From Brazil to the USA: The Largest Community’s Journey

OMG, it's been like sooo hard for these four countries to flex their status as rapidly growing economies. Like, they've been grinding so much, you know? The 90s was lit with the Asian Tigers flexing, especially Japan, and everyone was hyped about a fresh economic growth and development vibe. Phase one of the rapid growth totally crashed in '97 with the Asian financial crisis and ended in '99 with the collapse of the Brazilian currency, and Brazil was like the Latin American country that got hit the hardest by the financial crisis (Roett, 2010: 5). 

The development and growth vibes

OMG, like the BRICs were totally slaying it until the 2008 financial crisis hit. They were living their best lives for sure. Their crazy fast growth rate of economic development, huge potential has attracted a ton of foreign direct investment (FDI). In 2006, the FDI vibes of the BRICs were like, totally lit and made up like one third of the total FDI in developing countries. #BRICsFTW China is like, totally the top spot for FDI, they got a whopping $67.3 billion in 2006. And then Russia came in second with $48.9 billion in 2007, which is like a 70.3% increase from the year before, crazy! Brazil be slayin' at number three, but the country be flexin' with that inward FDI, goin' from $18.8 billion in 2006 to 37.4 billion in 2007. India has been hella slacking in the BRIC group, like seriously. The country only pulled in $15.3 billion in FDI in 2006 (Wan, 2010). The various crises created a major legit problem for the G-7 and their institutions, tbh. The developing countries were like, "Hmm, we're not so sure about the West's leadership, their old-school multilateral financial institutions, and this whole idea of "raw" market-driven development from back in the day after World War 2." It was like, lowkey sus to the developing countries that peace, democracy, and free markets would be the wave of the century. Yo, as the global recovery started poppin' in the So they formed the Bloc of G20 countries, a crew of developing countries that had each other's backs in the trade negotiations (Roett, 2010:138). OMG, like the negotiations were a total flop and it's obvi that future trade talks need to be all about the BRICs and their squad, not the US and the EU (Roett, 2010:10).

OMG, like the FDI to the BRICs has been spread out to various industries, ya know?

 

In China and Russia, it's all about the secondary industry, while in Brazil and India, they're all about that tertiary industry, ya know? The Service industry has been, like, totally the fave for inward FDI in Brazil cuz of its super cool openness policy. OMG, it's totally legit for foreign investors to flex on those stock shares in the manufacturing industry and also make bank on resource exploitation and infrastructure construction. No cap! The fin sector, transpo and telecoms, like, totally got mad FDI vibes. In Russia, the fuel industry and metalwork industry have been the main flex, while in India software, the financial sector, and consulting sector have had mad development over the years thanks to inward FDI. In China, there have been mad investments in the manufacturing industry, but the service sector has also blown up (Wan, 2010).

Brazil and China were the BRIC countries that totally slayed with their sick growth and mad FDI from 1992-1998. OMG, FDI to Brazil went from 2.06 billion in '92 to a whopping 28.86 billion in '98. Like, that's insane! In China, OMG, inward FDI like totally skyrocketed from 11 billion to 45.46 billion in the same period. It's lit! Russia had, like, major ups and downs in inward FDI cuz of its unstable political systems, and India's FDI flow didn't really do much for the whole BRICs gang cuz it's, like, small-scale overall. The growth was like, totally dead and just hit a major plateau from '98 to '03. Cuz of the trash American economy and the Asian Financial crisis in '97, the world growth rate took a major L and so did FDI worldwide. In Brazil, like, inward FDI was like booming until 2000 but then it like tanked big time after 2001 cuz of Argentina's financial crisis. In China, FDI went down at first, but then it started going up

 Obstacles and financial crises for the BRICs, like, yikes!

The growth rate for the BRICs was like, hella high and rapid from 2003 to 2006. China has totally flexed and become the major recipient of inward FDI, accounting for a solid 20% of that of developing countries. #ballerstatus OMG, the FDI in Russia is totally slaying Brazil, which was like so behind in the BRICs gang. Even India has experienced mad growth in this period (Wan, 2010). OMG, these four countries were like totally blowing up, so they started expecting mad respect and major inclusion in the global policymaking scene. The BRICs have totally flexed on the industrial countries when it comes to a bunch of issues, fam. One of the big probs was on world trade, fam. OMG when the new round on trade discussions were launched in Doha, Qatar in 2001 the goal was to flex talks on development, to open markets in agriculture, manufacturing, and services, and to finish the DOHA Development Round of negotiations by January 2005. In these convos, the BRIC countries, Brazil in particular, totally slayed as the key spokesmen and alternative policy makers for the developing world. The first two years of talk went pretty chill, but in 2003 the developing countries were like, "Nah, that US-EU agricultural proposal is so demeaning!"