EDITORIAL – Aug & Sept 2025-The Global South: Forging its own future

We only have to compare two recent images of world leaders to get an idea of how the global order has been turned on its head.  

The first is the August 18th meeting when Donald Trump sat at his Oval Office desk like a reprimanding schoolmaster, presiding over the line of European heads of government before him and making no secret of who called the shots.

Of course, all is not as it seems. But perceptions matter.

The second is the image of Vladimir Putin, Narendra Modi and Xi Jinping, the three big beasts of Asia, holding hands at a September 1st meeting, projecting not control but partnership. 

That meeting took place at the Chinese port city of Tianjin, where the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) presented itself as offering an alternative vision to that held by the West. 

Between those two poles lie the 80-odd countries in the loosely defined Global South. For them, the next few years presents an opportunity to mould their future. 

But it needs to be grasped firmly and not left to others. 

Tianjin built on earlier summits of the G20 and the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) with discussions on carving out financial and political systems that bypass Western institutions.

But, despite being set up a quarter of a century ago, the SCO has nothing to match the proven resilience of regional institutions like the European Union or the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. 

The SCO’s institutions are shallow, the rules unprecise and its decision-making heavily influenced by Beijing and Moscow. In short, it is little more than a patchwork of overlapping ambitions with unresolved divisions between key members. 

Amid this, the country to watch is India, which has decades of experience in keeping its feet in many camps. 

Over the past 20 years or so, the US has been coaxing India into its camp. Delhi is now a pivotal member of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue – whose aim is to counter China’s expansion – along with Australia, Japan and the US. 

Meanwhile, India and Russia have maintained a strong security pact since the 1970s, with Moscow supplying much of Delhi’s weaponry. 

To America’s advantage, India and China have kept up a frosty relationship with outbursts of border conflict. But the US has now shredded that careful diplomatic balance by betraying India’s trust on two levels.

It inflicted crippling tariffs, damaging India’s economy, and courted Pakistan’s military leader, raising questions over its security. 

Little wonder, then, that India wants to show that it has powerful friends, more reliable than an unpredictable Washington. 

The own goal by the US scores even higher if one adds the warming of the traditional enmity between China and India.

Modi, Putin and Xi’s carefully choreographed unity is designed to showcase a new home for nations weary of Western dominance. While the West reads this as a hostile threat, the real challenge comes from current systems failing the developing world. 

Taliban-conquered Afghanistan, Israel-conquered Gaza and gang-conquered Haiti are three of the most recent examples.

The White House curated image of Donald Trump with European leaders distilled a hierarchy long familiar to the Global South. America sits at the head of the table, while weaker nations cluster deferentially around. It illustrates power executed through command as opposed to the Tianjin images, which project an atmosphere of global governance through consensus. 

Of course, such conclusions are far from reality, but we live in societies where pictures tell a million words. 

Therefore, the time and climate are ripe for the Global South to begin writing its own narrative. India, with its long history of independent thinking, is one model to follow, showing selective engagement without subservience. 

The Tianjin summit revealed the ambition of China and Russia to construct parallel institutions, the caution of India in navigating between rival poles, and the deep appeal such alternatives hold for developing countries. 

However unstructured and experimental, this concept provides a fresh landing zone against the outdated, fractured one shown in the Oval Office tableau.

The global order is no longer written in Washington DC. But other powers have not yet built structures strong enough to take over. 

Therefore, this is the time for the weaker and poorer nations to claim their roles as authors of what is now being created. If the Global South does not write its own future, others will write it for them.