The BRIC Phantom: A comparative analysis of the BRICs as a category of rising powers

The economic growth potential of the BRICs often causes the four countries to be grouped together as an analytical category of ‘rising powers’ in the global system. A neo‐Weberian perspective argues that power in the global system is multidimensional and relational. The paths of the BRICs to integration in the global political, economic and military networks are compared using both material as well as relational network indicators of power. As their paths differ fundamentally, culminating in widely divergent global power positions, the BRICs cannot be classified as a category of rising powers.