Post on 08-Feb-2023
INTERNATIONAL STUDIES ASSOCIATION ANNUAL CONVENTION
SAN FRANCISCO 2013
Panel: Emerging Powers and Diplomacy
Author: Mariana Kalil – Institute for Strategic Studies, Fluminense Federal University
(INEST-UFF)
THE FOUR DIMENSIONS OF THE BRAZILIAN FOREIGN POLICY TOWARDS
AFRICA AND THE CHINESE CHALLENGE
April, 2013
INTRODUCTION
This article results from the author’s final project in her Bachelor’s Degree that
counted with the advice of Dr. Diego Santos at the Institute of International Relations from
the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro (IRI/PUC-Rio). The thesis compared
Brazil’s and China’s insertion in global economic affairs in the light of Joseph Grieco’s
contributions (GRIECO, 1997). Through an analysis of their relations with the United States,
the African Continent and the World Trade Organization, the author aimed at finding
similarities and differences between the behavior of a rising State that holds traditional
leverage such as hard power, China, and of another rising State that, in its turn, presents the
status of a medium power. Moreover, this article advances the work of the author into the
analysis of the relations between Brazil and the African continent, transcending financial and
economic variables to encompass four pillars, namely Ethnicity and Culture; Trade and
Investments; Technical Cooperation; and Political Cooperation. Ultimately, pragmatism and
solidarism will be considered to underscore Brazil’s national interests and impulses to shape
an “organic multilateralism”, in the words of the former Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Celso
Amorim (AMORIM, 2012).
The common belief that the road to hell is paved with good intentions finds enough
evidence in the history of foreign affairs. In International Relations, solidarism has been
accused of idealism or hypocrisy – usually, both. While it’s reasonable to find overrated the
idealism intrinsic to a common belief-led perception of solidarism on an international stage
that insists in power politics, hypocrisy has also been targeted as a common trace of
solidarism. In order to approach this value in the 21st century, one could reach out for the
Illuminist liberté, égalité et fraternité, the bases for the normative stance that pervades
positivism. The outcomes of the Illuminist ideas are quite distant from the actual spirit of the
French Revolution – suffice it to remember the nip and tuck between leftish trends that
embrace Robespierre and Babeuf and moderate wings that present the mild impulse of change
among the bourgeoisie.
Once the bourgeoisie embraced the French Revolution spirit to the extent that
bourgeois-States did not hesitate to engage in the spread of capitalism through imperialism in
the scope of excluding and competing nationalisms, liberté, égalité et fraternité laid the
foundations for both World Wars. Also, solidarity underpinned communism/socialism in the
20th
century, what sailed away from the borders of sympathetic ideas to result in Stalin’s
regime. Besides that, the white men burden represented a revisited narrative of solidarism to
colonize such continents as Africa or to bring the “best” ideology to places like Hungary.
During the Cold War, solidarity represented the crux of the relations between the superpowers
and their areas of influence, as well as their aggiornada ‘scramble for Africa’, in order to
conquer governments to their side. Additionally, the theory of democratic peace also takes
solidarism as key to support the export of democracy through offensive foreign policies that
aim at bringing on the end of history even through unilateral means. Nonetheless, after the
Cold War, the overt idea of solidarism was replaced by issues concerning the multilateral
agenda. Alas, the environment, human rights and disarmament were deemed essential for
world peace only to result in tragedies like Rwanda, Srebrenica and East Timor. Solidarity,
hence, enters the 21st century rather discredited.
Notwithstanding, if explicitly associated with pragmatism, solidarism may engender a
useful paradigm for the analysis of foreign policies that, in spite of their recent emergence in
the International System, do not carry the will or the capacity to play by the rules of
traditional power politics. Thus, the expansionism that permeates the behavior of revisionist
States would not necessarily explain the strategy of international engagement of rising
revisionists nowadays. In this sense, Brazil offers a useful example of Pragmatic Solidarism
via its relations with Africa.
In Brazilian Foreign Policy, revisionism has long been the center of the agenda, but
the country entered the dawn of the 21st century with no issues involving its borders or a
possible dissatisfaction regarding its territorial size or even its own population as a potential
market. On the contrary, in the first decade of the ongoing century, Brazil has discovered a
reasonable share of its population that has recently been lifted out of poverty to participate in
a new middle class, and there are still more than those roughly 30 million citizens to be
included. Its economy, in its turn, does not grow out of proportion to cause an uncontrollable
thirst for new markets. It turns out that Brazil’s PIBinho, as critics enjoy dubbing Brazil’s
growth, has reflected a country that fits within its own borders.
In the aftermath of the war on terror hysteria, Jim O’Neil’s BRIC launched the trend of
matching economic power to political clout in the International System. The 2008 financial
crisis fueled such prism. Market sizes and growth began essential variables to label emerging
powers. Maria Regina Soares de Lima sharply understands that as part of a semi-periphery à
Wallerstein, Brazil belongs to a class of States that are not either the most powerful or the
richest, nor the least developed (LIMA, 2012). This concept entails an economic perspective
of power, but, since the powerful and “nuclearized” Chinese are still considered an emerging
nation, it seems economy has taken the saddle of conceptualization in contemporary
International Relations (SHARMA, 2012).1
Therefore, Brazil occupies a relative position in the International System in which it is
interpreted as a rising State and a developing nation, all which leads to a perception of an
inevitable revisionist foreign policy. Indeed, Brazil’s revisionism is rather explicit. The
country demands a more democratic Security Council in the United Nations, the conclusion of
the Doha Round in the terms of its first manifest, the democratization of the IMF and the
World Bank, and so on. Nonetheless, the assertive and requesting tone of Brazilian foreign
policy is mostly restricted to the multilateral sphere. According to Mr. Amorim, the country
intends to emphasize institutions that could create a more multilateral world, what he names
“organic multilateralism” (AMORIM, 2012). The former foreign minister, and currently
Minister of Defense, believes in multilateralism as a tool to shape and advance Brazil’s and
most of the countries’ interests in the face of an increasingly multipolar array. Brasília would
not defy the status quo at any cost, but would leave aside its reluctance to engage in a Foreign
Policy that would offer a new pattern of behavior.
Be that as it may, in multipolar or unipolar society, Brazil’s main objective as a rising
State would be to generate a new multilateralism that reflexes the reality of the many – a
strategy that creates a context in which there are indirect gains. Solidarism appears, thus, as
paramount – especially if the organic vernacular is closely examined, since it brings us back
to a Durkheim-like organic solidarism (DURKHEIM, 1893). The so-called organic
multilateralism would be a generalized behavior in which actors elect multilaterally agreed
rules as ways to unequivocally relate to each other. The “rise of the Rest” would make it
easier to shape such a world, because it would reflect the participation of more than 2/3 of the
world’s population via behaviors that would differ from the traditional and, for some,
inexorably tragic power politics.
Furthermore, as an emerging power and a developing nation, Brazil still struggles with
matters of underdevelopment, such as illiteracy and child mortality. While it uses its rising
financial leverage to invest in know-how to overcome such hurdles, it insists in breaking
1 It is of the utmost relevance to understand that, although economic growth and potential markets are keys to
power in the current international political landscape, political domestic stability still matter; otherwise, African
countries that include citizens in the consumers’ market would doubtlessly be the latest up-incomers.
pharmaceutical patents and in transferring technology to other developing nations, even
during and after the financial crisis of 2008. And this, among other spheres, is where Brazil’s
solidarism and multilateral revisionism meet material results that spread not only to its own
society.
Learning the difference between Brazil’s actions and those of former metropolises or
superpowers is a matter of grasping elements of identity, perception and discourse, all bases
for a constructed narrative that encompasses the fortune of history, the shape of the national
interest and the methods of governments. When the European Union and European countries,
especially former metropolises, position democracy and the export of development at the core
of their agenda for developing nations like those in Africa, they usually generate the
perception of hypocrisy, distrust or hierarchy. Since it connects its aid to OECD parameters, it
corroborates the narrative of the white European that wants to spread “better values” to the
black. In their turn, countries, such as Brazil or even China, do not share this stigma.
Nonetheless, while there are similarities between Sino-Brazilian’s insertions, there are also
pointed differences.
The Chinese have built a network of businesses and politics that match their capacities
financially and politically, silently as they usually are. Apparently less threatening, Brazil’s
recent booming entrance in Africa has made more noise, with its culture legitimizing the soft
power of the investments in the region – Brazilian soap operas, for instance, are loud in such
cultures as Mozambique. China and Brazil both share with Africa matters of
underdevelopment, like the need to create infrastructure and means for the progress of rural
populations. Thus, they both enter Africa offering know-how in terms of development. They
have even done so together through the CBERS for Africa, a bilateral initiative that provides
free knowledge on natural resources for the Continent. However, the Chinese expansion may
symbolize the rise of a nation that the Brazilian intense participation in the black continent
does not. While China and Brazil are both pragmatic in their solidarism, pragmatism ends up
fitting as the noun in this equation. Brasília’s narrative, in its turn, brigs pragmatism as an
adjective to the noun, solidarism, hence, creating a seemingly contradictory self-image of a
Pragmatic Solidarism, in particular after Lula’s administration.
Brazil does not have the capacity to be a global player in military terms, but China
does (MEARSHEIMER, 2001). And this is one of the reasons the Chinese in Africa sound
like a challenge not only for Brazil’s businesses and interests, but also for the entire
International System, including Africa. China’s role in the Black Continent provides an
enticing subject for the Academia, since it generates different views on Beijing’s interests,
potential and defies traditional prisms on power politics. The Brazilian presence in the
African continent may or may not compete directly with the Chinese. However, the level of
fierceness in the Chinese stance may point to more than the need of oil or the recognition of
mainland China over Taipei. Hence, the ‘Beijing Consensus’ may publicize its intentions
towards Africa, but the country’s mere status in the International System generates a more
apprehensive response from other actors. Joseph Grieco states that, as a rising great power,
China would be interested in rationalizing its dominance to avoid a fatal counterbalance –
clearly imminent in a Southeast Asia with the unquestionable presence of the United States,
not to mention India’s and Pakistan’s nuclear capability and North Korea’s ongoing
brinkmanship (GRIECO, 1997). Developing a trustworthy narrative over its own intentions
in Africa would provide a more comfortable rise for the Chinese in the International System.
Aside from the Chinese question that brings analyses back to discrediting solidarity,
when pragmatism is not explicitly admitted, Brazil does not hesitate to clarify its interests in
Africa by a two-hinged approach: multilaterally and bilaterally. Multilaterally, medium
powers like Brazil need the legitimacy and the voice of several States to echo its own
(GRIECO, 1997). If in the WTO least developed nations are less reluctant to underpin
Brazil’s (and its partners) claims, what results in liberalization of pharmaceutical intellectual
property, for example; in the climate change field, the 2009 Copenhagen Conference proved
Brazil, as well as South Africa, China and India (the BASIC) alone do not necessarily have
leverage enough to enforce change over the positions of center States, namely Japan and the
United States, especially if their positions are not backed up by the G77.
In the perspective of Nicholas Onuf, in the post-Cold War scenario, in order to change
rules that could shape the International System and, eventually, the behavior of the States, a
medium power would indeed have the voice and the possibility to do so (ONUF, 1989).
Alongside with Grieco’s stance, enhancing the legitimacy of narratives would be essential for
a country like Brazil. Nonetheless, since the System still plays by some rules of traditional
power politics, alliances would be paramount for what Joseph Grieco understands as to
enhance the opportunity of voice of these medium-States to provide them with enough
bargaining power to finally shape the system as they wish. The concession the neorealist
makes to the upcoming reality of the post-Cold War world helps to sustain the constructivist
scrutiny of Onuf (ONUF, 1989). Alexander Wendt, in his turn, would gladly understand that
anarchy can indeed be what States make of it in the 21st century (WENDT, 1992). However,
Mearsheimer would underscore the persistence of the protagonist mechanisms of the balance
of power as hindrances to an actual change in the system, if, in fact, norms will someday
manage to shift and restrain the whims of Hobbesian States, surtout in terms of International
Security (MEARSHEIMER, 2001).
In Brazil’s foreign policy towards Africa, Keohane’s diffuse reciprocity is also to be
considered. The nation’s desire to participate as a permanent member in the Security Council
of the United Nations demands a rally around the country in the General Assembly of the
organization. A positive image of the country among its counterparts in Africa would,
ultimately, lead to a better acceptance of its legitimacy and potential representativeness in the
decisive organ of the UN. Therefore, in the multilateral scope, one could easily grasp Brazil’s
share of Pragmatism in its solidary relations with Africa. These political and diplomatic
diffuse gains would be part of the forth pillar that constitute the Pragmatic Solidarism, the
political cooperation dimension.
In bilateral relations with African countries, Brazil advances a foreign policy that
encompasses the four pillars previously mentioned that shape this so-called Pragmatic
Solidarism to the region. Through relations that emphasize a) ethnicity and culture, b) trade
and investments, c) technical cooperation and d) political cooperation, Brazil puts forward its
national interests, as well as its primary will to shape a world of different dynamics in which
development plays an important role in matters of security, which, finally, would lead to a
more democratic International System, what favors a medium power such as itself (KALIL,
2012a).
The aim of this paper is to understand these 4 pillars that seem to constitute the
Brazilian Pragmatic Solidarism towards Africa. There will be only one part in this article.
Nevertheless, it will be divided into the 4 pillars. In the conclusion, the Pragmatic Solidarism
will be contrasted with the Chinese allegedly ambiguous insertion in Africa, willing to
pinpoint questions that could be addressed to those who intend to understand the Chinese
behavior, as well as a possible new “scramble for Africa” among emerging States.
THE FOUR PILLARS OF THE BRAZILIAN FOREIGN POLICY
TOWARDS AFRICA: AN OVERVIEW2
The four pillars of the Brazilian Foreign Policy towards Africa were withdrawn from
the World Bank’s report (2011) named Bridging the Atlantic: Brazil and Sub-Saharan Africa:
evolving South-South Cooperation . Namely Susana Carrillo and José Flávio Sombra Saraiva
point out five periods in the history of Brazil-Africa relations, while tracing aspects of the
relations that have shaped the current scenario. Thus, ethnicity and culture, trade and
investments, technical cooperation and political cooperation would constitute the pillars of
supposedly increasingly solid relations. This paper aims at analyzing the role of those
elements in the broader strategy of the Brazilian Foreign Policy, the Pragmatic Solidarism,
which the African-Brazilian liaisons would epitomize.
Bellamy (2002) challenges the incorporation of pragmatism as an adjective to a
solidary foreign policy. Although the author treats namely dilemmas of humanitarian
interventions, some of his reflections relate to the opportunities and challenges of labeling the
Brazilian Foreign Policy towards Africa as a Pragmatic Solidarism. At a glance, pragmatism
would project a hurdle unlikely to be transcended, when it comes to a coherent narrative on
solidarism. One of the major hindrances would be that:
Pragmatism therefore holds out the possibility of justifying humanitarian
principles and courses of action that demand the suspension of sovereign
prerogatives whilst simultaneously rejecting foundationalism and the quest for legitimising criteria. A solidarism rooted in pragmatism holds that human
solidarity is based on sentimentality rather than ‘common humanity’ and that
humanitarian intervention ought to be seen not in terms of the upholding of universal moral principles, but rather as theory informed practice based upon
the extension of values created within particular communities (Bellamy,
2002).
The author states that pragmatism would reject any form of true Solidarism, since it
would engender an undisputed instrumentality that surpasses any moral or less instrumental
intentions. Moreover, according to Bellamy, the existence and recognition of Solidarism
would necessarily encompass the existence of shared values which would only be possible in
certain communities. It is of the utmost relevance, nonetheless, to underscore that the
Solidarism of the Brazilian Foreign Policy is not rooted in Pragmatism. The Pragmatic aspect
of the concept comes out of the indirect results that solidary practices generate for the country
2 The data regarding Brazil’s relations with Africa was found in the Itamaraty website.
and allows the State to legitimate its strategy in the domestic scenario, while corroborating the
country’s aim to diversify its partnerships in order to attain an economy less vulnerable to
center-States.
The inevitable gains outcomes of Brazil’s policies do not taint with instrumentality
Brasília’s overall goal to shift practices in the world order. The objective bit of Brazil’s
Solidarism in the 21st is a consequence of individual strategies that appear by the side of
Solidarism in the scope of Brazil’s Foreign Policy, namely the aim to diversify partnerships.
Also, the maximization of political gains in the shape of political support in multilateral
organizations would stem from the Solidarism rather than would motivate it, since the country
does not hold significant relative military or economic capacity neither to speak softly, while
carrying a big stick nor to advance a dollar diplomacy.
Several discourses from diplomats, chiefs of State and foreign ministers lead us to a
narrative of foreign policy that underscores its principles and goals in each and every sphere
(MRE.gov, 2012). Overall, one could summarize three purposes that surround Brazil’s
Pragmatic Solidarism towards Africa: 1) The promotion of international development, 2) the
diversification of partnerships and 3) the constitution of a more democratic world order are
repeatedly mentioned when it comes to the relations with Africa.3
Intrinsic to the pillars of Trade and Investments and of Political Cooperation in the
Brazilian Foreign Policy towards Africa, the diversification of partnerships and the
constitution of a more democratic world order add a pragmatic hint to the aim of promoting
international development. Nonetheless, unlike Muggah’s and Hamann’s (2012)
understanding, Brazil’s foreign policy towards less developed nations, not only to Africa,
begins with the notion of promoting development as a way of spreading and legitimating the
Labor Party’s understanding of politics and of moving forward with the notion of non
indifference that represents the historical synthesis of the Brazilian Foreign Policy’s official
cordiality and understanding of development and to security.
According to Fonseca (2004), in the 1990’s, the Brazilian Foreign Policy advanced a
strategy of autonomy via participation. Vigevani & Cepaluni (2007), in his turn, understands
the Lula’s administration input on foreign policy as autonomy via diversification.
Diversifying partnerships would relevant the central tone of the Labor Party’s aims in
international politics, but affirming that economic gains are the primary guidance to the
3 These were withdrawn from the speeches, statements to the press and other means, such as interviews with the
Foreign Affairs Ministry’s members, to advance the country’s narratives on foreign policy.
country’s entire agenda runs the risk of neglecting not only the peculiarities of Presidential
Diplomacy, but also Itamaraty’s historically constructed rationale.
To highlight solely the economic elements of the diversification in the autonomy via
diversification means placing trade and investments as the only bases of Brazil’s relations
with Africa. Trade and investments are indeed important issues, and Brazil’s foreign trade
relies on Africa for a significant part of the country’s exports of manufactured goods, while
represents fertile ground for what Cervo (2011) pinpoints as the current internationalization of
the economy, in light of Africa’s ongoing rebirth. In fact, bilateral trade increased from US$ 4
billion to US$20 billion between 2000 and 20104. State-driven and private investments in the
continent have also risen considerably. According to the World Bank Report, the former
began in order to promote better environment for the latter, but the Report contradicts itself in
the same section, when it traces to the 1980’s Brazil’s private sector-driven investments in the
continent, a decade in which the Brazilian bankruptcy inhibited the country’s economic ties
with Africa. Trade, in its turn, has been increasing since the 1970’s, when Brazil supported
controversial independences in the continent, although it decreased in the 1980’s, in the face
of Brazil’s economic pickles, and remained timid in the 1990’s. It is, therefore, reckless to
link Brazil’s solidarity with Africa solely to Trade and Investments, or to the country’s
economic goal of diversifying partnerships.
The Brazilian Solidarism towards Africa actually first appeared overtly in the
country’s agenda in its relations with Portuguese-Speaking nations. Culture and ethnicity are,
thus, fundamental roots for the Solidarism. In the 1996, solidarity was placed basilar to the
foundation of the Community for Portuguese-Speaking Countries (1996), while Brazil did not
carry a foreign policy the was willing to diversify its partnerships with Africa, nor did it have
the domestic economic stability to outreach in that direction.
4 The CPLP was officially created in 1996. Thenceforth, the exchange between Brazil and Portuguese-speaking
nations rose steadily from a surplus of around 21 million dollars in the year of the creation to a surplus of around
1 billion dollars in 2011 whose top was in 2009, when it achieved a bit more than 2 billion dollars. The total
amount of trade between Brazil and CPLP members sums up to around 800 million dollars-average/year, since
1996 until 2011. When it comes to the African continent, Brazil carries a deficit because of its imports of oil and its derivatives especially from North African nations. Since 1996 until 2011, the average deficit is one of around
1 billion dollars, while the total trade sums up to around 11 billion dollars. Thus, the CPLP countries represent
almost 10% of the trade with the entire continent. The figures must be carefully analyzed, since most of
Portuguese-speaking nations in the continent have recently come out of fragile contexts or face the hurdles of
such landscape, not to mention the size of the markets in places like Cabo Verde, São Tomé e Príncipe and East
Timor, what Angola and Mozambique striving largest share of the population could not compensate more than it
already does. Therefore, the participation of CPLP members in Brazilian trade figures with Africa reveals steady
and increasing connects with Portuguese-speaking nations since the advent of the organization. Concomitantly,
trade numbers also show that trade with Africa tended to rise steadily (MDIC.gov, 2013).
Brazilian enthusiasts of African studies usually neglect cultural and ethnical elements
of Brazilian-African relations, while historical aspects are often approached (SARAIVA,
2011). This article aims to provide a general landscape of Brazilian-African cultural and
ethnic ties that have risen throughout history. The country’s independence in 1822 was
followed by Benin’s statement recognizing Brazil as a freed State and proclaiming the African
country’s desire to be part of the brand new Empire. The Portuguese-Brazilian treaty
establishing the recognition of the independence included a clause in which Brazil gave up
any intentions of expanding its jurisdiction to Africa, what was guaranteed by Britain’s naval
leverage. Moreover, in the second half of the 19th century, Brazil’s population was of roughly
2 million people, except that at least 1.5 million of them were African descents. Thus, Brazil’s
nationality is entrenched with the African ethnicity and culture. Nowadays, more than half of
the Brazilian population considers itself of African descent.
Social and ethnic inequalities still hinder the participation of African descents in
society, which was alerted by abolitionists in the 19th
century already. One of the most
prominent Brazilian abolitionists, Joaquim Nabuco stated in 1883 that the abolition
represented only the first step for the full integration of the black population into the Brazilian
society, what has not yet been achieved and has only begun to be properly addressed after the
1988 Constitution. Under the guise of the recent fundamental law, reminiscent of maroons
have gained the property of the lands they historically inhabit, as well as had their cultural
idiosyncrasies officially recognized; affirmative action has been delivered to decrease the
educational gap between the blacks the whites in the country; criminal organizations in
favelas have been dismantled and communities have been revitalized, in order to include
those societies, majorly populated with non whites, in the Brazilian mainstream, what ends up
challenging the prejudice towards the black. The simple urgency of this matter already
bridges Brazil to many African societies nowadays, not only to those that have experienced
apartheid, but also to others that face deep social inequalities.
Gilberto Freyre’s Casa-grande & senzala treats the subject of syncretism vastly.
According to Freyre, the most traditional religion institution and with more adepts in the
country, the Brazilian Catholic Church and faith feature African traditions, such as the
mysticism of the cult of many saints (its seriously a humongous amount of figures, what
brings one back to African manifold gods), superstitions regarding promises, objects donated
to the walls of the Churches after the fulfillment of the wishes through the constant prayer for
certain saints, and so on. Multiculturalism is also addressed by the author, as he underscores
the African descent’s contribution on Brazil’s Portuguese, with the widespread use of
diminutives to portray affection towards people and objects, not to mention on food. Brazil’s
typical cuisine would stem from the participation of the black women in the kitchens of the
Big Houses. In their turn, Brazilian mixed ethnic traces would result from repeated sexual
violence, but also, as Sérgio Buarque de Hollanda expresses, from the Portuguese’s less
reluctance to engage in relationships with other ethnicities.
Several Afro-Brazilian museums throughout the country celebrate these ties. The Afro
Brazil Museum in São Paulo and the recently inaugurated MUNCAB – National Museum for
Afro-Brazilian Culture, in Salvador, unite art and history to show the many similarities that
join Brazil and Africa culturally and ethnically. Moreover, one of Pierre Verger’s discoveries
through photography epitomizes the connections. Again, Benin appears in the scenario.
During the first half of the 19th
century, when slave trade was legal in Brazil, Brazilian
traffickers would buy from Africans those who nationals had lost wars or were imprisoned.
Back then, a dynastic struggle took place in Benin and the winner sold his mother and his
brother to Brazilian traffickers. Later in the 20th century, Pierre Verger’s incursions in
Brazilian maroons found engravings in thrones that connected his photographic memory to
Benin’s dynasty, hence, reuniting the dynasty.
Alberto da Costa e Silva, one of the most prominent Africanists in Brazil nowadays,
usually refers to the Ocean that separates Brazil from Africa as ‘the river named Atlantic’ to
emphasize the ties among the regions. In 2003, such peculiarity was recognized by the
African Union that proclaimed Brazil as the sixth region of the Continent. Nowadays, it is
discussed whether Haiti could or not participate as an actual member in the Union, since it is
not geographically in Africa – Brazil is just an observer and has not shown interest to enter
the organization, nor has it been invited. However, narratives exist to be deconstructed, and
geography could easily be read to turn the middle Atlantic into a river just as it did to the
South Atlantic. Timing is appropriate, since Brazil leads the United Nations’ efforts to rebuild
the Haitian State.
As positive as they may seem, ethnic ties among Brazil and Africa may also come as
an issue to the bilateral relations. Brazilian civil servants and military of the highest
commands are still white, as well as the Brazilian investors that go to Africa. Therefore,
turning ethnicity into capability is one of the highest challenges for Brazil’s Pragmatic
Solidarism towards Africa – what adds up to the importance of bringing race to the political
discussion domestically, since Brazil’s international multiracial identity still shocks
significant parts of the Brazilian population.
Culture and ethnicity, therefore, are core elements of Brazil’s foreign policy strategy
towards Africa. Moreover, they are the elements that motivated Brasília’s first assumption of
solidarity towards Africa, in the CPLP. Such Solidarism is, however, a result of a broader
historical process. While cultural and ethnic links have sparkled the institutionalization of
Solidarism, the evolution of Brazil’s official cordiality and autonomy via diversification
explain the country’s apparent benevolent narrative. In hindsight, the autonomy via
diversification can be portrayed as Brazil’s general intent to diversify not only partnerships,
but namely the agenda of the International System. By bringing the aspects of development to
the concept of International Security, through the responsibility while protecting and the
resolutions it pushed in the Security Council in order to spread the notion of interdependence
between those two elements, Brazil diversified the Council’s approach over International
Security. Brasília also pushed for G20F meetings that would treat financial matters as relevant
to economic stability, but especially to the fulfillment of the Millennium Development Goals.
Among the BRICS and the IBSA, Brazil has sustained positions that bring to the spotlight the
well-being of the people in its multifaceted manner. South-South cooperation,
notwithstanding, is not the only table in which Brazil diversifies the narrative, which would
not be that groundbreaking. Brazil’s almost each and every declaration or treaty with a center-
States has included clauses of trilateral cooperation – or has mentioned the urgency of
spreading development to attain a safer International System.
Therefore, although the internationalization of the Brazilian economy via spreading
national direct investments in places like Africa runs together with the goal of diversifying
partnerships to depend less on center-States, the overall tone of Brazil’s Foreign Policy is one
that overcomes the simple generation of profits. Muggah’s and Hamann’s perspective,
furthermore, fall short of grasping Brasília’s historical narrative of foreign policy – and again
Africa appears as the sharp illustration. To label Brazil’s solidarism as generous is to
misunderstand the emphasis on less hierarchical patterns. Generosity is embedded in the self-
image of more capacity of delivering certain results. The authors’ lexical choice project an
image of a weak Africa and a growing Brazil that would deem itself better and occasionally
bend to the needs of the many, but only to the extent that its own status remains safe. A slip
could describe Muggah’s and Hamann’s choice of word, but in the 21st century Africa’s
economic boom is met with urbanization and social improvements. The mobile and Internet
penetration in the continent still contrasts with high mortality rates. However, the outlook is
not as grim as it has been, and GDP rates are only the tip of the iceberg (Special Report:
emerging Africa on The Economist, March, 2nd
-8th
, 2013).
Brazil’s Pragmatic Solidarism understands Africa as a partner, not as a mere receiver
of its aid or investments, in exchange for a warm reception of goods. Brazil’s foreign policy
narrative insists that solidarism has brought benefits for the African continent, as well as for
the Brazilians, what would result especially from Technical Cooperation. The third pillar of
Brazil’s Pragmatic Solidarism towards Africa is far from one of the least important. Brazil’s
Agency for Cooperation, under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, underlines the aim of that
cooperation as to promote development. This highlight comes in the wave of domestic social
change under the Lula administration (SARAIVA, 2011). President Lula’s humble origins
and the Labor Party’s understanding of politics led to a rally around the idea of exporting such
programs as Zero Hunger, Light for Everyone, Water for Everyone, not to mention several
initiatives of affirmative action and so on.
Brazil’s dense relations with Africa are relatively recent. In the 1960s and 1970s, the
country hesitated to engage into an Africanist foreign policy (SARAIVA, 2011). The year of
1975 could be considered a watershed, but the 1980’s bankruptcy led to a decade of sparse
cooperation which was followed by another one of few initiatives. Thus, the Lula
administration deliberately inserted Africa in the core of its strategy. Analyses that favor
economic gains as paramount for Brazil’s foreign policy of technical cooperation have been
proved fragile. Lula’s choice of Africa matches his own cultural and ethnical backdrop, as
well as the Labor’s Party approach to politics domestically. When President Obama
congratulated Lula for being ‘The Man’, in light of his achievements in Brazil, but also of his
efforts in the international arena, the Party indirectly gained the legitimacy it lacked in the
1980’s and 1990’s among the country’s middle class. Thus, the Solidarism that appeared as a
facet of a new government also enters the logic of Keohane’s diffuse gains.
The idiosyncrasies of Lula can be pointed as essential for the many trips to Africa, as
well as to speeches in such scenarios as the Davos Economic Forum when the President urged
the prevalence of development over finances (SARAIVA, 2010). Lula was active in Foreign
Policy and wanted to spread the government’s strategies to end poverty throughout the world.
That was the tone of his many encounters with French Presidents and other leaders that
recognized in him a symbol of prosperity against all odds. Thus, during his administration,
Brazil was not reluctant to forgive the debts of African countries. While the G8 suffered
pressure from civil society, Lula managed to turn Brazil into an example of how Solidarism
could be pragmatic, since it would not only engender better lives for the citizens in least
developed countries, but also would indirectly reduce the risks of Security issues like
terrorism or drug traffic.
Concocted by his Foreign Ministry Celso Amorim, the non indifference was the
principle that guided Brazil’s participation in several issues. In spite of the country’s firm
belief in non intervention and sovereignty, Brazil would not be indifferent to situations where
Human Security, but especially development was at stake. The global outreach of non
indifference, with all its Solidarism, stems from Brazil’s historical official cordiality.
Brazil’s historical understanding of partnership with countries that carry asymmetries
with the nation in the International System is a result of Viscount of Rio Branco’s paradigm
of official cordiality (CERVO, 2008). In the 1870’s, the Viscount of Rio Branco stated that
Brazil should speak softly and make concessions to countries in South America that bared
unfavorable asymmetries with the South American giant. The Baron of Rio Branco later
institutionalized his father’s paradigm in what Francisco Doratioto (2000) considers the
attempt to build a shared sovereignty in South America. Brazil would then prevent itself from
intervening in Uruguay and Paraguay to avoid balancing against its rise in the South
American sub-system.
In the 1930’s, Brazil and Argentina prevailed in the sub-continent’s System, adopting
the official cordiality as paradigms for participation in conflicts in the neighborhood – suffice
it to bring up their mediation in the Chaco War, between Paraguay and Bo livia. In the 1950’s,
Brazil’s Pan American Operation (OPA) extended the official cordiality to Latin America and
Africa, when the government argued in favor of not only the country’s own development, but
also and especially of those least developed. Also, in 1958, the Brazil-Bolivia Roboré Treaties
proved that the Brazilian Foreign Policy intended to underscore the official cordiality. In
Roboré, Brazil consciously failed to protect its own economic interests in terms of oil
exploitation and land demarcation to promote a bigger national interest: an official cordiality
with its neighbors to avoid a perennial imminence of counterbalance.
The Independent Foreign Policy deepened the official cordiality providing it with the
notion of social justice, and, in spite of differences between the countries’ Military Regimes,
so did the dictatorships from the ‘60s to the 80’s in the region. Brazil’s and Paraguay’s
bilateral treaty on Itaipu proves the South America’s biggest country’s intentions to put vanity
aside, when Paraguay insisted on not adapting the country’s energy devices to the voltage of
the new hydroelectric, which meant even more costs for Brazil, which was already financing
most of the project and would buy Assunción’s share of the production at an agreed and, back
then, overvalued price.
In the 1980’s, Brazil and Argentina engaged in a process that culminated with
MERCOSUR, but the country’s official cordiality is more explicit in its relations with
Northern South America and Latin America. Figueiredo travelled all over South America and
Sarney founded the Group of Rio, while Brazil did not hesitate to engage in global initiatives
to mitigate poverty, such as the South-South Preferential Trade System. Although most of
the authors acknowledge the 1990’s as a more selfish moment of Brazilian Foreign Policy, in
which its own development and the participation in multilateral spheres overcame the
country’s proximity with developing nations; in 1996, the previously mentioned creation of
CPLP marks the transition between official cordiality and Pragmatic Solidarism.
Non indifference once again brought official cordiality back to the narrative, namely
when Brazil engaged in MINUSTAH. After the 1960’s, when social justice was added to the
notion of official cordiality, such solidary approach plummeted, although the foreign policy
discourse of the right-wing military regime insisted in promoting global development as the
only mean to achieve peace. If, back then, developing recently independent nations would
provide Brazil with markets and sources for its own good, and the goal of diversifying
partnerships indeed tainted Brazil’s honest call to be the gatekeeper of human rights, in light
of domestic characteristics, the current impulse of joining the promotion of development with
official cordiality reflects Brazil’s own accomplishments. Macroeconomic stability was
achieved and the country no longer depends on international financial institutions. Moreover,
the social landscape has been improved to the extent that Brazil has long fulfilled the MDGs.
Solidarism is, hence, a result of a historical process that encompasses Brazil’s
narrative of Foreign Policy and the country’s domestic evolution. Brazil’s Technical
Cooperation with Africa illustrates this concomitance. Mainly, when it comes to such pillar of
the Brazilian-African relations, Brazil exports agricultural expertise and social technology.
Africa’s prevalence in Brazil’s international technical cooperation, above even Latin America,
is a consequence not only of Africa’s dim context, but also of the similarities between Brazil’s
and continent’s societies and landscape. Culture and Ethnicity appear again relevant for
Brazil’s Solidarism.
In terms of Trade and Investments, however, Africa or the Least Developed countries
are not exceptions. Brazil’s figures have all risen at significant rates. Hence, Solidarism has
not influenced directly Brazil’s foreign trade – and neither did culture and ethnicity. The merit
of Solidarism is to distinguish Brazil’s presence in Africa from others, such as the Chinese,
for it constitutes an identity that differs from the general perception of China. Once again,
Pragmatism ought to be taken into account. While China is frequently labeled imperialist in
its quest for Africa, Brazil tends to provoke less fierce reactions. However, Brazil’s
Solidarism results in indirect gains that feature also political matters. The Political
Cooperation between Brazil and Africa are paradigmatic.
The Africa-South America Cooperation Forum (ASA) and other institutions offer
opportunities for the countries to dismantle distrusts and to promote relations that offer
opportunities for both sides, as well as the chance for the bigger countries like Brazil and
South Africa to offer the most, in order to show their commitment to the region. The
opportunities provided by the Brazilian participation as an observer in the African Union are
also outstanding, especially when the organization recognizes Brazil’s will to build closer ties
with the region and invites the Brazilian Chief of State to participate actively in negotiations.
In this sense, former President Lula is a symbol of what Brazil represents for Africa, and, for
that matter, a capability for Brazil’s relations with the continent. As he was not recognized
necessarily as white, Lula represented what Brazil meant for those African countries who
were struggling to overcome harsh underdevelopment. Lula and Brazil have both managed to
surpass hardship, and the South American friend not only could share the strategies to move
away from fragile contexts, but was also willing to do so.
The Dilma administration lost Lula’s appeal, but the strategy remains fairly the same..
In her General Assembly speeches, Dilma did underscored the need for an economic
collective security, as well as an islamophobia that could hinder North Africa’s participation
in global affairs on the aftermath of the Arab Spring. Moreover, the current government
sustains the narrative of the essentiality of closing the Doha Round in terms that favor
developing nations, but especially those least developed in the African continent.
What Brazil has been asking in return is what Keohane dubs diffuse reciprocity. The
country has not showed its Big Stick, namely because it does not have considerable military
forces. Investments in the military arsenal in Brazil are smaller than those in such African
countries as Nigeria. The Brazilian Military Arms are more than ever subdued to a civil
power, and nowadays to diplomacy, since the former Ministry of Foreign Affairs is now
occupying the post of Minister of Defense. Consequently, differently from China, Brazil does
not have the capacity or the will to use force in Africa. For Brazil, it seems like the desirable,
albeit indirect, outcome of its relations with Africa is reaping the political rewards of its soft
power. Politically, it means gathering support in multilateral arenas, or at least convenient
abstentions. It means also guaranteeing a sphere of influence that transcends South America
and its historical suspicion towards Brazil.
The Pragmatic Solidarism has, hence, a solid political dimension in which political
cooperation is advanced not only in terms of narrative, but also of international institutions
that connect Brazil and Africa and allow the region and the Brasília to concert positions that
could, thus, constitute the expected diffuse reciprocity for the South American giant.
Nonetheless, the diffuse gains of pillar of political cooperation of Brazil’s Pragmatic
Solidarism to Africa are not restricted to outcomes regarding Brazil’s immediate interests in
multilateral arrays.
The mere exercise of a solidary narrative and the constitution of those organizations
engender a new world order. An approach à Gramsci would present an argument that Brazil,
and perhaps the BRICS, are to demand a new hegemony. Mr. Amorim underscores Brazil’s
intensions to form an organic multilateralism. The Brazilian Foreign Policy has historically
constituted a narrative that intends to build a more democratic international arena in which
development surpasses matters of security to provide a sustainable world peace. Therefore,
the exercise of Pragmatic Solidarism in Africa is in itself the exercise of a new way of
performing Foreign Policy. Pragmatic Solidarism would be the exercise of Foreign Policy in a
way that guarantees national interests and overcomes the dynamics of power politics.
Pragmatic Solidarism and its four pillars towards Africa would constitute a new
paradigm of behavior in the international system that may reflect new behaviors, especially
from center States. Brazil’s active role in the multilateral arena would be a reflect of such
attempts – and the concept of Responsibility While Protecting would epitomize the intent of
changing behaviors via rules, an endeavor especially challenging in terms of rWp, for its
intentions to restrain power politics in humanitarian interventions (KALILb, 2012). The
Pragmatic Solidarism of Brazil’s relations with Africa would, therefore, represent an indirect
desire to endorse new behaviors in the international arena. Whether or not bringing about a
new hegemony, the challenge is posed.
CONCLUSION: PRAGMATIC SOLIDARISM VIS-À-VIS THE CHINESE RISE
Kaplan’s (2010) take on China’s geographical relevance lies upon the traditional
realist point of view of the prevalence of a zero sum game in the International System.
Although the author acknowledges the unlikelihood of a direct conflict between the United
States and China, he finds threatening China’s increasing influence in places such as Africa,
since it would provide Beijing with the possession of the ‘geographical pivot of history’.5
Kissinger (2011), in his turn, opens the black box of China to describe its initial rise in
the international arena as conservative, since it aimed at fitting in multilateral institutions and
reached out for traditional Confucian concepts to guide the State’s international relations. The
author, as well as the current American Foreign Policy, according to Kissinger’s own
perspective, tends not to enter the hysteria of geopolitical stances. Au contraire, the former
Secretary of State underlines that China might indeed be engendering efforts to what Joseph
5 “The English geographer Sir Halford Mackinder ended his famous 1904 article, "The Geographical
Pivot of History," with a disturbing reference to China. After explaining why Eurasia was the geostrategic
fulcrum of world power, he posited that the Chinese, should they expand their power well beyond their borders,
"might constitute the yellow peril to the world's freedom just because they would add an oceanic frontage to the
resources of the great continent, an advantage as yet denied to the Russian tenant of the pivot region." Leaving
aside the sentiment's racism, which was common for the era, as well as the hysterics sparked by the rise of a non-
Western power at any time, Mackinder had a point: whereas Russia, that other Eurasian giant, basically was, and
is still, a land power with an oceanic front blocked by ice, China, owing to a 9,000-mile temperate coastline with
many good natural harbors, is both a land power and a sea power. (Mackinder actually feared that China might
one day conquer Russia.) China's virtual reach extends from Central Asia, with all its mineral and hydrocarbon wealth, to the main shipping lanes of the Pacific Ocean. Later, in Democratic Ideals and Reality, Mackinder
predicted that along with the United States and the United Kingdom, China would eventually guide the world by
"building for a quarter of humanity a new civilization, neither quite Eastern nor quite Western (…)To
accomplish this task, China has built advantageous power relationships both in contiguous territories and in far-
flung locales rich in the resources it requires to fuel its growth. Because what drives China abroad has to do with
a core national interest -- economic survival -- China can be defined as an über-realist power. It seeks to develop
a sturdy presence throughout the parts of Africa that are well endowed with oil and minerals and wants to secure
port access throughout the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea, which connect the hydrocarbon-rich Arab-
Persian world to the Chinese seaboard. (…) To be sure, China is not an existential problem for these states. The
chance of a war between China and the United States is remote; the Chinese military threat to the United States
is only indirect. The challenge China poses is primarily geographic -- notwithstanding critical issues about debt,
trade, and global warming. China's emerging area of influence in Eurasia and Africa is growing, not in a nineteenth-century imperialistic sense but in a more subtle manner better suited to the era of globalization.
Simply by securing its economic needs, China is shifting the balance of power in the Eastern Hemisphere, and
that must mightily concern the United States. On land and at sea, abetted by China's favorable location on the
map, Beijing's influence is emanating and expanding from Central Asia to the South China Sea, from the
Russian Far East to the Indian Ocean. China is a rising continental power, and, as Napoleon famously said, the
policies of such states are inherent in their geography. (…) Beijing is preparing to envelop Taiwan not just
militarily but economically and socially, too. Some 30 percent of Taiwan's exports go to China. There are 270
commercial flights per week between Taiwan and the mainland. Two-thirds of Taiwanese companies have made
investments in China in the last five years. Half a million tourists go from the mainland to the island annually,
and 750,000 Taiwanese reside in China for about half of every year. Increasing integration appears likely; how it
comes about, however, is uncertain and will be pivotal for the future of great-power politics in the region. If the United States simply abandons Taiwan to Beijing, then Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, Australia, and other
U.S. allies in the Pacific Ocean, as well as India and even some African states, will begin to doubt the strength of
Washington's commitments. That could encourage those states to move closer to China and thus allow the
emergence of a Greater China of truly hemispheric proportions (KAPLAN, 2010).”
Grieco (1997) would call ‘rationalize its dominance’6. By understating nationalist and
triumphalist voices in the domestic sphere, the Chinese Foreign Policy deploys its efforts in
advancing a strategy of foreign policy that they call “Peaceful Development”. Therefore, the
Chinese outreach to Africa would mainly respond to the country’s efforts to overcome
hindrances to full development, what would explain Beijing’s preferential relations with
African nations that possess natural resources.
In this sense, China’s presence in Africa would not differ from its increasing
participation in Latin American affairs. Therefore, a Latin American approach to China’s rise
in Africa would have to deal with the former Empire’s prevalence in international trade within
the region. Yet, studies have not multiplied to question the American hegemony in Latin
America, even in the light of China’s role as the main trader with several countries in
America’s immediate are of influence in the context of a trend of leftish Bolivarianismo. It
turns out that studies regarding the Chinese presence in Africa have focuses more on strategic
terms than have others about Beijing’s Foreign Policy. When it comes to Brazil, diplomacy
has been trying to place China as a partner for the South American country’s own prosperity,
as well as to advance new dynamics in the International System. Brazil may consider Africa
its preferential area of influence under the nation’s latest global player status, but the
concomitance of Chinese businesses in the continent is not Brasília’s most urgent task
regarding its presence in Africa.
China’s relations with Africa have come and gone. Since the Revolution, there are
moments in which they are denser than in others (LARGE, 2008). George Yu’s reports on
Sino-African relations bring up this discontinuity. In 1965, Africa occupied a central role in
the Chinese Foreign Policy, and the recently independent countries tended to identify with
former colonized China. Since then, Communist China has been a model for the development
6 “China’s rise, Liu prophesies, will usher in a golden age of Asian prosperity in which Chinese products,
culture, and values set the standard for the world. The world will be harmonious because China’s leadership will
be wiser and more temperate than America’s, and because China will eschew hegemony and limit its role to
acting as primus inter pares of the nations of the world. (…) Peaceful rise. (…) China’s leaders decided to take a
hand in the debate at this point, to demonstrate that the published triumphalism is far from the mood of the
leadership. (…) , 2010, a comprehensive statement policy: Persisting with Taking the Path of Peaceful
Development, which is neither a ruse by which China hides its brightness and bides its time nor a naïve delusion
that forfeits China’s advantages. It is a genuine and enduring policy because it best serves Chinese interests and comports with the international strategic situation. ‘Persisting with taking the path of peaceful development is
not the product of a subjective imagination or of some kind of calculations. Rather, it is a result of our profound
recognition that both the world today and China today have undergone tremendous changes as well as that
China’s relations with the world today have also undergone great changes; hence it is necessary to make the best
of the situation and adapt to the changes’. (…) The earthshaking changes require that China abandon the vestiges
of Mao’s doctrine of absolute self-reliance, which would isolate China. China is not in a position to be arrogant
and boastful, because it still faces tremendous challenges domestically (KISSINGER, 2011).”
of some African nations, such as Liberia, Sierra Leone and Gambia (LARGE, 2008). Some
state that China preferably relates to countries that followed the communist lead or belonged
to the third world movements; others highlight China’s preferential liaisons with regional
great powers. Be that as it may, in the first decade of the 21st century, Beijing spreads its
relations with countries throughout Africa, mostly in those that offer natural resources and
trade. Relations that are solely based on trade tend to be seasonal – and what’s been recently
noticed is a trend of continuity in Sino-African relations. China has enhanced its contributions
to United Nations peace operations in Africa and, by 2007, had roughly 1.300 nationals in the
continent. In 2000, the China-Africa Joint Business Council institutionalized the State’s
support to Chinese businesses in the region (GILL & REILLY, 2007). China has also been
aiding the modernization of military forces in Africa, while its presence is known for lax
accountability over human rights violations.
Beijing’s participation in African affairs is, nonetheless, far from outstanding, if
compared to China’s general strategy. The peculiarities of the Chinese entrance in the
continent are more connected to local aspects as opportunities, such as natural resources, and
as hindrances to what the West would deem legitimate relations, such as non democratic
governments. Nonetheless, if China does not insert democratic or human rights clauses in its
contracts with Africans, neither does Brazil.
Brazil’s persistence in overcoming stereotypes of traditional hegemony when it comes
to its ascension in the international arena has not caught the attention of many researchers in
International Relations. An analysis of the discourse via a post-positivist theory would be of
great value to the understanding of Brazil’s narrative, while Brazilian Foreign Policy insists in
pointing out the practices of its narrative. This article intended, thus, to provide the rationale
behind the current Brazilian Foreign Policy through the country’s relations with Africa. By
bringing up China’s presence in the continent, it aimed at providing an opportunity to rethink
the Eastern Great Power actual impact and intentions in the International System. The
Pragmatic Solidarism appears, thus, as an opportunity to further analyses that may compare
and contrast China’s self-proclaimed Peaceful Development with Brazil’s foreign strategy in
the 21st century. Politically, China has established a diplomatic network that is very similar to
that of other countries, but does the country expect only diffuse reciprocity? Unlike Brazil,
China conditions its aid to its recognition over Taipei, what is in itself an exercise of power.
This goal lies within the Beijing Consensus, as it states that China aims at acquiring the
recognition of mainland China and maintaining the PCC.
If Joseph Grieco’s perspective is correct, China is not going to use its relations with
Africa to exercise its offensive power far from the annoying détente of Southeast Asia, and,
hence, the political cooperation dimension of their relations would not include potentially
offensive military ties. Nonetheless, a neorealist approach would be essential to understand
China’s show-off in terms of Trade and Investments and Technical Cooperation in the black
continent. As Mearsheimer argues in his The tragedy of Great Powers politics, one of the
pillars of the country’s emergence as a great power is its mammoth funds. The other would be
its huge population – and in this sense sending Chinese workers to Africa, instead of hiring
the local force, sounds rather coherent. Therefore, to fully understand China’s aim in Africa
could be to address how it differs from the four pillars of Brazil’s Pragmatic Solidarism
towards the continent.
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