This year’s Valdai meeting in Sochi felt different. The setting was the same—Sochi’s sea air, the beautiful mountains, the big screens—but the mix in the room told the story. This time, the room was filled with delegates from Asia, Africa, the Middle East, while the West was represented by only a small group of academics. The title captured the mood: “The Polycentric World: Instructions for Use.” The message from Moscow is clear, the multipolar world isn’t coming, it’s already here. Countries are no longer waiting for universal rules—they’re adapting, trading, negotiating in their own ways. The theme for the 2025 Valdai annual conference represents a culmination of Russia’s intellectual transition from critiquing to designing the world order.
The post Crimea phase (2015–2019) phase was marked by an attempt to diagnose the flaws in the world order. The session themes were focused on Global Order and Governance, as Moscow questioned the liberal order and advanced Greater Eurasia as an alternative logic. The 2020–2021 phase represented an epistemological rupture. The pandemic foregrounded Tech and Environment and Society and Values, embedding technological sovereignty and information control into the strategic vocabulary. Then came the inflection point in 2022, marked by the Ukraine crisis. It produced a surge in War and Security and the Nuclear theme, symbolising Russia’s full re-entry into realist discourse. In parallel, Valdai added Civilisational and Value debates, reframing conflict as a contest of moral principles and shared identity, not merely arms and self-interest. From 2023 onward, the agenda reflects a phase of normative construction with Multipolarity, AI, and World Majority debates showing Russia’s intent to architect a morally and technologically plural order. Russia now theorises global transformation not as a reaction to Western decline but as a self-sustainable polycentric world order.
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s speech underlined this shift. His tone was calm and confident, not defensive. He did not talk about Russia being isolated or misunderstood. Instead, he described Russia as one of the world’s main civilisational poles—a country helping to build the rules of a new order. If his 2007 Munich speech was a warning against U.S. dominance, this one was a statement that the post-Western era has arrived. Putin said, “[Multipolarity] this new space is more democratic….Perhaps never before have so many countries had the ability or ambition to influence the most significant regional and global processes”[1]
Besides the thematic evolution, the regional focus of Valdai discussion club has also witnessed some shifts. With 67 sessions dedicated to the global theme, Valdai has remained a global policy forum rather than a regional one, consistent with its positioning as a world-order dialogue platform.
From 2015 to 2019, the focus was mostly global, reflecting a Russia that was still engaged with the world on Western terms while building its own space through Eurasia and the West Asia/Middle East. These years marked the start of Russia’s idea of Greater Eurasia and its growing activity in non-Western regions. Post the 2020-2021 pandemic interlude, from 2022 on the focus widened to the Global South and Ukraine. Valdai began presenting multipolarity not only as a power balance but as a cultural and moral alternative. By 2025, Valdai now speaks from a position of authorship, not reaction. The Valdai worldview is directed towards designing a world where the voice of Russia, Eurasia, and the Global South carry equal weight.
In Russia’s pivot to Global South, India has found a special place. Delhi’s statecraft has long been designed for many-centred worlds: strategic autonomy, diversified partnerships, energy pluralism, technology built as public infrastructure, and economic diplomacy that de-risks rather than decouples. This year the Valdai report’s core hypothesis was that states now adapt to complex, multidirectional change rather than pursue revolutionary redesign. This fits well with India’s Foreign policy orientation. That is why India finds itself well placed in Russia’s vision of a polycentric world.
Polycentrism, as the Valdai 2025 report observed, operates without fixed principles or stable rules, shaped instead by a wider array of actors and variables than the global governance systems built in the mid-20th century.[2] The idea captures today’s transition: power is negotiated among shifting centres, not fixed hierarchies. The Valdai gathering itself reflected this—forty-two countries, two-thirds from Asia, Africa, and the Middle East—embodying what participants called the “world majority,” a collective voice of nations no longer content to remain peripheral to global debates.
That same plural logic now extends to the financial domain. At Valdai, one of the recurring questions was how nations can shield their economies from systemic vulnerabilities created by sanctions, payment dependencies, and currency shocks. While Russia is constructing alternatives, India is expanding its choices within the existing system. New Delhi’s financial strategy is not one of de-dollarisation but of de-risking i.e. diversifying partners, currencies, and payment channels to enhance resilience within the system rather than outside it.
The Reserve Bank of India defines its rupee-settlement framework as “an additional arrangement to the existing system of settlement in freely convertible currency,” emphasising that it “will reduce dependence on hard currency.”[3] This language captures India’s method: complementarity rather than conflict. In practice, this translates into quietly expanding local-currency arrangements—such as with Malaysia[4] and the UAE[5]—and rupee-denominated facilities for select neighbouring economies. These mechanisms add resilience without disruption. India’s goal is to remain fully integrated with global finance while ensuring that no single currency, clearing route, or political centre can unilaterally define its economic sovereignty. The rupee trade system is still evolving, but the direction is clear—more flexibility and more self-reliance (Atma Nirbharata).
Another big theme was technology, who controls it, who sets the standards, and how countries can protect their data and innovation systems. Russia’s idea of technological sovereignty is about independence from Western supply chains and platforms. India’s approach is similar, but more open. India’s Digital Public Infrastructure (Aadhaar, UPI, CoWIN, ONDC) has shown that a country can build technology as a public good, which is transparent, affordable, and replicable. Countries do not need to buy a corporate stack to go digital, they can assemble public rails and let competition happen on top. That is sovereignty without autarky.
Valdai placed great emphasis on civilisational identity. The idea was that democracy and development do not have to follow one Western model. Each society has the right to choose its own form. India has long spoken the same language. Our concept of Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam—the world as one family—offers an inclusive approach that values diversity and coexistence.
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov used the term “indivisible security,” meaning that one country’s safety should not come at the expense of another’s. The principle first appeared in the 1975 Helsinki Final Act and was reaffirmed in the 1999 Istanbul Charter for European Security. “Our eagle is two-headed—East and West,” Lavrov reminded the audience, signaling that Moscow seeks balance, not isolation. He revived the RIC (Russia-India-China) idea, first proposed by Yevgeny Primakov in 1998, pointing out that the format is ready to restart now that India-China border tensions seem to have eased a bit. The point was clear, Eurasia’s future order will be built by regional players themselves, not imposed from outside.
India is comfortable with this idea. Its security approach has always been based on strategic autonomy: cooperate with many but don’t join rigid blocs. That allows India to act as a bridge between regions, not as a participant in their rivalries.
The most striking thing about Valdai 2025 was its pragmatic tone. The panels were not debating abstract theories. They discussed real problems such as how to trade under sanctions, how to use AI in governance, and how to maintain stability in a fragmented system. That mindset suits India. Its diplomacy too is built on practical cooperation rather than ideology—working with different partners on different issues. India partners with the U.S., Japan, and Australia in the Quad on maritime security; with BRICS and the SCO on issues of counter-terrorism and Eurasian connectivity; and with France and the Global South on climate initiatives such as the International Solar Alliance. This approach reflects the same principle that drives a polycentric world – adaptability over doctrine.
There are clear opportunities for India in this evolving order. Connectivity remains the most tangible one. The International North South Corridor (INSTC), the Arctic shipping lanes, and Russia’s Far East can all connect with India’s transport and logistics network provided these routes are made commercially viable and legally predictable. Standard-setting offers another frontier. In areas such as digital payments, AI ethics, and cross-border data flows, India’s open and inclusive digital model positions it to work with the Global South in developing fair standards not controlled by any single bloc. A third area lies in people-to-people mobility. As Russia faces demographic and skill shortages, India can establish transparent, mutually beneficial labour-mobility frameworks that link its human capital with Russia’s economic demand. Together, these areas illustrate how India can translate its principles of strategic autonomy into practice.
There are risks. A world of many centres can become a world of many conflicts if sovereignty becomes an excuse for power politics. India must remain careful not to be pulled into any side’s rivalry. It must recognise that China’s size gives it enormous weight in any Eurasian framework. India’s role should be to balance this, not by confrontation but by offering workable alternatives—digital, developmental, and diplomatic.
Valdai 2025 confirmed one thing: Russia believes the post-Western world is already functioning. It is no longer seeking to re-enter Western-led institutions; it is building around them. “We are not building an anti-Western order,” Putin said. “We are building a world where no one centre dominates.” If Valdai 2017, themed “Creative Destruction: Will a New World Order Emerge from the Current Conflicts?”, was about Russia questioning the old order, then Valdai 2025 represents its definition of a new one. The polycentric world is like a network, not a hierarchy. India doesn’t need to choose a camp. It just needs to keep doing what it already does best, connecting across regions, and balancing interests.
Rupal Mishra is Researcher – Connectivity Program at Gateway House.
This article was exclusively written for Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations. You can read more exclusive content here.
Support our work here.
For permission to republish, please contact outreach@gatewayhouse.in
©Copyright 2025 Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations. All rights reserved. Any unauthorised copying or reproduction is strictly prohibited.
References:
[1] http://en.special.kremlin.ru/events/president/transcripts/78134
[2] https://valdaiclub.com/a/reports/dr-chaos-or-how-to-stop-worrying/
[3] https://www.rbi.org.in/commonman/Upload/English/FAQs/PDFs/ITSIR16012025.pdf
[4] https://www.mea.gov.in/lok-sabha.htm?dtl%2F36851%2FQUESTION+NO271+TRADING+IN+LOCAL+CURRENCIES
[5] https://www.india-briefing.com/news/india-uae-agreements-on-currency-settlement-payment-systems-and-key-sector-collaboration-28929.html