Preface and Acknowledgements
Executive Vice Chairman of Board of Directors&Secretary General, National Institute for Global Strategy, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences
The word “BRIC” first originated from a foreign minister's meeting between Brazil, Russia, India and China during the 2006 General Assembly of the United Nations. The concept was based on an idea brought forth by a chief economist from Goldman Sachs and extended into an international economic body. In 2010, with the joining of South Africa, BRIC became BRICS. From September 3 to 5, as the 9thBRICS summit opens in Xiamen, China, the curtains will be opened on the second golden decade of development. Therefore, this book is born.
In the joint effort of the member states, BRICS countries have successfully cooperated for 10 years. From an investment concept in economic report to the arena of global governance, to becoming a shiny placard in cooperation between emerging markets and developing countries, the BRICS countries achieved significantly in cooperation in politics, economy, security and cultural affairs. As cooperation field of BRICS countries expand, from unilateral to bilateral, from single to multi dimension, from trade and investment in the beginning to tourism, finances, culture and science, from trade to enterprises and global governance reform negotiations, from governmental communications to party communications to think tank, culture, science, technology, education and legislative communications, from domestic issues to negotiations on international issues, from bilateral to multilateral cooperation, the BRICS cooperation has become an important force in stimulating world economic growth, perfecting global governance and making international relations about people's welfare.
At present, the international situation is complicated. Under the shadow of an international financial crisis, all countries around the world are having a hard time and the BRICS countries are no exception. They face many complicated and harsh challenges in further development. How should BRICS countries further strengthen cooperation and continue to be front runners of pushing global governance? How should they stay unshaken by storms, undisturbed by discords and unobstructed by difficulties, continue constructing and strengthening a partnership that maintains world peace, enhances joint development, publicizes multilateral civilization and increases global economic governance, in order to achieve greater development?
In this process where challenges can be turned as opportunities, pressure turned as motivation, from Ufa to Goa to Xiamen, BRICS cooperation increases in height, especially needs leadership from the five countries to frequently visit each other, hear each other's opinions, consider the world's situation from the perspective of other countries.
“Strengthening cooperation with BRICS countries has always been a priority in Chinese diplomatic relations. China will keep strengthening cooperation with BRICS countries and increase economic growth, complete cooperation framework and produce more results, in order to bring benefits for the people and contribute more to world peace and development.”. BRICS countries will definitely “lead cooperation with an open mind, promote developing according to economic rules, fully exploit the‘golden rules' of dialogue, exercise the political wisdom of ‘finding common ground while admitting differences, ' establish the ‘path of confidence' with BRICS cooperation and make BRICS cooperation into the origin of new ideas in global governance.” When President Xi Jinping was attending an informal BRICS leadership meeting in Turkey on November 15, 2015, he pointed out that“the world needs to have a new view on the makeup of the BRICS.” On July 7, 2017, Xi Jinping made a conclusion speech while presiding at an informal meeting of BRICS leadership conference in Hamburg, bringing out the four“unwavering.” We believe that the 9thBRICS summit in Xiamen, China will become a new starting point for BRICS countries to step up to a whole new level and will take BRICS cooperation into the key development stage of a second decade.
“BRICS research project” is one of the key projects of the National Institute for Global Strategy of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. In the long term, we followed the principle of “setting foot on domestic matters, using foreign experiences to advertise domestic affairs, closely follow and pay attention to commentary from foreign strategic think tanks on BRICS development, as a grassroots research path and method. On May 14, 2017, chairman of board of directors Cai Fang brought forth a five-point suggestion to more than 200 directors of strategic think tanks and experts on how to promote joint research project on the Belt and Road during the “think tank parallel forum” in the “Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation.” He said that first, we need to jointly plan topics and promote joint research. Each think tank has its own specialty and field and can contribute wisdom to Belt and Road construction in all ways. Through joint research, we can find common interests, which can help the execution of Belt and Road to be close to reality and the people. Second, establish a sharing mechanism for academic results. Periodic or aperiodic strengthening of academic exchange is one of the best ways of keeping interaction between think tanks. It helps with deepening understanding and exchanges of ideas. Third, share cultivation of talents. We should encourage visiting of researchers, cultivation of post-doc candidates between think tanks. The visits and exchanges can be short term and can be long term, with the goal of cultivating special talents who are interested in research on Belt and Road and can have achievements. Fourth, jointly publish results. The form of publishing joint research reports can enable people to make calls on important concerns and produce vast societal influence, which is beneficial to pushing government decision. Fifth, hold aperiodic joint conferences and establish a daily contact mechanism. Conference is the most direct way of strengthening communication, helpful to generating new ideas and suggestions. On the other hand, daily contact is necessary, we are gradually accumulating experience in this field.
He also called that “In pushing Belt and Road, we first need to communicate, know what each other are worried about, what each other need, in order to have cooperation. We hope to establish a think tank alliance, a think tank net. In this alliance, in this net, what we need to do is to better serve our research to practice, to have Belt and Road better serve to China's and the world's development in all aspects. In this alliance, this net, people can survive together, gather ideas, and form a mechanism of long term cooperation through people exchanges, cooperative research and information exchanges. We can have interaction and communication at least in the field of academia and build it as an example of people connecting along the Belt and Road. This is also the origin of us paying attention to strengthening contact and integration with BRICS think tanks and treat joint research as an important channel of research. It's the realization and forum of the “opening up and establish think tanks” concept brought forth by chairman Cai Fang and can be an exploration and attempt of our research work that serves our domestic fellowmen.
On June 8-9, 2017, we held the first BRICS think tank forum with Guangming Think Tank and University of International Relations in Beijing. The forum was titled “2017 BRICS Think-Tanks Forum – The coordination of BRICS Development Strategies: Way to Shared Prosperity” and invited about 50 government officials and experts from BRICS' main think tanks to discuss the cooperation and development of the BRICS countries in the next 10 years to come. The book is a presentation of the joint research and sharing of the exchange of viewpoints.
In the future, National Institute for Global Strategy think tank is willing to conduct scientific and deep joint research with think tanks from BRICS countries and other experts and scholars on the future developmental route of BRICS mechanism, to support BRICS countries to “keep deepening partnership for a brighter future” with our wisdom. At the same time, in this process, we can also form a good “partnership” with BRICS think tanks and together we can push for a “bright future” of think tank cooperation. This is our wish and one of our academic goals.