Grievance seems to define contemporary international relations. Donald Trump's presidency is driven by a feeling that the United States is laughed at, exploited and taken advantage of. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's single-minded pursuit of nuclear weapons is the product of deep insecurity and a sense that his country does not enjoy the status that it deserves.
The BRICS group of five major emerging economies — Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa — are similarly motivated and aligned by a sense that they do not get the credit nor the status that they deserve in the world. The group was identified in 2001 by a Goldman Sachs economist who argued that four of the nations — South Africa would join the group in 2010 — would dominate the global economy in the 21st century. Today, the five countries represent 40 percent of the world's population and more than 25 percent of its land. Between 1990 to 2014, those economies grew from 11 percent of global GDP to almost 30 percent.
Unfortunately, the global financial crisis and the subsequent collapse of global commodities markets — on which Brazil, Russia and South Africa depend for much of their growth — has done great damage to the BRICS concept. Nonetheless, the group's ambitions and grievances remain substantial.