Artificial intelligence is becoming a battleground for global competition—over standards and rules for AI governance, over infrastructure, data, computing power, talents, and the right to shape the direction of technological development. BRICS is gradually moving beyond declarations about digital cooperation to become a forum for developing a non-Western approach to global AI governance.

China is central to this process. It is driving the BRICS AI agenda, shaping its institutions, and providing many of the resources behind it. But the long-term viability of this framework will depend on how well it reflects the interests of India, Brazil, Russia, South Africa, and the bloc’s newer members. This became even more apparent in 2026: China’s initiative expanded beyond BRICS, while BRICS members have joined competing frameworks for AI cooperation.

China’s approach: from principles to infrastructure

China’s BRICS strategy has three layers.

THE FIRST IS NORMATIVE. China has published its own initiative on global AI governance, built around technological sovereignty, opposition to digital discrimination, the safe use of data, and a greater role for developing countries in shaping international rules. In this view, AI is not simply something to be regulated; it is also a resource for development, and access to it should not be controlled by a small group of technological powers. China’s formula—development, sovereignty, and access to technology—fits neatly with BRICS’ identity as a bloc challenging the unequal distribution of power and technological capabilities in the global system.

THE SECOND LAYER IS INSTITUTIONAL. China is bringing AI into BRICS’ ongoing mechanisms, including research groups, forums, centers of expertise, industrial platforms, and education programs. In 2024, Beijing established the China-BRICS AI Development and Cooperation Center as a platform for knowledge-sharing, joint research, AI training, and the deployment of AI solutions across BRICS countries. That same year, the Kazan Declaration stressed the need to share experience in developing and using AI. In 2026, Beijing took this approach beyond BRICS: in July, 29 countries established the World AI Cooperation Organization (WAICO) in Shanghai.

THE THIRD LAYER IS RESOURCES. China has a much stronger AI infrastructure than most other BRICS members, including a well-developed AI industry, major technology platforms, substantial computing capacity, university programs, and experience applying AI in industry, public administration, and services. This advantage allows China to put forward more than political principles within BRICS. It can also offer practical proposals on technology-sharing, cloud infrastructure, education programs, and industrial applications.

In New Delhi, China’s proposal took shape as a package of initiatives: an open BRICS AI community, cooperation on large language models, a cloud platform, and an alliance for training engineers. Back in July, Beijing had pledged to offer developing countries 5,000 places in AI training programs and research seminars over five years.

 

How BRICS sees the global development of AI

BRICS is gradually taking shape as an alternative forum for discussing global AI governance. This does not mean rejecting international law or multilateral institutions. On the contrary, in 2025 BRICS leaders adopted a statement on global AI governance that emphasized the role of the United Nations, the need to ensure equal access to technology, support for open models, and the importance of preventing safety, transparency, and ethics standards from becoming barriers for developing economies.

At the same time, China’s initiatives are changing the terms of the debate. Within BRICS, AI is seen not only as a technology that needs regulation, but also as infrastructure for development—one to which access is distributed highly unevenly. As a result, the BRICS position is less about rejecting Western models outright than about shifting the emphasis. Western discussions of AI often focus on model safety, user rights, algorithmic transparency, and preventing abuse. The BRICS perspective adds another concern: technological dependence.

From this perspective, AI safety is not just about whether algorithms work correctly and predictably; it is also about protection from external technological pressure. Transparency means not only being able to explain how models work, but also understanding who controls the data, infrastructure, and standards. Developing expertise means learning not just to use ready-made AI tools, but to build, adapt, and oversee systems of one’s own.

In this sense, BRICS is offering more than a different vocabulary for AI regulation: it is bringing a different political perspective to the issue. For the bloc’s members, AI is simultaneously a matter of technological modernization, state sovereignty, economic development, and the redistribution of resources and opportunities in the global system.

 

Not a monolith: how other BRICS countries are shaping the AI agenda

China is providing the main impetus for AI cooperation within BRICS, while the other members are giving the agenda substance that reflects their own strategic priorities and national approaches to AI development.

Russia’s position broadly aligns with China’s on technological sovereignty, resilience to sanctions, and criticism of Western dominance. But Russia’s AI strategy also has its own features: replacing imported technology in its infrastructure and prioritizing homegrown AI models, often described as sovereign models. For Russia, the BRICS AI agenda matters not only as a forum for shaping rules, but also as a way to reduce dependence on Western technology ecosystems.

India supports inclusive AI governance and, like China, presents itself as a voice for the Global South. Its approach, however, differs from Beijing’s. New Delhi wants to be a producer of AI solutions, not just a consumer. Its strategy focuses on developing homegrown foundation models, public computing infrastructure, workforce training, and digital diplomacy. India has joined Pax Silica, a US-led framework focused on AI, semiconductors, and critical minerals, but has not joined WAICO. So far, India’s approach has not undermined the broader BRICS agenda. Instead, it has made it less centered on a single power by creating a second major hub of technological influence within the bloc.

Brazil is giving the AI agenda a stronger social dimension. For Brazil, AI is not only a question of sovereignty and industrial modernization; it also raises issues of inequality, labor, civil rights, education, and the fair distribution of benefits. This gives the BRICS AI agenda a social and distributive dimension alongside its focus on infrastructure. Brazil has carried this approach onto the global stage as well: the 2025 BRICS statement on global AI governance was adopted under its presidency.

South Africa links the BRICS AI agenda to African interests and inclusive development. For Pretoria, AI is important as a tool for bridging the digital divide and addressing basic infrastructure challenges in energy, transport, public services, and education. South Africa supports the Chinese-Brazilian push for fairer global AI governance, while seeking to ensure that African priorities are part of it.

Within BRICS, the agenda is taking shape through a coalition of different priorities rather than a single, uniform approach: China offers infrastructure, Russia emphasizes autonomy, Brazil focuses on social issues, South Africa brings in African priorities, and India seeks to balance relations among different technological powers.

BRICS members have also joined different external frameworks. China, Russia, Brazil, South Africa, Indonesia, Ethiopia, and Iran have joined WAICO. India and the UAE have declined to join the organization but have signed on to the Pax Silica initiative, which is geared toward closer integration with a US-centered AI ecosystem. These developments raise a pressing question: can BRICS countries maintain a common AI agenda?

 

From Chinese impetus to shared leadership

Over the next three to five years, China is likely to remain the main architect of the BRICS AI agenda: for now, the other members do not have a comparable combination of capabilities. Yet they are already adding priorities of their own—priorities without which the BRICS agenda could not claim to offer a full-fledged alternative to Western approaches to AI governance.

The next major test will come in 2027, when China takes over the BRICS presidency. Its presidency will show whether Beijing chooses to advance its initiatives through BRICS, where consensus with India is necessary, or through WAICO, which India has not joined. Over a ten-year horizon, the picture could become more complex. If India remains engaged in the common BRICS agenda while strengthening its own AI infrastructure and expanding its digital diplomacy, and if Russia turns its idea of sovereign AI models into a concrete proposal for other members, BRICS could develop shared leadership rather than a Chinese monopoly.

But shared leadership within BRICS will not emerge automatically. At least three conditions are needed: common computing and data infrastructure, funding mechanisms for joint projects, and a politically acceptable way to distribute technological influence. Without these, BRICS risks remaining a forum for coordinating principles rather than becoming a fully fledged center for developing and deploying AI solutions.

This points to the central paradox of China’s role: the more actively it promotes the BRICS AI agenda, the more it needs other countries—not as spectators, but as co-authors. Without them, China’s initiative will look like a national project presented under the guise of multilateralism. With them, it could become a broader Global South platform capable of playing a role in global AI governance.

 

Conclusion

BRICS’ potential to shape global AI policy will depend on whether the bloc can turn China’s initial momentum into a more distributed framework for cooperation. Beijing, however, has already established WAICO, where India’s consent is not needed for decisions to be made. BRICS may become one of several platforms for Chinese AI diplomacy, rather than its main vehicle.

If the bloc does manage to build a more distributed framework, BRICS could move beyond declarative digital cooperation and become an independent center of global AI governance—one that not only sets out alternative principles but also puts them into practice through its own data resources, computing capacity, education programs, industrial applications, and expert institutions. If this transformation does not take place, the BRICS AI agenda will retain political significance but remain institutionally weak and largely declarative.