International institutions

From four emerging economies meeting at Yekaterinburg in 2009, BRICS has grown into an expanded forum that claims to speak for the Global South within a Western-led order.

Counterweight and voice

• Reform agenda: larger IMF and World Bank quotas for emerging economies and reform of the UN Security Council.
• Own institutions: the New Development Bank and the Contingent Reserve Arrangement (agreed in 2014) offer development finance and liquidity outside Bretton Woods conditionality.
• Expansion: Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, the UAE and Indonesia have joined, with a partner-country tier, widening the group's demographic and energy weight.
• Southern agenda: local-currency trade, food and energy security, climate justice and technology access.

Projecting an alternative

• Against the G7's exclusivity, BRICS presents itself as a forum of large developing economies without a hegemon or treaty obligations.
• India's framing is 'non-Western, not anti-Western': a reform platform, not a bloc against the G7; India chairs BRICS in 2026.
• Limits: India–China rivalry, differing regimes and interests, and China's economic dominance make a common position hard.
• Its institutions remain small beside the IMF and World Bank, and de-dollarisation is more slogan than system.

BRICS amplifies the Global South's voice, but its credibility as an alternative rests on cohesion and institutions that deliver, not on the size of its membership.

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Eight decades after 1945, the Security Council still mirrors the power map of the Second World War. Reform needs the consent of the very powers whose rivalry it is meant to manage — and that is where it stalls.

The reform agenda and the Charter hurdle

• Agenda: more permanent and non-permanent seats, limits on the veto, better working methods and regional balance; Intergovernmental Negotiations have run since 2009 without a negotiating text.
• Hurdle: Article 108 requires two-thirds of the General Assembly and ratification by all five permanent members, so any P5 member can block change.

How East–West confrontation blocks reform

• Paralysis in practice: the US and its allies against Russia and China on Ukraine, Syria, sanctions and Gaza; frequent vetoes leave the Council unable to act on the gravest conflicts, and each side reads reform as the other's gain.
• Entanglement: Russia and China coordinate positions, while Washington backs expansion selectively — endorsing India and Japan but wary of diluting its own weight.

Why the explanation is incomplete

• Interests cut across blocs: China resists permanent seats for Japan and India; the Uniting for Consensus group, including Italy and Pakistan, opposes any new permanent members; every P5 member guards the veto.
• North–South divide: Africa's Ezulwini Consensus demands two permanent seats with veto; the Global South wants representation, not merely a re-balanced East–West Council.
• Partial progress despite rivalry: the 2022 General Assembly veto initiative forces a debate after every veto; the Pact for the Future (2024) recommitted members to Council reform.

India's stake

• Through the G4 and L.69 coalitions, outreach to Africa and a long record of peacekeeping, India presses for text-based negotiations — while keeping working ties with both camps.

East–West rivalry explains the paralysis only in part; reform will come when collective pressure from the Global South, including India, makes the status quo costlier for the P5 than change.

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Terrorism crosses borders in fighters, finance and ideology, so no state can counter it alone. The Security Council created the Counter-Terrorism Committee when it unanimously adopted Resolution 1373 under Chapter VII on 28 September 2001, obliging every member state to criminalise terrorism and its financing.

The architecture

• The CTC, comprising all 15 Council members, monitors implementation of Resolution 1373; its Executive Directorate (CTED) assesses countries and recommends assistance.
• Associated bodies: the ISIL (Da'esh) and Al-Qaida Sanctions Committee with asset freezes, travel bans and arms embargoes; the 1540 Committee on weapons of mass destruction and non-state actors; the UN Office of Counter-Terrorism for capacity building; and the General Assembly's Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy (2006).

Achievements

• Near-universal counter-terror laws and financing controls, aligned with FATF standards, make it harder to move money and men across borders.
• Sanctions listings have frozen assets and constrained groups and individuals; CTED assessments have driven capacity building in weak states.
• Adaptation to new threats: under India's chairship in 2022 the CTC adopted the Delhi Declaration on countering terrorist use of drones, social media and online financing.

Shortcomings

• No agreed definition of terrorism: India's Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism, proposed in 1996, remains pending, so who counts as a terrorist still depends on politics.
• Selective listing: 'technical holds' by permanent members delay designations — Masood Azhar was listed only in 2019 — eroding credibility.
• Enforcement depends on states: state sponsorship, safe havens and weak capacity blunt the framework, and sanctions without due process raise human-rights concerns.
• Emerging gaps: lone-actor attacks, online radicalisation and crypto financing outpace the rules.

Verdict and reforms

• Adopt the CCIT, end anonymous holds on listings, strengthen due process through the Ombudsperson, fund CTED's technical assistance, and integrate FATF and regional bodies more closely.

The CTC and its bodies have built a global legal and monitoring framework that did not exist before 2001, but their effectiveness stops where political will does; a shared definition and impartial listings would turn the framework into real deterrence.

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The oceans cover most of the planet, regulate its climate, hold much of its life and carry the bulk of world trade. What happens at sea shapes life on land, so rules for shipping are rules for the planet. The International Maritime Organization, the UN specialised agency for shipping (convention of 1948, in operation since 1958, London), writes those rules.

The sea in the cosmos

• Climate and life: oceans absorb heat and carbon and sustain fisheries and coastal livelihoods; pollution and warming at sea return as cyclones, bleaching and lost catch.
• Trade: shipping carries the bulk of world merchandise trade, making safe and clean navigation a global public good.

Protecting the environment

• MARPOL (1973/78) controls oil, chemical, sewage, garbage and air pollution from ships; the 2020 sulphur cap cut sulphur in marine fuel sharply.
• The Ballast Water Management Convention checks invasive species; the Hong Kong Convention sets safe and green ship recycling, relevant to India's Alang yards; the Polar Code protects fragile polar waters.
• Climate: the 2023 GHG strategy targets net-zero emissions from international shipping by or around 2050, with indicative cuts of 20-30 per cent by 2030 and 70-80 per cent by 2040.

Safety and security

• SOLAS (1974) sets standards for construction, equipment, fire safety, life-saving and navigation; STCW (1978) sets training and certification standards for seafarers; the Global Maritime Distress and Safety System coordinates rescue.
• Security: the ISPS Code, adopted after 2001, requires ship and port security plans; the SUA Convention addresses unlawful acts against ships; IMO guidance supports anti-piracy cooperation, as off Somalia and in the Gulf of Guinea.

Limits

• The IMO sets standards but cannot enforce them; compliance depends on flag and port State control, weakened by flags of convenience and unregulated 'dark fleets'; environmental targets have often lagged science, and consensus slows decisions.

India's link

• India implements IMO conventions through the Merchant Shipping Act and the Directorate General of Shipping, sits on the IMO Council and ratified the Hong Kong Convention in 2019.

The IMO shows how shared standards can protect a shared resource; their worth is decided by faithful national implementation, and a maritime nation like India has every reason to lead that effort.

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India's climate diplomacy has moved from defending equity and the right to develop to announcing targets and leading coalitions, while still tying its ambition to finance, technology and fairness from the developed world.

Early stance: equity first

• At Rio (1992) and Kyoto, India stressed common but differentiated responsibilities and resisted binding cuts, citing developed countries' historical emissions and its own development needs.

The shift to commitments

• Copenhagen (2009): India accepted a voluntary target to cut emissions intensity, without legally binding cuts.
• Paris (2015): its first NDC combined an emissions-intensity cut, a non-fossil share of power capacity and a forest carbon sink; India and France launched the International Solar Alliance.
• Glasgow (2021): the 'Panchamrit' pledges of 500 GW non-fossil capacity and a billion-tonne emissions cut by 2030, and net zero by 2070.
• August 2022 update: the NDC raised the 2030 emissions-intensity cut to 45 per cent from 2005 levels and non-fossil power capacity to about 50 per cent.

Geopolitics behind the policy

• Finance and technology: India presses developed countries to deliver climate finance and technology transfer as the condition of faster action.
• Trade: it opposes carbon border taxes such as the EU's CBAM as protectionism in climate dress.
• Coal: at COP26 India pushed 'phase down' rather than 'phase out' of coal to protect energy access and jobs.
• Energy security: after the Ukraine war India balances coal and imported-fuel dependence against clean-energy goals, with solar manufacturing, green hydrogen and partnerships.
• Coalitions: the International Solar Alliance gives India a leadership platform among developing countries and a voice independent of the big emitters.

India now pairs ambition with a demand for climate justice; its credibility rests on delivery at home and on finance and technology from the developed world.

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The sun is always shining somewhere; the Green Grids Initiative-One Sun One World One Grid (GGI-OSOWOG), launched by India and the UK at the COP26 World Leaders Summit in Glasgow in November 2021, aims to build a shared grid on that fact.

Purpose of the initiative

• Interconnect regional grids across borders and time zones so solar power generated where the sun shines serves demand elsewhere, including after sunset.
• Cut cost and fossil back-up: pooled renewable supply and storage across regions need less standby capacity and improve grid stability.
• Widen energy access and speed decarbonisation for all partners.
• Approach: regional interconnections first, then wider links towards a global grid, with the ISA coordinating work among member countries.
• For India it complements the Glasgow pledges of 500 GW non-fossil capacity and 50% of energy needs from renewables by 2030.

When the idea was first floated

• Prime Minister Modi first proposed One Sun One World One Grid at the first Assembly of the International Solar Alliance in October 2018; COP26 gave it institutional form with the UK as partner.

Challenges

• Cross-border power-trade rules, grid standards, financing, political trust, transmission losses and cyber security of interconnected grids.

If trust, standards and finance can be secured, the initiative could make clean power cheaper and more reliable for every partner.

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The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (2001) grew out of the Shanghai Five (1996) into a Eurasian grouping; India and Pakistan joined as full members in 2017, and with Iran and Belarus it now has ten members.

Aims and objectives

• Regional peace and stability; joint action against the 'three evils' of terrorism, separatism and extremism; mutual trust and good-neighbourliness; and cooperation in trade, energy, transport, culture and people-to-people ties.
• Institutions: the Council of Heads of State, a Secretariat in Beijing and the Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure (RATS) in Tashkent for intelligence sharing and joint exercises.

Critical examination

• Achievements: a stable forum for Russia, China and Central Asia; regular counter-terror exercises and intelligence exchange; a platform for dialogue on Afghanistan.
• Limits: the security agenda dominates while economic integration stays thin; China and Russia shape decisions; consensus rule and India-Pakistan and India-China differences slow action.
• Weak enforcement: little success in settling disputes among members or on Afghanistan after 2021; outcomes remain declaratory, earning the 'talk shop' label.

Importance for India

• Central Asia: energy, markets and connectivity through INSTC and Chabahar, where India otherwise lacks land access.
• Security: counter-terror cooperation through RATS, a forum to raise cross-border terrorism, and a voice on Afghanistan's stabilisation.
• Strategic autonomy: engaging China and Russia without alliance ties, balancing India's Western partnerships.
• Agenda-setting: as chair (2022-23) India proposed a 'SECURE' SCO, promoted startups and traditional medicine, and declined to endorse the Belt and Road over CPEC and sovereignty.

For India the SCO is a useful Eurasian and counter-terrorism forum, valuable so long as it pursues its own interests on connectivity and sovereignty rather than the agenda of larger members.

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Under the International Health Regulations (2005) the WHO coordinates the response to health emergencies; in COVID-19 it proved indispensable yet slow, under-funded and dependent on member States.

Contributions

• Alert and guidance: a Public Health Emergency of International Concern on 30 January 2020, a pandemic declaration on 11 March 2020, testing protocols, clinical guidance and situation reports.
• Global public goods: the ACT-Accelerator and COVAX (with Gavi and CEPI) for equitable vaccine access, Emergency Use Listing to speed approvals, and the Solidarity trial of treatments.

Shortcomings

• Speed and consistency: on 14 January 2020 it relayed China's finding of no clear human-to-human spread; the emergency came only on 30 January; mask advice shifted.
• No teeth, no money: it cannot enforce IHR duties to report and share data; assessed contributions are under a quarter of its budget, and the US notice of withdrawal (July 2020, reversed January 2021) showed its dependence on great powers.
• Vaccine inequity: COVAX missed its delivery targets amid vaccine nationalism; India and South Africa's TRIPS-waiver proposal (October 2020) sought wider access.

Verdict

• No other body could have coordinated the response; its failures were mostly of mandate and money. Reform: predictable assessed funding, IHR compliance and transparency, independent surveillance, and a binding pandemic accord.

The WHO delivered coordination and public goods but could neither compel States nor fund itself; global health security needs a better-resourced, more accountable WHO and members that honour their IHR duties.

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The United States, once UNESCO's largest contributor, stopped paying dues in 2011 after Palestine's admission, notified its withdrawal on 12 October 2017 citing arrears, the need for reform and ‘anti-Israel bias’, and left on 31 December 2018.

Too little cash

• The US had supplied about a fifth of the budget; its default forced cuts, hiring restraint and reliance on earmarked voluntary funds.
• Earmarked money lets donors steer priorities in education, science, culture and heritage, weakening the organisation's own agenda.

Too much politics

• Middle East disputes, Palestine's membership and resolutions on Jerusalem and Hebron's heritage, turned technical decisions into bloc votes.
• Washington read these as bias against Israel; Israel announced its own withdrawal alongside the US.
• Politicisation is not new: the US left in 1984 over politicisation and mismanagement and returned only in 2003.

Fighting for life?

• Losing a major member dented UNESCO's universality and finances, yet its standard-setting on heritage, education and science continued.
• The US rejoined in July 2023, then in July 2025 announced a fresh withdrawal, showing how exposed the body remains to one member's politics.
• India, which gains from UNESCO's heritage, education and science work while balancing ties with Palestine, Israel and the US, needs a depoliticised, well-funded UNESCO.

UNESCO's crisis is as much political as financial; predictable contributions from many members and consensus-driven technical decisions would protect its mandate better than dependence on one power.

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Tariff escalation from 2018, led by the US and China, and the paralysis creeping over WTO dispute settlement have raised doubts about the survival of the rules-based trading order; reform must restore trust without sacrificing development.

Key areas of reform, and India's stake

• Dispute settlement: restore the Appellate Body, blocked by the US refusal since 2017 to approve new members; address concerns about overreach and delay while keeping binding two-tier adjudication, which shields developing countries like India from power-based settlement.
• Negotiating function: consensus makes decisions slow and some members push plurilateral deals; India insists on inclusive multilateral outcomes and opposes plurilateral agreements being written into WTO rules without consensus.
• Agriculture: subsidy rules favour rich countries; India seeks a permanent solution on public stockholding for food security (MSP-based procurement), a special safeguard mechanism against import surges, and cuts in developed countries' trade-distorting support.
• Special and differential treatment: flexibilities for developing countries are under attack, with demands that large economies 'graduate'; India argues that low per capita income and development needs justify continued flexibility.
• Unilateral measures: tariffs justified on 'national security' grounds, such as the US steel and aluminium tariffs of March 2018, and tit-for-tat retaliation strain the system; discipline on the security exception and better notification and transparency are needed.
• New issues: e-commerce, investment facilitation, industrial subsidies and state-owned enterprises are on the table; India wants policy space for digital and industrial development, and progress on Mode 4 movement of professionals in services.

The WTO can survive by restoring its dispute system, securing balanced rules on agriculture and development, and settling new issues by consensus; India's interest lies in a rules-based order that keeps policy space for food security and development.

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ECOSOC, one of the UN's six principal organs under Chapter X of the Charter, coordinates its economic and social work; its 54 members are elected by the General Assembly for three-year terms.

Main functions

• Studies and recommendations (Article 62): studies and reports on economic, social, cultural, educational and health matters, with recommendations to the General Assembly, members and specialised agencies.
• Coordination: it coordinates the UN's funds, programmes and specialised agencies and reviews their reports.
• Rights and cooperation: it promotes human rights, prepares draft conventions for the General Assembly and calls international conferences.
• Civil society: consultative status for non-governmental organisations.
• Article 68 requires it to set up commissions in economic and social fields.

Functional commissions

• Statistical Commission: global statistical standards.
• Commission on Population and Development: population trends and policy.
• Commission for Social Development: social policy, poverty, ageing and disability.
• Commission on the Status of Women: gender equality and women's rights.
• Commission on Narcotic Drugs, and Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice: drug control and criminal justice cooperation.
• Commission on Science and Technology for Development, and the UN Forum on Forests.
• Related: five regional commissions, and the High-level Political Forum, which replaced the Commission on Sustainable Development.

The commissions feed expert, issue-wise inputs into global policy; ECOSOC coordinates and advises, its authority resting on consensus rather than compulsion.

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The WTO, established in 1995, administers trade agreements, hosts negotiations and settles disputes so that trade flows predictably in a globalised economy. Its Doha Round, launched in 2001 as a 'development round', remains unfinished fifteen years on.

WTO's aims

• Rule-based, non-discriminatory trade through most-favoured-nation and national treatment; progressive liberalisation; binding dispute settlement; and special and differential treatment for developing members.

Why Doha stalled

• Agriculture: developed countries retain large farm subsidies while pressing emerging economies for market access; developing countries want subsidy cuts first.
• NAMA and services: demands for steep industrial tariff cuts from India, Brazil and China met little movement on farm support.
• Changed approach: the Nairobi Ministerial (December 2015) recorded that some members no longer reaffirm the Doha mandates and prefer 'new approaches' and new issues such as e-commerce and investment, while developing countries insist on finishing Doha first. Nairobi did agree to eliminate agricultural export subsidies.

Indian perspective

• Livelihoods: with millions of small farmers, India and the G-33 demand Special Products and a Special Safeguard Mechanism against import surges.
• Food security: MSP procurement and public stockholding can breach WTO subsidy limits; the Bali peace clause (2013) is interim, and a permanent solution is still pending.
• Strategy: defend policy space, hold developed countries to the development mandate, support trade facilitation, and build coalitions with other developing countries; the government also pursues regional and bilateral options in parallel.

The Doha impasse reflects a real North–South divide rather than a failure of the WTO itself; India's interest lies in keeping multilateral rules alive while securing farm livelihoods and food security within them.

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In 1977 UNESCO appointed the International Commission for the Study of Communication Problems under Seán MacBride, a Nobel Peace laureate; its 1980 report, Many Voices, One World, examined the imbalance in global information flows.

Aims and objectives

• Diagnose the one-way flow: a handful of Western news agencies controlled international news, so developing countries were reported through others' eyes and often stereotyped.
• Propose a New World Information and Communication Order (NWICO): a balanced, two-way flow of information and reduced dependence on the North.
• Build capacity: national communication policies, stronger domestic and regional media, technology transfer and training for developing countries.
• Democratise communication: treat it as a right of individuals and communities, with access, participation and plurality of voices, and link it to development, peace and cultural identity.
• Protect journalists and raise professional standards without licensing the press.
• Controversy: Western governments and media saw NWICO as cover for state control; the United States (1984) and the United Kingdom (1985) left UNESCO, and the debate later shifted to 'free flow' with plurality.

India's position

• As a leading voice of the Non-Aligned Movement, India backed the demand for balance and helped build the Non-Aligned News Agencies Pool, which exchanged member countries' news to counter Western agency dominance.
• India used communication for development, notably the Satellite Instructional Television Experiment (1975–76) that beamed educational programmes to villages.
• At home, India kept a free, privately owned press and did not treat NWICO as a licence for state control, though the Emergency (1975–77) showed how censorship could be abused.

India sought a plural and balanced information order without state control of the press; the MacBride questions of who speaks and who is heard remain live in today's platform-driven media.

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