Many small sparks can start a huge fire. This is true in domestic politics and international defence alike. In Bangladesh,student protests over job quotas gathered momentum until they brought down the Hasina government in 2024. The Arab Spring showed how localized grievances can shake an entire region.
Today, European governments are dealing with widespread public anger over inflation and the rising cost of living, while new political movements stir up tension across South Asia.
In international relations, small political shifts often signal much larger structural changes. The global defence landscape is undergoing a similar reorganization. The Warsaw Pact has long faded into history, NATO is feeling the strain of American isolationism, and the ongoing war in Ukraine has exposed deep fault lines across the Western security apparatus.
In the Middle East, Washington’s long-standing security guarantees are coming under intense pressure. The limits of American military cover, combined with Iran’s adoption of asymmetric warfare, forced key regional players to rethink their assumptions. These security concerns paved the way for the Mecca Defence Pact between Saudi Arabia, Pakistan,and Turkey in August 2026.
A subsequent defence agreement signed in October 2026 by Turkey, Qatar, Pakistan, and Indonesia further underlined this regional realignment.
These pacts raise a crucial question for international relations: can the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) evolve into a genuine power center for the Global South, offering both financial independence and collective military defence?
The broader geopolitical environment certainly presents an opening. As the United States scales back its traditional role as a global financier and security guarantor, major multilateral bodies are facing severe funding shortfalls. Thousands of foreign assistance programs and critical United Nations initiatives are coming under financial strain. Smaller nations,from Kuwait to Venezuela and the Baltic states, are left questioning the long-term reliability of traditional security arrangements.
Yet if the OIC wants to step into this void, it must first address its own structural weaknesses. Its academic and research institutions remain underdeveloped, its governance systems are fragile, and its member states remain deeply divided by national interests.
On paper, the collective potential of the OIC is immense. Its 57 member states represent nearly two billion people and a combined economic output exceeding $7 trillion. Wealthy nations like Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Turkey,and Indonesia hold considerable economic weight. If the bloc were to mobilize its assets effectively, a joint fund equal to less than 3% of its total gross domestic product could raise $200 billion every year.
Such a development fund could be financed through several practical mechanisms: standardizing national Zakat collection systems, tapping into massive sovereign wealth funds, issuing regional Sukuk bonds for large infrastructure projects, and levying small tariffs on trade between member states.
Yet the primary obstacles to raising this capital are political rather than financial. Deep-rooted rivalries among Gulf nations, Iran, and Turkey regularly block effective consensus. Furthermore, the OIC lacks the modern administrative frameworks and transparent governance needed to manage a multi-billion-dollar fund. At the same time, many member economies remain tied to Western banking networks.
Establishing an Islamic Development Fund to complement or replace declining Western foreign aid would require high levels of technical competence, independent auditing, and consistent operational standards that the bloc currently cannot provide.
A similar challenge exists in the realm of global financial infrastructure. While Western economies rely on the SWIFT network, China operates CIPS, and Russia uses SPFS, the OIC has no shared financial messaging or cross-border payment system.
Building an independent OIC messaging and settlement network would require an initial investment of up to $2 billion, along with strict regulatory coordination, advanced cybersecurity systems, and full central bank cooperation.Without these technical foundations, moving regional trade away from Western financial systems remains a practical impossibility.
Military integration presents an even greater hurdle. Although countries such as Turkey, Pakistan, and Egypt maintain powerful armed forces, the OIC lacks a binding collective defence agreement. Existing initiatives, such as the Saudi-led counter-terrorism alliance, fall far short of an integrated military command. Strategic differences remain the central problem: key member states pursue conflicting regional agendas, maintain strong individual ties with NATO or Washington, and use incompatible military hardware and operational doctrines.
A realistic path toward cooperation would require small, practical steps—such as joint maritime patrols, coordinated humanitarian response, and shared intelligence—rather than the immediate creation of a unified military force.
Ultimately, the main obstacle facing the OIC is not a lack of money, people, or weapons. It is a lack of institutional unity and political commitment. Until its members strengthen their domestic institutions, modernize their governance frameworks, and resolve their internal disputes, ambitious plans for an independent financial network or a unified defence alliance will remain theoretical concepts rather than practical realities for the Global South.
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Wahidul Islam is a journalist based in Dhaka