The BRIC Thesis

The BRIC thesis

São Paulo, Brazil.
Goldman Sachs argues that the economic potential of Brazil, Russia, India, and China is such that they may become among the four most dominant economies by the year 2050. The thesis was proposed by Jim O'Neill, global economist at Goldman Sachs.[7] These countries encompass over 25% of the world's land coverage and 40% of the world's population and hold a combined GDP (PPP) of 15.435 trillion dollars. On almost every scale, they would be the largest entity on the global stage. These four countries are among the biggest and fastest growing emerging markets.
However, it is not the intent of Goldman Sachs to argue that these four countries are a political alliance (such as the European Union) or any formal trading association, like ASEAN. Nevertheless, they have taken steps to increase their political cooperation, mainly as a way of influencing the United States position on major trade accords, or, through the implicit threat of political cooperation, as a way of extracting political concessions from the United States, such as the proposed nuclear cooperation with India.

The BRIC numbers
The Economist publishes an annual table of social and economic national statistics in its Pocket World in Figures. Extrapolating the global rankings from their 2008 Edition for the BRIC countries and economies in relation to various categories provides an interesting touchstone in relation to the economic underpinnings of the BRIC thesis. It also illustrates how, despite their divergent economic bases, the economic indicators are remarkably similar in global rankings between the different economies. It also suggests that whilst economic arguments can be made for linking Mexico into the BRIC thesis, the case for including South Africa looks considerably weaker. A Goldman Sachs paper published later in December 2005 explained why Mexico wasn't included in the original BRICs. According to the paper,[12] among the other countries they looked at, only Mexico and perhaps Korea have the potential to rival the BRICs, but they are economies that they decided to exclude initially because they looked at them as already more developed. According to that paper, Mexico becomes the fifth-largest economy by 2050, ahead of Russia.


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