the developing world is becoming developed in the process of emerging, it's a transitional phase.
The last decade, if it's taught us anything, is that there are big structural challenges with that worldview. One is that we no longer have the Americans driving globalization. The second is that it's no longer clear that democracy is winning, in terms of the aspirational trajectory of different countries. Third, the developing world, most of which has indeed, gotten wealthier, nonetheless, now generally feels like they are not heading towards convergence with the West and the West isn't really trying to help them.
There are lots of reasons for that. You look at the inshoring and the friendshoring and the industrial policy in the United States and coordinated with Europe and Japan, you look at the consolidation of the G7. Suddenly, you also look at the trends towards automation, deep learning and AI in particular, and well, who's going to drive the next 20-30 years to help ensure that the Global South continues to develop, continues to emerge? Then, of course, we had three years of pandemic and they revealed preferences from The West: we're not going to help you all that much, it is every country for itself.
Then, of course, you've got the war in Russia and now, the Grain Deal that the Russians have just pulled out of. Who's going to make sure they get the grain? Who's going to make sure they get the LNG? It's going to be the wealthy countries. The poor countries are stuck with higher prices, greater starvation, and coal. Finally, you have got climate change. The countries that are going to be hit the hardest by climate change are frequently the ones that haven't even been able to benefit from the industrialization that got us the climate change. Technology for post-carbon is getting cheaper but it's not like the West is providing significant amounts of support that would allow the poorest countries to effectively make that transition.
So for all of these reasons, the so-called developing world or the lower developed nations and the middle developed nations are increasingly finding that they have something in common with each other. That commonality is that their interests are not being served in the 21st century and they don't feel like they can count on The West. Now, there's a lot of differentiation inside this grouping, of course.
China, which you would have considered to be developing sort of 10 years ago, certainly 20 years ago, you wouldn't call a part of the Global South, in part because they are so, so much more powerful, in part because they're the largest creditor to the developing world, to the Global South, in part because they're the largest carbon emitter. China is still a relatively poor country, a middle income country, $12,000 per capita, but you wouldn't refer to them as the Global South. So with all of those caveats, I do find that the Global South is an increasingly useful way to think about a growing geopolitical cleavage that is important, is disruptive, and needs to be addressed.
Certainly, when you speak to the leaders of the G7, the Americans, the Europeans, the Japanese, they are all highly aware that they are largely not doing well with the Global South and they need to find a way to address that. I hear that in almost identical terms from all of those government leaders, all of them.
Potolicchio: Let's zero in on the fastest riser of the Global South. What's your analysis with India?
Bremmer: India is the one that certainly the Americans feel like they've done the best job. Modi is the most popular, democratically-elected leader of any major democracy in the world. He really wants to define his international legacy as building a much stronger relationship, specifically with The United States. That is not exclusively because of, but largely because of a very deep-seated problematic relationship with China and increasingly, China's proxy Pakistan. What we've seen as Modi being on a sharp pro-US and pro-Western curve over the last decade, he did not think that The US would be easy to work with in 2014, when he became a leader.
Today, he truly thinks that The US along with Japan, are India's best partners for the economic and the technological transformation that he envisages for India. As I said, it helps that he sees China as India's number one threat and he seeks to keep China out of India's frontier economic sectors, and also believes that The United States and The West, more broadly, will help them accomplish that.
Certainly, his foreign and defense policy team shares that view. I would say, hostility towards China is bipartisan in India, the same way it is in The United States. Though, there is skepticism about The United States inside some of Modi's team, particularly from the Hindu right, because they look back at America's Pakistan legacy, the Muslim population, not surprisingly, as well as the far left, who see The United States as great Satan/imperialist. But urban youth are showing very strong pro-US sentiment. Overall, I'd argue that Indians are the most pro-US among the Global South, you see that from Pew Research.
You talk about the Quad, you talk about India's ideas of decoupling, you look at Modi's recent trip to the United States, all of the technology investment that's happening from The United States, in particular into India, so what you really see here, if that's the way you start, you say, "Wow!"
In the run-up to the G20 Summit, after consulting all sorts of countries around the Global South, they basically decided that India sees an opportunity to expand its profile, especially along the Indian Ocean, Red Sea Golf, undermining China, and securing resources for itself. It also has some low-cost, digital green technology and infrastructure stories to sell to the Global South, though it lacks resources and certainly lacks administrative capability. It is pushing for Global South-oriented solutions within the G20, which it's chairing right now. They've been organizing, essentially, a G10 of the Global South, including China in this case, especially on climate to coordinate a common agenda there. Now, I would say that secondary to the tilt towards the west, but it still is important. He does want to be the face of cooperation within the Global South, he doesn't want that to happen without India, and he certainly likes the idea of using its chairmanship of the G20 as cover.
Their ambitions, though, and their language: very modest, like what you'd see from China, 10-20 years ago. Indian diplomats, for example, they're banned from actually using the phrase "great power" or "superpower" to describe India or its ambitions. Modi likes to use this Sanskrit phrase "Vishwaguru", which means "universal teacher". It's all about leading by example. A lot of India's Global South policy, which is not what they say when they talk to the Americans, is about leading by example.
Potolicchio: Here's my most nostalgic question of the day, because the first time I ever asked you a question was "what leaders should I pay attention to that we're not paying attention to?" and you mentioned Indonesia. This was like eight-nine years ago. Indonesia, what's your analysis there?
Bremmer: First of all, Indonesia gets nowhere near the attention that India does. It's smaller, it doesn't yet have the Western investment that makes the headlines, but it's quite stable politically. It's quite proud of its role in founding, alongside India and others The Non-Aligned Movement. It also prioritizes solidarity with other Muslim countries and opposition to Israel, which comes up in its foreign policy, which has sometimes created suspicion and sensitivities around the West, in a post-colonial society. Having said all of that, Indonesia is generally less eager than a lot of Global South countries to antagonize The West. They see economic and, more recently, security ties with The United States, with Japan, as a very important counterbalance to the growing influence and the growing assertiveness of China. I would say Indonesia doesn't yet see India as so important in that regard, though over time, I expect, they will.
Potolicchio: In our quest to have my daughters' understand the world more, we have done a lot of travel to the furthest reaches of the globe with them. But we were intentionally specific in our 1 year celebration for our eldest. We cut cake on the Bosphorus, in Istanbul, Turkey, looking both East and West. Your take on this pivotal linchpin country that seemingly straddles the geopolitical divide?
Bremmer: Erdogan and many Turks want Turkey to be seen as an emerging power that is challenging the existing West-led order. The credibility for doing so given their massive economic challenges is hot as well. That underpins some of their alignment with the Global South because Erdogan wants to be the voice of the downtrodden and the unheard. You see him advocating for Palestinian rights and self-determination, arguing for a shake-up of the UN Security Council to give the rest of the world the sort of say the permanent five members have.
The US and the Europeans are both viewed with a lot of skepticism. The Turks' relationships with them are largely transactional, looking for leverage wherever they have it and you've seen a lot of that, of course, on the NATO accession conversations on the Black Sea Green Deal and the rest, on Syria, with the overarching belief that Western powers want to have hegemony over world politics and keep the developing world and right rival major countries at bay. Relations with the West are kind of a necessary evil. India is not yet a big focus for Turkey, because they're concentrating their diplomatic and commercial efforts on their immediate neighborhood, the Middle East, the eastern Mediterranean, the Caucasus, as well as their extensions, the Balkans, Central Asia, and some Africa. I would say that among major non-western powers, Turkey has been more focused on developing strong ties and working relations with Russia, China, and Brazil, and not so much with South Africa or India.
Of the major powers, Japan is the one exception where Turkey has enjoyed very strong relations, and they want to maintain them: some historic ties, good diplomatic relations, lots of Japanese investment and Turkish respect for Japan's economic capacity. That's been very stable.
At the beginning, I'm giving you all these reasons why the Global South is a thing, and now we're running into yeah, they all feel that way and yet, they don't have the same developed economies, the same developed diplomatic capability. What they can actually do to their day-to-day economic statecraft, their day-to-day diplomacy is necessarily more constrained than the sort of aspirational or ideological alignment that we are nonetheless seeing.
Potolicchio: To finish our tour around the global south, Ian, I want to get your thoughts on South Africa, and then Brazil.
Bremmer: I'd say South African citizens, and certainly the government, broadly view rich countries as very comfortable to do nothing to address the inequalities that exist between them and Africa. South Africa's view is that they should never, an African country, should never enter any engagements with rich countries with a begging bowl and they should never walk away from negotiations being satisfied with being fed table scraps. That's really this, I mean, kind of still feeling that they're at the wrong end of a neocolonial set of policies. Certainly, you see a lot of that in their rhetoric, diplomatically, but they're also calling on other African countries to push for trade and diplomatic relations with rich nations that don't just focus on extraction of raw materials, and no value add, but also scientific knowledge and skills transfers and partnerships on a more equal footing, like what China has been doing over the last 20-30 years, which has gotten them out of the Global South.
In that regard, they've been pushing for reform of multilateral institutions, like the UN Security Council, the WTO, for greater representation for African countries and the African Union. They've been advancing not only their own foreign policy interests but also those of the continent, you see that particularly in the G7. That was particularly true during the pandemic, with the joint proposal with India to The WTO, for that TRIPS Intellectual property waiver to manufacture vaccines, as well as getting the first pharma company on the continent in 2021 to create local vaccine manufacturing capability, also mRNA transfer hubs in Cape Town.
South Africa's bilateral relations with India and Japan have been pretty good in recent years, gradually, sort of including partnerships on higher education, Science, Technology to get beyond the idea of we're just extractive sort of industry from South Africa. India and Japan, are South Africa's third and fourth largest trade partners after China, The US, and Germany. That's a pretty big deal. I think the interesting thing about South Africa, because they are, by far the most advanced and diversified economy on the continent, though not the largest (Nigeria) they're continuing to look at wanting to advance partnerships with rich nations, but at the same time, have hegemonic influence over things inside Africa.
When you see the BRICS, and China wants to expand the BRICS, South Africa's like, "well, let's do a Brexit and Africa summit, we'll be in charge of like all the Africa stuff", which is a little bit like the way the Indians think about not wanting to expand the Quad, they like being in a position where they're the ones that get to have influence with The United States and the advanced countries. Then, they get to discuss that with all the other poor countries. It is definitely a first among region's approach in the Global South.
In Brazil, the Lula administration obviously wants to play a role as a leader in the Global South. Harder for Brazil, given where Bolsonaro was compared to where Lula is. That level of transition, which hasn't really played out so far in the other countries we've talked about, because there's been, frankly, either more consistency or it hasn't mattered as much.
India - the consistency, Turkey - the consistency, South Africa hasn't really mattered as much. I think that the Lula administration rejects the idea of having to choose sides, and they're willing to ruffle some feathers in the process, but Lula specifically wants to play his position as hosting the next G20 summit to move forward the idea of having the Global South play a much greater role. They particularly want to show leadership on environmental issues and their role on deforestation on the Amazon, as a wedge. I expect that that's going to get traction this year, which will then be followed by Brazil hosting the COP Summit, so that's how they're going to play.
Potolicchio: Back to China. There is one of Lawrence Summer's quotes: "When we're engaged with the Chinese, we get an airport. And when we're engaged with you guys, we get a lecture." China and the Global South?
Bremmer: China is, as I mentioned, at the beginning, the largest creditor to the Global South, and Belt and Road has been a massive undertaking over the last couple of decades. For the first decade, they were doing it, the second decade, they branded it, but now it's slowing down. A lot of this is bad debt and a lot of it, they're just trying to extend for countries that are having a hard time servicing it. On the one hand, China is by far the most important trade partner to every one of these Global South countries, that gives them a lot of political influence. On the other hand, China is no longer seen as just writing checks and solving problems for these countries in a way that they were 5-10-15 years ago.
I think that a lot of the countries we're talking about are looking for more than just China. Some of them are looking for security relations with the United States, you see that across Southeast Asia. Some of them are looking for more Western investment to be able to balance and hedge, you certainly see that in Turkey and Brazil. Some of them are just worried that China itself, as an economy, is not a great bet, given that their economy is slowing down, given the challenges that they're facing demographically in terms of their own bad corporate debt and the economic slowdown, despite the end of COVID, zero-COVID. So, yes, the Chinese are very important and they'll continue to play an outsized role for most of these countries compared to the United States, but it's a very assertively hedged drill.
Potolicchio: Ian, you put your big GZERO summit strategically in Tokyo, for a reason. What does the Global South think about Japan and what its role should be?
Bremmer: Well, I think that the Global South welcomes Japan's focus on them. Japan is, in a sense, the least controversial of the major powers out there, in terms of the historic level of humanitarian aid, the high quality of the investments in the managerial support, in the lack of corruption that attends them and also the soft power, and the general level of positive cultural affinity that countries around the world connect when you ask them about Japan. So it's not controversial when the Japanese are coming in, it's just too frequently their footprint is light. There just aren't a lot of Japanese in Africa, so you don't encounter them very much. You do in Peru, but like in Turkey and Britain, it's hard. I would say that this is an area where Kishida has done a lot.
The first time I sat down with Kishida, the first 20 minutes, he wanted to talk to me about the Global South and how Japan could do more. So that was pretty interesting. He's made that the key element of his foreign policy, he has invited lots of Global South leaders, including Lula, Modi, and Jokowi, also leaders from the Comoros, who chair The African Union right now, The Cook Islands, Chair of The Pacific Islands Forum, to the G7 Summit that they just hosted in Hiroshima. After decades of work, Japan has cultivated excellent relations in Southeast Asia too, where they're viewed very favorably. Even though Japan is not the country that the Americans are spending the most time talking about, when you talk about the Global South, the fact is, that they have a pretty strong base. They're well respected, they're well aligned. I think that the Japanese are also very sensitive to the concerns of Global South nations in a way that the Americans frequently aren't.
No one in Japan is trying to get members of the Global South to choose between The US and China. Kishida wants to position Japan as the bridge between the G7 and the Global South. Japan is uniquely kind of a country that has some credibility in the global south to pull it off, in part because Japan is the only Asian member of the G7. It's like a Western club and Japan's kind of like hanging out there. They are playing a bigger role in geopolitics generally right now and that's something that Global South members, when they think about, are pretty happy with. But I would also say that China's always looming large in Japan's mind, and Kishida's attention on the Global South is not just because he's a good guy, but also because the Japanese are interested in countering China's influence.
サム・ポトリッキオ（米ジョージタウン大学教授）
「グローバルサウスは冷戦時代、当時のソ連が欧米に対抗するためにつくり出した概念だ」あるロシア人ジャーナリストは、私との対話の中でそう語った。「植民地主義や帝国主義と戦うのだと駆り立てるのが、彼らと連携するには最良の方法だった」
彼は母国ロシアのウクライナ侵攻を痛烈に批判する一方、グローバルサウスという古くて新しい一大勢力に注目していた。グローバルサウスの国々は、ウクライナ戦争で必ずしもロシアを批判しなかった。グローバルサウスが力を増した現在、それ自体が「大国」と化した──このロシア人ジャーナリストが言外に示したことは明らかだ。
グローバルサウスとは大まかに、アジア、アフリカ、中南米、オセアニアの途上国を指す。その台頭を最も体現している国はインドだろう。S&Pの時価総額の15％近くを占める欧米の優良企業に加え、グーグルの親会社アルファベットやスターバックス、IBM、マイクロソフトなど世界的企業のトップ、それに世界銀行の新総裁もインド出身だ。
6月下旬に訪米したインドのナレンドラ・モディ首相は、ワシントンで熱烈な歓迎を受けた。9月9～ 10日の20カ国・地域（G20）首脳会議では議長国も務めた。
ロシアがウクライナにいわれなき攻撃を開始した昨年2月24日以降、グローバルサウスのかなり多くの国がウクライナからもロシアからも中立を維持しようとした。昨年3月のウクライナからのロシア軍の即時撤退を求める国連決議の採択では、インドや中国、アフリカの国々の3分の1など35カ国が棄権した。現在ニューヨークで開催中の国連総会でも、グローバルサウスの動向が注目されている。
ウクライナでの戦争は、西から東への人口的・経済的シフトを国際安全保障への影響力に転換する地政学的チャンスをグローバルサウスに与えている。これらの国々は経済力の向上と人口増加を背景に自信を増し、よりバランスの取れた世界情勢を構築したがっている。単にどちら側に付くかを選ぶのではなく、外交の調停・交渉役として新たな世界秩序をつくり出す可能性を歓迎している。
中国はグローバルサウスを率いることで超大国として有利な立場に立とうとし、ロシアはいまだに冷戦時代の「非同盟」国の名残を享受している。アメリカも国益拡大のため、グローバルサウスへの対応に本腰を入れるだろう。覇権を争う大国の論理で世界は分断に向かっている。
揺れ動く国際秩序のカギを握る存在ながら、まだ明確な定義のない、グローバルサウスとは一体何なのか。パワーバランスの変化により国際秩序が大きく揺れ動くとき、地政学について頼れる解説者となるのが、国際政治学者のイアン・ブレマーだ。リスク分析・予想を得意とする頭脳集団ユーラシア・グループの創設者で、Gゼロ世界（G7の影響力が低下し、真に指導者的な大国が存在しなくなった世界）の概念を提唱した人物だ。そのブレマーに、米ジョージタウン大学教授のサム・ポトリッキオが聞いた。（以下は英文インタビューとなります）
What is Global South?
Speaker: Dr. Ian Bremmer, President of Eurasia Group
Interviewer: Prof. Sam Potolicchio, Founding Executive Director of American Councils For International Education's Center for Global Leadership, Lecturer at Georgetown University
◇ ◇ ◇
Potolicchio: Dr. Bremmer, it's turning into an annual tradition to consult you as the world gets more uncertain and unstable. Your top risk for 2023 was a "Rogue Russia". The Global South is becoming an increasingly influential player in mediating this conflict. So I ask you, how do you define the term "Global South" and why does it matter how we analyze this concept now?
Bremmer: You go back to the collapse of the Soviet Union and you have this presumption of a couple of things. First, that democracy is going to be the true North of the Globe, and it's just a question of how you get folks integrated. Globalization - same thing, you're creating a global middle class over 50 years, which means that emerging markets, the developing world is becoming developed in the process of emerging, it's a transitional phase.
The last decade, if it's taught us anything, is that there are big structural challenges with that worldview. One is that we no longer have the Americans driving globalization. The second is that it's no longer clear that democracy is winning, in terms of the aspirational trajectory of different countries. Third, the developing world, most of which has indeed, gotten wealthier, nonetheless, now generally feels like they are not heading towards convergence with the West and the West isn't really trying to help them.
There are lots of reasons for that. You look at the inshoring and the friendshoring and the industrial policy in the United States and coordinated with Europe and Japan, you look at the consolidation of the G7. Suddenly, you also look at the trends towards automation, deep learning and AI in particular, and well, who's going to drive the next 20-30 years to help ensure that the Global South continues to develop, continues to emerge? Then, of course, we had three years of pandemic and they revealed preferences from The West: we're not going to help you all that much, it is every country for itself.
Then, of course, you've got the war in Russia and now, the Grain Deal that the Russians have just pulled out of. Who's going to make sure they get the grain? Who's going to make sure they get the LNG? It's going to be the wealthy countries. The poor countries are stuck with higher prices, greater starvation, and coal. Finally, you have got climate change. The countries that are going to be hit the hardest by climate change are frequently the ones that haven't even been able to benefit from the industrialization that got us the climate change. Technology for post-carbon is getting cheaper but it's not like the West is providing significant amounts of support that would allow the poorest countries to effectively make that transition.
So for all of these reasons, the so-called developing world or the lower developed nations and the middle developed nations are increasingly finding that they have something in common with each other. That commonality is that their interests are not being served in the 21st century and they don't feel like they can count on The West. Now, there's a lot of differentiation inside this grouping, of course.
China, which you would have considered to be developing sort of 10 years ago, certainly 20 years ago, you wouldn't call a part of the Global South, in part because they are so, so much more powerful, in part because they're the largest creditor to the developing world, to the Global South, in part because they're the largest carbon emitter. China is still a relatively poor country, a middle income country, $12,000 per capita, but you wouldn't refer to them as the Global South. So with all of those caveats, I do find that the Global South is an increasingly useful way to think about a growing geopolitical cleavage that is important, is disruptive, and needs to be addressed.
Certainly, when you speak to the leaders of the G7, the Americans, the Europeans, the Japanese, they are all highly aware that they are largely not doing well with the Global South and they need to find a way to address that. I hear that in almost identical terms from all of those government leaders, all of them.
Potolicchio: Let's zero in on the fastest riser of the Global South. What's your analysis with India?
Bremmer: India is the one that certainly the Americans feel like they've done the best job. Modi is the most popular, democratically-elected leader of any major democracy in the world. He really wants to define his international legacy as building a much stronger relationship, specifically with The United States. That is not exclusively because of, but largely because of a very deep-seated problematic relationship with China and increasingly, China's proxy Pakistan. What we've seen as Modi being on a sharp pro-US and pro-Western curve over the last decade, he did not think that The US would be easy to work with in 2014, when he became a leader.
Today, he truly thinks that The US along with Japan, are India's best partners for the economic and the technological transformation that he envisages for India. As I said, it helps that he sees China as India's number one threat and he seeks to keep China out of India's frontier economic sectors, and also believes that The United States and The West, more broadly, will help them accomplish that.
Certainly, his foreign and defense policy team shares that view. I would say, hostility towards China is bipartisan in India, the same way it is in The United States. Though, there is skepticism about The United States inside some of Modi's team, particularly from the Hindu right, because they look back at America's Pakistan legacy, the Muslim population, not surprisingly, as well as the far left, who see The United States as great Satan/imperialist. But urban youth are showing very strong pro-US sentiment. Overall, I'd argue that Indians are the most pro-US among the Global South, you see that from Pew Research.
You talk about the Quad, you talk about India's ideas of decoupling, you look at Modi's recent trip to the United States, all of the technology investment that's happening from The United States, in particular into India, so what you really see here, if that's the way you start, you say, "Wow!"
In the run-up to the G20 Summit, after consulting all sorts of countries around the Global South, they basically decided that India sees an opportunity to expand its profile, especially along the Indian Ocean, Red Sea Golf, undermining China, and securing resources for itself. It also has some low-cost, digital green technology and infrastructure stories to sell to the Global South, though it lacks resources and certainly lacks administrative capability. It is pushing for Global South-oriented solutions within the G20, which it's chairing right now. They've been organizing, essentially, a G10 of the Global South, including China in this case, especially on climate to coordinate a common agenda there. Now, I would say that secondary to the tilt towards the west, but it still is important. He does want to be the face of cooperation within the Global South, he doesn't want that to happen without India, and he certainly likes the idea of using its chairmanship of the G20 as cover.
Their ambitions, though, and their language: very modest, like what you'd see from China, 10-20 years ago. Indian diplomats, for example, they're banned from actually using the phrase "great power" or "superpower" to describe India or its ambitions. Modi likes to use this Sanskrit phrase "Vishwaguru", which means "universal teacher". It's all about leading by example. A lot of India's Global South policy, which is not what they say when they talk to the Americans, is about leading by example.
Potolicchio: Here's my most nostalgic question of the day, because the first time I ever asked you a question was "what leaders should I pay attention to that we're not paying attention to?" and you mentioned Indonesia. This was like eight-nine years ago. Indonesia, what's your analysis there?
Bremmer: First of all, Indonesia gets nowhere near the attention that India does. It's smaller, it doesn't yet have the Western investment that makes the headlines, but it's quite stable politically. It's quite proud of its role in founding, alongside India and others The Non-Aligned Movement. It also prioritizes solidarity with other Muslim countries and opposition to Israel, which comes up in its foreign policy, which has sometimes created suspicion and sensitivities around the West, in a post-colonial society. Having said all of that, Indonesia is generally less eager than a lot of Global South countries to antagonize The West. They see economic and, more recently, security ties with The United States, with Japan, as a very important counterbalance to the growing influence and the growing assertiveness of China. I would say Indonesia doesn't yet see India as so important in that regard, though over time, I expect, they will.
Potolicchio: In our quest to have my daughters' understand the world more, we have done a lot of travel to the furthest reaches of the globe with them. But we were intentionally specific in our 1 year celebration for our eldest. We cut cake on the Bosphorus, in Istanbul, Turkey, looking both East and West. Your take on this pivotal linchpin country that seemingly straddles the geopolitical divide?
Bremmer: Erdogan and many Turks want Turkey to be seen as an emerging power that is challenging the existing West-led order. The credibility for doing so given their massive economic challenges is hot as well. That underpins some of their alignment with the Global South because Erdogan wants to be the voice of the downtrodden and the unheard. You see him advocating for Palestinian rights and self-determination, arguing for a shake-up of the UN Security Council to give the rest of the world the sort of say the permanent five members have.
The US and the Europeans are both viewed with a lot of skepticism. The Turks' relationships with them are largely transactional, looking for leverage wherever they have it and you've seen a lot of that, of course, on the NATO accession conversations on the Black Sea Green Deal and the rest, on Syria, with the overarching belief that Western powers want to have hegemony over world politics and keep the developing world and right rival major countries at bay. Relations with the West are kind of a necessary evil. India is not yet a big focus for Turkey, because they're concentrating their diplomatic and commercial efforts on their immediate neighborhood, the Middle East, the eastern Mediterranean, the Caucasus, as well as their extensions, the Balkans, Central Asia, and some Africa. I would say that among major non-western powers, Turkey has been more focused on developing strong ties and working relations with Russia, China, and Brazil, and not so much with South Africa or India.
Of the major powers, Japan is the one exception where Turkey has enjoyed very strong relations, and they want to maintain them: some historic ties, good diplomatic relations, lots of Japanese investment and Turkish respect for Japan's economic capacity. That's been very stable.
At the beginning, I'm giving you all these reasons why the Global South is a thing, and now we're running into yeah, they all feel that way and yet, they don't have the same developed economies, the same developed diplomatic capability. What they can actually do to their day-to-day economic statecraft, their day-to-day diplomacy is necessarily more constrained than the sort of aspirational or ideological alignment that we are nonetheless seeing.
Potolicchio: To finish our tour around the global south, Ian, I want to get your thoughts on South Africa, and then Brazil.
Bremmer: I'd say South African citizens, and certainly the government, broadly view rich countries as very comfortable to do nothing to address the inequalities that exist between them and Africa. South Africa's view is that they should never, an African country, should never enter any engagements with rich countries with a begging bowl and they should never walk away from negotiations being satisfied with being fed table scraps. That's really this, I mean, kind of still feeling that they're at the wrong end of a neocolonial set of policies. Certainly, you see a lot of that in their rhetoric, diplomatically, but they're also calling on other African countries to push for trade and diplomatic relations with rich nations that don't just focus on extraction of raw materials, and no value add, but also scientific knowledge and skills transfers and partnerships on a more equal footing, like what China has been doing over the last 20-30 years, which has gotten them out of the Global South.
In that regard, they've been pushing for reform of multilateral institutions, like the UN Security Council, the WTO, for greater representation for African countries and the African Union. They've been advancing not only their own foreign policy interests but also those of the continent, you see that particularly in the G7. That was particularly true during the pandemic, with the joint proposal with India to The WTO, for that TRIPS Intellectual property waiver to manufacture vaccines, as well as getting the first pharma company on the continent in 2021 to create local vaccine manufacturing capability, also mRNA transfer hubs in Cape Town.
South Africa's bilateral relations with India and Japan have been pretty good in recent years, gradually, sort of including partnerships on higher education, Science, Technology to get beyond the idea of we're just extractive sort of industry from South Africa. India and Japan, are South Africa's third and fourth largest trade partners after China, The US, and Germany. That's a pretty big deal. I think the interesting thing about South Africa, because they are, by far the most advanced and diversified economy on the continent, though not the largest (Nigeria) they're continuing to look at wanting to advance partnerships with rich nations, but at the same time, have hegemonic influence over things inside Africa.
When you see the BRICS, and China wants to expand the BRICS, South Africa's like, "well, let's do a Brexit and Africa summit, we'll be in charge of like all the Africa stuff", which is a little bit like the way the Indians think about not wanting to expand the Quad, they like being in a position where they're the ones that get to have influence with The United States and the advanced countries. Then, they get to discuss that with all the other poor countries. It is definitely a first among region's approach in the Global South.
In Brazil, the Lula administration obviously wants to play a role as a leader in the Global South. Harder for Brazil, given where Bolsonaro was compared to where Lula is. That level of transition, which hasn't really played out so far in the other countries we've talked about, because there's been, frankly, either more consistency or it hasn't mattered as much.
India - the consistency, Turkey - the consistency, South Africa hasn't really mattered as much. I think that the Lula administration rejects the idea of having to choose sides, and they're willing to ruffle some feathers in the process, but Lula specifically wants to play his position as hosting the next G20 summit to move forward the idea of having the Global South play a much greater role. They particularly want to show leadership on environmental issues and their role on deforestation on the Amazon, as a wedge. I expect that that's going to get traction this year, which will then be followed by Brazil hosting the COP Summit, so that's how they're going to play.
Potolicchio: Back to China. There is one of Lawrence Summer's quotes: "When we're engaged with the Chinese, we get an airport. And when we're engaged with you guys, we get a lecture." China and the Global South?
Bremmer: China is, as I mentioned, at the beginning, the largest creditor to the Global South, and Belt and Road has been a massive undertaking over the last couple of decades. For the first decade, they were doing it, the second decade, they branded it, but now it's slowing down. A lot of this is bad debt and a lot of it, they're just trying to extend for countries that are having a hard time servicing it. On the one hand, China is by far the most important trade partner to every one of these Global South countries, that gives them a lot of political influence. On the other hand, China is no longer seen as just writing checks and solving problems for these countries in a way that they were 5-10-15 years ago.
I think that a lot of the countries we're talking about are looking for more than just China. Some of them are looking for security relations with the United States, you see that across Southeast Asia. Some of them are looking for more Western investment to be able to balance and hedge, you certainly see that in Turkey and Brazil. Some of them are just worried that China itself, as an economy, is not a great bet, given that their economy is slowing down, given the challenges that they're facing demographically in terms of their own bad corporate debt and the economic slowdown, despite the end of COVID, zero-COVID. So, yes, the Chinese are very important and they'll continue to play an outsized role for most of these countries compared to the United States, but it's a very assertively hedged drill.
Potolicchio: Ian, you put your big GZERO summit strategically in Tokyo, for a reason. What does the Global South think about Japan and what its role should be?
Bremmer: Well, I think that the Global South welcomes Japan's focus on them. Japan is, in a sense, the least controversial of the major powers out there, in terms of the historic level of humanitarian aid, the high quality of the investments in the managerial support, in the lack of corruption that attends them and also the soft power, and the general level of positive cultural affinity that countries around the world connect when you ask them about Japan. So it's not controversial when the Japanese are coming in, it's just too frequently their footprint is light. There just aren't a lot of Japanese in Africa, so you don't encounter them very much. You do in Peru, but like in Turkey and Britain, it's hard. I would say that this is an area where Kishida has done a lot.
The first time I sat down with Kishida, the first 20 minutes, he wanted to talk to me about the Global South and how Japan could do more. So that was pretty interesting. He's made that the key element of his foreign policy, he has invited lots of Global South leaders, including Lula, Modi, and Jokowi, also leaders from the Comoros, who chair The African Union right now, The Cook Islands, Chair of The Pacific Islands Forum, to the G7 Summit that they just hosted in Hiroshima. After decades of work, Japan has cultivated excellent relations in Southeast Asia too, where they're viewed very favorably. Even though Japan is not the country that the Americans are spending the most time talking about, when you talk about the Global South, the fact is, that they have a pretty strong base. They're well respected, they're well aligned. I think that the Japanese are also very sensitive to the concerns of Global South nations in a way that the Americans frequently aren't.
No one in Japan is trying to get members of the Global South to choose between The US and China. Kishida wants to position Japan as the bridge between the G7 and the Global South. Japan is uniquely kind of a country that has some credibility in the global south to pull it off, in part because Japan is the only Asian member of the G7. It's like a Western club and Japan's kind of like hanging out there. They are playing a bigger role in geopolitics generally right now and that's something that Global South members, when they think about, are pretty happy with. But I would also say that China's always looming large in Japan's mind, and Kishida's attention on the Global South is not just because he's a good guy, but also because the Japanese are interested in countering China's influence.
サム・ポトリッキオ（米ジョージタウン大学教授）