After the Cold War and global bipolarity, since the beginning of the 1990s of the
last century, there was an acceleration of the processes of regionalization and glob
alization, then two important phenomena began to be observed regarding the distri
bution of power in the international system: on the one hand, some powers began
to experience decrease in their national–international power and, with it, in their
international projection; on the other hand, some countries (specifically the so-called
BRICS) began to emerge or, in some cases, re-emerge as powers. Consequently, some
academics returned to the concept of middle powers to address this phenomenon.
Clearly, the so-called middle or intermediate powers constituted an extremely
diverse set of nations, each with different historical trajectories and not always with
common objectives to address shared challenges. Although in specific circumstances,
such as the containment of great powers, they could come together and unite in
defense of the rights of weaker states, generally speaking, they were unable to main
tain a significant level of solidarity. This situation revealed theoretical, methodolog
ical, and conceptual issues in relation to the concept of “middle power”. Despite its
attractiveness, this concept was insufficient to explain the changes in international
reality toward the end of the 20th century and the transformations in power dynamics
in the Post-Cold War international system.
