The Ukrainian crisis which marked the year 2014 was analysed by LEAP’s Euro-BRICS network as the result of an overlap between two economic unions, the European Union and the Eurasian Economic Union, having failed to cooperate in creating the conditions for a non-conflictual co-development[1]. In other words : « the first conflict of the multipolar world ». Indeed the multipolarity of the XXIst century world is neither good or bad, it is a fact which policy-makers must address with optimism and rationality in order to organise it so that today’s multipolar world doesn’t look like Europe in the 1930s.

 

More generally, the Euro-Russian crisis, as well as all those currently multiplying in the Middle-East and worldwide, clearly signal that the system of global governance is breathless and that it is now a matter of emergency to reform, see rebuild, it in order to avoid – or at least limit in duration – a loss of control of the geopolitical situation.

 

Since 2009, LEAP has been anticipating that a rapprochement between Europe and the BRICS was likely to contribute significantly to reinventing tomorrow’s global governance:

. the euro-BRICS axis is representative of today’s global balance in terms of economic and demographic weight namely

. the BRICS countries are emblematic of the emerging multipolar world

. Europe must acknowledge this reality to prevent a West/BRICS bipolarisation

 

Lastly, Europe and the BRICS anchor themselves into experiences of regional integration which provide a natural model for mutipolar global governance. European Union, Mercosur, African Union, Eurasian Union,… are indeed successful processes of integration of nation-states of different size and culture.

 

These regional integrations probably account for the most successful achievement of nation-states in the second half of the XXth century. But today these nation-states seem to hesitate to finalise this process of organisation of the XXIst century world, a hesitation likely to nullify all the work done until now.

 

Supra-national entities are indeed faced to three challenges today:

. achieve their democratic anchorage in order to gain the political legitimacy they need (and deserve) to operate normally (Towards a political validation of regional entities)

. find their place in a global architecture today suffering from relying on the national level only (Towards the creation  of the intermediate level of global architecture)

. adapt their model of inter-state cooperation to inter-block cooperation on a global level (Towards a multipolar global governance).

 

The 5th Euro-BRICS conference intends to tackle this issue of the integration of supra-national (EU, AU, Eurasia, Mercosur…) and mega-national (China, India…) entities to the global architecture, as well as its feasibility and the role states must play in this finalisation of the process of regional integration and establishing of a multipolar global governance adapted to the characteristics of the XXIst century.

 

Youth event (8-9 June):

  • A fully-fleshed website already! Impressive efficiency of Nikolai and his team with a website of the Youth Event already available: http://eurobricsyouth.com/. Enjoy visiting it and all its information : dates, venue, program information, link to Social Media of Euro-BRICS
  • Selection process : 50 European and BRICS delegates will be selected through a formal process, based on their motivation and profile quality. The application form is available here : http://eurobricsyouth.com/join-us. Please don’t hesitate to cirulate this link among the students and student and youth organisations you know. The maniest, the greatest quality of the young delegates! Roman Chukov is in charge of this selection mechanism : [email protected]
  • Organising committee : a Euro-BRICS Organising Committee will be decided upon and implemented in the course of next week, made up of students and youth from Europe and BRICS only (no oldies 🙂
  • Funding for the delegates : The selected delegates will get their travel and accommodation costs covered by LEAP. However a minor contribution will be required from them as a token of their motivation – probably around 40-50 euros, maybe cheaper for the BRICS delegates.
  • 100 participants : Apart from these central 50 delegates, members of the organising committee, keynote guests, diplomats, members of our Euro-BRICS network, as well as any students or youth willing to come at their own expense (or funded by other organisations) will join the event which we hope will easily reach 100 participants at least.

LEAP’s diplomatic conference (8 June):.

  • Coordination : Vivienne Blommendaal, from LEAP, is in charge of coordinating the organisation of the conference : [email protected]
  • A diplomatic conference as part of the Youth event : LEAP’s diplomatic event aims at gathering 50 participants from our network and from European and BRICS foreign ministries, as well as supranational organisations’ secretariats. The discussion of this one-day conference will be presented in the Youth event’s plenary session on the next day.
  • Guests identification and invitation : At this stage we are mostly concerned by the identification of potential guests (officials from the multilateral departments of Foreign Ministries and from supranational organisations) and sending them invitations. YOUR HELP WOULD BE EXTREMELY HELPFUL IN THIS REGARD : don’t hesitate to send us names and contact details of people that we should invite! Thanks in advance!!

 

 

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Euro-BRICS Helsinki 2015 – pres – en 2

Youth event – Concept