Paper Title:

Interest, participation, control and influence:

democratization, civil society, bureaucratic conflicts and

the shaping of a public policy in Brazil.

Prepared for delivery at the 2014 Congress of the Latin

American Studies Association, Chicago, IL May 21 - 24, 2014.

Authors: Presenter: Haroldo Ramanzini Júnior;

hramanzinijunior@gmail.com

Presenter: Rogério de Souza Farias; rofarias@gmail.com

Paper Tracking Number: 702056

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Introduction

With great fanfare, the Brazilian Ministry of Foreign

Affairs (Itamaraty) launched on February 26, 2014 a series of

debates to increase the ties between society and state in the

making of foreign policy1. In the background of the

initiative is a deep transformation. In what is seen as an

international trend, democracy is conceived in more than the

narrow activities of campaigning, voting and voicing.

Nowadays, people want “more direct control over outputs”

(Houtzager e Lavalle: 2010; Lavalle, Houtzageret al.: 2006;

Peters: 2010, 211). Not just that. They also demand to shape

how their own involvement should be defined and

operationalized (Creighton: 2005, 9). If the 20th century

witnessed the rise of bureaucratization and technocracy in an

effort to curb patronage, increase efficiency and perform

specialized tasks, now we are moving to a situation of

increasing oversight over bureaucracy (Bowornwathana e

Poocharoen: 2010, 308; Olivieri: 2011). There is a wave of

initiatives under the banner of participatory, deliberative,

stakeholder, collaborative or cogovernance democracy. This

trend is reflected in the research agenda in the political

science, public policy analysis and administrative law (Meier

e O'toole: 2006, 21).

In Brazil the Constitution of 1988 created several new

institutional arrangements for democratic participation.1 Figueiredo, Luiz Alberto Machado. Diálogos sobre política externa. Folhade S. Paulo. P. A3. 26/02/2014.

2

Other legislation followed through, creating specific

channels of citizen engagement in public policies (Brasil,

Carneiroet al.: 2013). Brazil became “one of the world’s most

important laboratories of democratic innovation” (Coelho:

2007, 35). The country is now internationally known as the

land of orçamento participativo and has more than 170 experiences

in this field (Avritzer: 2009, 2). These initiatives result

from a larger mood that is highly critical of traditional

politics and see new sources of legitimacy in direct

connections between state and society. Some authors point out

that even in what is considered more impervious areas of

government activities, like foreign policy, in general, and

international trade negotiations, in particular, there is a

new kind of interaction between state and society. This is

startling. The field of international trade negotiations

until recently appeared to contrast with all principles of

democracy and accountability (Goldman: 1994, 633). Now, one

important venue of investigation about democracy in Brazil is

the impact of domestic politics on international cooperation

and bargaining.

Most authors defend that globalization and

democratization increased the interest of civil society in

foreign policy and also reshaped Itamaraty. Some even point

to how in comparison with the past there is more interest and

participation from civil society in foreign policy and in

international trade negotiations (Alcântara: 2001, 19;

3

Cardoso: 2001, 5; Faria: 2008; 2012, 316; Hirst e Pinheiro:

1995, 8; Kearney e Armijo: 2008, 994-7; Lima: 2000, 294;

Pinheiro e Milani: 2012, 18; Puntigliano: 2008, 29). This

argument is convergent with much of what decision-makers in

Brasília believes (or want us to believe). Particularly

during the 1990s, Itamaraty adopted a more aggressive

rhetoric in the issue of state-society relations. According

to the diplomat Rego Barros, the organization attempted to

strengthened the dialogue with social organizations,

parliamentarians, trade unions, NGOs, press, businessmen and

state and municipal governments. The premise was that foreign

policy would be more instrumental to Brazilian development if

society could “more openly discuss and monitor it” (Barros:

1998, 18, 9 e 21). Clodoaldo Hugueney, one of the most

experienced diplomats in international trade negotiations,

stated in 2003 that he “never came across to a level of

participation and coordination so intense” as to the one he

was experiencing at that time.2 A diplomat recently stated:

“only recently foreign policy became a popular subject3”. The

seminars promoted by Itamaraty in 2014 also results from this

new awareness.

The literature was successful in raising a research

problem and bringing awareness to the topic. But the record

is unclear in terms of better understanding of the decision

2 Ata da Comissão de Agricultura e Política Rural. Câmara dos Deputados. 14/8/2003.3 Luiz Felipe de Macedo Soares. Política externa e ideologia. O Globo. 23/7/12.

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making process. Each observer has a different concept of

participation and influence. Detecting conceptually how

actors engage in this theme, however, is a prerequisite to

judge the level of state autonomy and insulation of

particular governmental institutions.

This paper will focus into the role of Itamaraty and how

it interacts with other government organizations and social

and political groups. We intend to bring a fresh view on this

subject, connecting the ongoing state-society theoretical

literature to the current debate on Brazilian foreign policy.

Our argument is that, with few exceptions, most works use the

concept of participation without specifying what kind of

interaction it entails between actors or assuming influence

will be a natural consequence of the interaction between

government and society or of the interaction between

government agencies4. A secondary problem is the fact they

frame changes in the nature of the decision making process

without a clear base line. Much worse, they tend to make

unsubstantiated claims about the past.

Being aware of how we use language to describe political

phenomena is not a sideshow to our substantive work. Lax

discipline in concept use will blur boundaries with

neighboring concepts, reduce descriptive power and affect

theory-building (Hilgers: 2011, 538-70). John Gerring created

a criteria for testing the strength of concepts based on

4 The exceptions are Diniz e Ribeiro: 2008, 18; Anastasia, Mendonça e Almeida: 2012, 627.

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familiarity, resonance, parsimony, coherence,

differentiation, depth, theoretical utility and field utility

(Gerring: 1999). Our work certainly does not reach the

benchmark he created, but we are certain it is a significant

step towards a more constructive debate.

In order to connect the concepts to an empirical study,

we will analyze Brazilian activities in multilateral trade

negotiations from 1946 to 2005. This will bring greater

variation to our dependent variable, something that most

studies fail to do. And as we know, cases without variance in

the dependent variable are useful in investigating new

hypotheses and bringing complexity to specific explanations,

but the selection bias will cause problems if we want to make

causal inferences (Collier e Mahoney: 1996, 60). It is not

our purpose to present a thorough examination of the

interaction between society and state actors in the field of

multilateral trade negotiations, something we already

presented in other contributions (Farias: 2009; 2012; Farias

e Ramanzini Júnior: 2011; Ramanzini Júnior e Mariano: 2013,

Ramanzini Júnior, 2012 #3110). Here our objective is

demonstrate how participation cannot be equated with

influence – one is a form of interaction, the other is the

potential result.

This case is relevant to the current debate about the

relative autonomy of the Brazilian state and particularly

about the strength of Itamaraty. We will base our analysis on

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a set of standard questions: Who decides who participates in

the decision making process? How are participants selected?

Do the proceedings change policies? Does Itamaraty has final

control over decisions? Do other government agencies

participate and influence only to the extent permitted by

diplomats?5

Our argument is that participation and influence varied

across issue areas and decision makers in the period from

1946 to 2012. However, the influence organized groups,

citizens and other branches of the government had was much

higher in the past than it is today. We agree, therefore,

with the assessment that the enthusiasm of the

democratization period “triggered a sort of academic amnesia

regarding what was already know about Latin American

societies and democracy, about its conditions, actors and

consequences” (Vilas: 1997, 4). We concur with several works

that point out how states and bureaucracies managed to retain

their autonomy in the context of economic globalization and

democratization, withstanding the pressures from activists

(Agné: 2011, 46).

This article will first portray the current debate on

citizen activism towards public policies both in the

democratic theory and in the public policy analysis

literatures. The next session will focus on the concept of

5 A similar complaint is made in the U.S. The USTR supposedly was thegatekeeper during the Uruguay Round and could curtail the activism ofother actors (Goldman: 1994, 651).

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“participation”. In the following one we will work with the

concept of influence. In the sequence, we apply the concepts

of participation and influence to a specific case. The

article concludes with a policy-oriented suggestion on how to

bring meaningful participation and influence of society

actors and other areas of the government into the decision-

making process of Brazilian foreign policy.

The wave

In 1969, Sherry Arnstein pointed out in a seminal

article that “the idea of citizen participation is a little

like eating spinach: no one is against it in principle

because it is good for you” (Arnstein: 1969, 216). She argued

that like freedom, democracy and world peace, the right a

citizen has in influencing public policy was almost a

consensus. She wrote in a period of upheaval, where the

expressionless face of state bureaucracy seemed at odds with

popular demands. Reaction to autocratic powers and better

response to people’s needs explained its creation. But as the

burden on state responsibilities increased, political

officials delegated powers to unelected bureaucracies. At the

peak of the technocratic fad that was sweeping state-society

relations since the 1930s, citizens were increasingly worried

about the power of autonomous bureaucracies (Mccubbins,

Nollet al.: 1987, 243; Nylen: 2003, 3). They had and have

expertise, resources, strategic information and legal

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legitimacy. They used and still uses these tools to insulate

themselves and choose policies that departure from the ones

supported by elected politicians. It is not odd to see them

undermining democratic values and threating democracy itself

(Mccubbins, Nollet al.: 1987, 246; Meier e O'toole: 2006, 1).

Even a personality who epitomized such situation such as

Henry Kissinger complained: “the staff on which modern

executives come to depend develop a momentum of their own.

What starts out as an aid to decision-makers often turns into

a practically autonomous organization whose internal problems

structure and sometimes compound the issues which it was

originally designed to solve” (Kissinger: 1966, 509). This

was a threat to the foundations of the democratic regime,

particularly in countries with great social demands

(Schmitter e Karl: 1991, 81). The ideal democracy requires

final control from citizens over the agenda – became

increasingly difficult to reach (Dahl: 2006, 9).

We now live in a countermovement of rolling back the

power back to society (Krause e Meier: 2003, 73).

Increasingly, citizens and organized groups demanded that

government should “open the decision-making process to the

public and gracefully make the transition from professional

administrator and facilitator” (Callahan: 2006, 156). People

“want a direct say, not filtered through elected

representatives or lobby groups” (Bishop e Davis: 2002, 14).

The task of engaging citizens directly into the daily

9

policymaking became the heart of the literature on

“collaborative governance”, which criticizes central control,

hierarchy and single authority and promotes networks,

coordination, mediation and multiple authorities (Booher:

2007).

Citizens, activists and scholars who support a more

porous state apparatus do not see more actors in the decision

making arena as a threat to regular democratic channels. In

fact, this extended activities could prevent government

officials from choosing policies which reflect their own

interests (Dür e De Bièvre: 2007, 1). Active participation

and influence is equated with more efficient and effective

services, satisfied citizens, better decisions, citizen

empowerment and less paternalistic practices (Donahue e

Zeckhauser: 2006, 505; Eubanks: 2007; Neshkova e Guo: 2012,

269; Nylen: 2003, 48; Smith e Larimer: 2010, 201). It may

improve networks and communication, have educative effects

and can give participants a sense of self-improvement and

agency (Nylen: 2003, 28, 62; Roberts: 2004, 323). Some even

claim that opening the decision making process the general

public interest might prevail, instead of a narrow set of

interest groups (Callahan: 2006, 160; Rowbottom: 2010, 73;

Yackee: 2011, 375). Finally, the activity can serve to find

what specific sectors of society want (information) or can be

just an effort to promote openness and accountability

(Callahan: 2006, 157-8).

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This relentless wave wanted to have more oversight even

in domains considered to be in the field of foreign policy.

For them, the conception of what should be considered

national interest can be contested (Headley e Burton: 2012,

236). Several authors point to criticism leveled at this

activist wave. Admittedly, the quest for more democratic

governance in public bureaucracies is a fad (Bowornwathana e

Poocharoen: 2010, 304). As an author points out, some say

that society “should not be consumed by the potentially

extravagant demands of participatory government when public

business can be delegated to a class of representatives and

administrators who reliably advance their interests” (Fung:

2006, 670). Some argue that promoting public participation

will be far from equalizing influence of all interested

parties. This is partially right, as “those who choose to

participate in a public participation program are self-

selecting” and rampant interest group activity might also

undermine the legitimacy of the democratic regime (Creighton:

2005, 12; Dür e De Bièvre: 2007, 1; Herrnson, Shaikoet al.:

1998, 215; Yackee e Yackee: 2006, 135).

Participation

Participation is a concept highly debated in political

science, usually connected with the broader issue of

legitimacy in a democratic environment6. For Sidney Verba and

Norman Nie, in the election cycle it means the activities6 For a short appraisal of contending theories see Merolla: 2008.

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private citizens perform aimed at influencing the choice of

government personnel and/or the actions they take. It is by

examining citizens’ political participation that political

scientists assess the quality of democratic representation.

The term is also used in the field of public policy

analysis and is thought as an activity – lobbying, electoral

campaigning, paying taxes, performing jury duty and public

hearings (Callahan: 2006, 150-1; Weible, Heikkilaet al.: 2012,

16). Participation in this sense entails a meeting or medium

for an interaction – speak, hear, exchange opinions, face-to-

face contact – a communicative process where several actors

interact. This however is increasingly an inaccurate frame to

societies where virtual venues of activism play a great role

in policymaking (Young: 2002, 121).

Several authors, particularly those studying local

participatory arrangements, equate participation with

influence and changes in public policies (Brasil, Carneiroet

al.: 2013; Creighton: 2005, 7; Nylen: 2003; Roberts: 2004,

320; Wampler: 2012). Most of the literature that assesses

Brazilian politics in participatory budgets initiatives and

municipals councils suffers from the same problem. In one

particular work, participation has several meanings. It is

equated to influence and is measured by the participation of

the society actors in the proceedings of a particular

Council; but it also is understood as efficacy in terms of

reaching desired outcomes (Fuks: 2005, 48). The World Bank

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also defines participation in similar lines: a “process

through which stakeholders influence and share control over

development initiatives and the decisions and resources that

affect them” (Bishop e Davis: 2002, 15).

We should be cautious about equating voiced positions

with influence (Dür e De Bièvre: 2007, 7). In her seminal

article, Sherry Arnstein indicated the existence of eight

different levels of citizen participation: manipulation,

therapy, informing, consultation, placation, partnership,

delegated power and citizen control. They are a

simplification, but have great analytical benefits. In the

first six, citizens may be heard and express their opinions,

but “they lack the power to insure that their view will be

heeded by the powerful”. She portrays a specific situation

that resembles much of state-society interaction at the

Brazilian federal government: “In the name of citizen

participation, people are placed on rubberstamp advisory

committees or advisory boards for the express purpose of

‘educating’ them or engineering their support” (Arnstein:

1969, 217-22). Other authors followed a similar conceptual

path. Roz Diane Lasker and John Guidry differentiate between

opportunity, voice and influence: “Players have an

opportunity to participate in the process when they are

invited or when they initiate an opportunity on their own.

They have a voice when the opportunity enables them to

express their ideas to others. They have an influential voice

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when their ideas are used to make something happen (for

example, when actions are taken to address issues they raise

or when their ideas shape actions that are taken)” (Lasker e

Guidry: 2008, 201). The best concept to engage in the crucial

difference between purpose and results, design and outcomes

is still Huntington and Nelson’s. For them, political

participation is the “activity by private citizens designed

to influence government decision-making” (Huntington e

Nelson, 3).

Kathe Callahan defines “conventional participation” when

the decision maker “controls the ability of the public to

influence the agenda and the process”. In this case, he/she

invites other actors to the table only when seemed

appropriate, “usually after the issues have been framed and

decisions have been made.” They select time, location and

format of meetings and who will be invited, what will be the

agenda. In this case, usually “issues have been framed, the

agenda set, and most decisions made”. The participation is

therefore symbolic, a one-way route; it does not entail

deliberation, dialogue and an opportunity to change a

position of government officials (Callahan: 2006, 158-60).

There are several limitations that can preclude the

government from promoting the participation of other actors:

the agency is already committed to a decision, internal

opposition to bring other actors to the table, time or

resource constraints, and the nature of the decision is

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secret, has national security implications or can impair the

bargaining position with another actors (Creighton: 2005,

41).

Many meetings between public actors and private actors

“fail to discipline officials”, as Fung points out (Fung:

2006, 679). That is why participation cannot be equated with

influence. Participation is set of techniques, not a final

objective in itself (Bishop e Davis: 2002, 26). Government

officials have a vast array of tools to intentionally and

unintentionally use participatory schemes to legitimize their

own preferences and usually do not even bother to give

feedback to these actors explaining if, how and why their

opinions were (or were not) regarded in the decision-making

process. We should not, however, embrace the idea that this

kind of result is “is a waste of time for both the

organization and the public.” The dialogue can play a

salutary role in the learning of all involved even if does

not bring influence (Creighton: 2005, 9 and 28; Lasker e

Guidry: 2008, 8 and 201-7).

Influence

The expectation to yield influence is a basic premise

when citizens and groups interact with government officials.

People want the government to “hear rather than simply to

listen, nod and do what they were going to do in the first

place” (Cornwall e Gaventa: 2001, 34). They want actual

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influence over the decision-making process, not a bogus

scheme created by government officials o placate critics,

gather information and coopt society (Arnstein: 1969, 216;

Creighton: 2005, 11; Holtzman: 1966, 114-5; Potters e Sloof:

1996, 407).

It is not enough to detect who participates and how they

interact. We need to know how participation is translated in

actual policy; in another words, who influences and how. The

concept of influence lies at the heart of the political

science discipline and should not be equated to

participation. For more than a century scholars have studied

this issue. Few consensuses emerged. The reason is the

multiple ways individuals or organizations can influence and

how little straightforward evidence is produced to prove this

connection. One of the most advanced areas is the use of

quantitative methods to understand how campaign donations

affect voting behavior. This ambitious research agenda,

however, is riddled with problems (Fox e Rothenberg: 2011).

Some authors assess influence from database of interactions.

One contribution uses 6,300 responses from five surveys

conducted from 1978 to 1998 in order to grasp influence on

federal state agencies in the U.S. Their premise is that more

time spent with policymakers leads to more influence

(Kelleher e Yackee: 2006). Other influential study uses as a

proxy for influence 1,700 public comments sent to for U.S.

federal agencies (Yackee e Yackee: 2006). These efforts,

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however, have limitation. As Philippe Schmitter stated in the

1970s, the number of interactions between government

authorities and interest groups should not be considered as a

proxy for influence (Schmitter: 1971, 16-7).

The concept of influence is highly connected to the idea

of power. Political power can be conceived as “relative

influence over policy outcomes.” Who wields “true political

power within a system are those who can influence the

problems alternatives that are placed on the government

agenda” (Smith e Larimer: 2010, 76-7). If we are talking

about actor A influencing actor B it is not enough to

demonstrate coincident or convergent opinion – this is an

spurious correlation (Schmitter: 1971, 16-7). A potential to

influence is not equal to the actual influence. If a powerful

political actor knows the policy process is convergent with

his/her preferences, there are no incentives for trying to

influence the policy process. That is why scholars like

Robert Dahl argues it is not possible to test and compare the

relative influence of two actors if they have the same

initial preferences (Dahl: 1982, 12, Dahl, 1958 #3020).

Roz Diane Lasker e John Guidry created an useful method

to assess influence. This involves three steps. First we

should ask “who had a voice”, or who expressed a particular

set of grievance, ideas or proposals. This usually means

finding who was involved in the decision-making process. The

second is to detect how these expressions were dealt in the

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decision making process. Where they proposed? Was it

incorporated into the final decision or output? Most of the

task is tracking the interaction using a specific set of

questions: What? Whose? When? (Lasker e Guidry: 2008).

We should note that the actor influencing might not be

participating or even displaying the intention of

influencing. A think tank or university may influence the

decision making process indirectly through the impact of its

works (papers, journals, seminars, press conferences)

(Jordan, Halpinet al.: 2004, 207). Sometimes ideas produced by

a marginalized group in society can override powerful actors.

It is nonetheless visible several pathways in which one can

influence a specific policy process: 1) Provide written

comments; 2) Participate in meetings; 3) Participate in

advisory, regulatory negotiation, or other alternative

dispute resolution committees; 4) Communicate informally with

agency personnel; 5) Bring suit against the institution; 6)

Use the Parliament; 7) Use another agency; 8) Mobilize

membership and society; 9) Go to the President (Dür e De

Bièvre: 2007, 2 and 8; Furlong: 1998, 52).

We must also understand that sometimes interest groups

will refrain from act on individual government issues and

will focuses on underwrite and finance political candidates,

parties and ideologies or go to court to have broader

influence upon public policies (Kleinberg, 2010: 540;

Potters, 1996: 407). Several factors affect influence –

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institutions, group characteristics, issue-specific factors,

legal backing and authority. Unequal resources allow

organizations to “exercise unequal influence in determining

what alternatives are seriously considered” (Dahl: 1982, 47).

There are indications that “off the record lobbying” by

private actors have great influence on the preliminary stages

of the policy process and that private face-to-face contact

“are more influential than (...) less interactive

communication methods” (Yackee: 2011, 378).

Empirical Examination

In this last section we will apply the concepts and

considerations presented above to a specific case. Our

dependent variable is the relative influence of government

and society actors on the final position Brazil had in

GATT/WTO multilateral trade negotiations. The first step is

to define what stage of the decision-making process we are

analyzing. We decided to cover both ends – the domestic

decision making process and the multilateral one, where the

domestic position is executed. Sometimes decisions are taken

in a different moment than the one we think it is the right

one, or even “before the policy process has really started”

(Dür e De Bièvre: 2007, 8; Kleinberg e Fordham: 2010, 523).

If we frame our analyses at the wrong juncture, we will

wrongly acknowledge the role of actors and who participate

and influence in the decision making process. This usually

19

happens when we rely on private actors testimony. Sometimes

social activists and interest group representatives think the

real political process occurred when they actively

participated in meetings with government officials; in fact,

their invitation sometimes served only for the purpose of

rubberstamping or giving legitimacy to a decision already

taken. Another different matter is the “where”. We

acknowledge that the formal regulatory framework is a poor

index to assess how our variables behave7.

In our analysis, the state is seen both as an actor and

as an structure. As an actor, its composing unites

(individual and organizations) have preferences, strategies

and roles. As a structure, the state is a policy-making arena

(Immergut: 2006, 559). The analysis below is based on

extensive primary sources and on confidential interviews. The

task is to interpret what this information brings us in terms

of the relative role of different actors to the decision

making process. A superficial and straightforward reading is

simple. In the 1940’s Itamaraty had almost no weight in the

decision-making because most of the delegates came from other

branches of the government and society; now this reality has

changed as the institution brings at least half of all

personnel involved in the meetings. The role of non-

governmental forces is also relevant. In the beginning, they

participated in all formal domestic decision-making arenas

7 In our in-depth studies we found great distance between how a formalarrangement was suppose to work and how it actually did function.

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and had a share in the ranks of multilateral representatives;

now, they are completely excluded. In a nutshell, Itamaraty

has increased its share of relevance and other actors have

faced a contrary tendency.

Coordination units

From 1946 to 2010 the government created coordination

units formally responsible to define what would be the

Brazilian position in GATT/WTO multilateral trade

negotiations. It is far from truth, therefore, the claims

embraced by the literature about a supposedly novelty in this

kind of arrangements. There was always recognition that

multilateral trade negotiations had impact on several areas

of the economy and the regulatory framework of the state.

This precluded the decision-making process from being

concentrated in a single organization. Since 1946 we can also

observe the participation and influence of organized groups

from society. They had regular standing in these governmental

arrangements and could attend meetings and voice their

concerns.

A global analysis of the preparatory arrangements that

shaped Brazilian activities in multilateral negotiations

demonstrates that all of them had great formal resilience.

They outlived their original role for longer period, becoming

defunct relics of obsolete institutional designs. CCAG

(Comissão Consultiva de Assuntos do GATT), created the

21

Ministry of Finance in 1954, was only officially abolished in

1994, despite the fact that its heyday was in the late 1950s

and since the 1960s did not have any meaningful influence in

the decision-making process. CONCEX (Conselho Nacional de

Comércio Exterior), created in the 1960s, resurrected briefly

in the 1980s and it is not possible to find the legislation

that brought it to an end. GIS (Grupo Interministerial de

Serviços) and GIB (Grupo Interministerial de Bens), created

in 1986 to shape the Brazilian position to the Uruguay Round,

was extinguished only in 1999, five years after the Round

ended. Their legal foundations portray certain aspirations in

regard the relative power of government organizations and the

level of society participation in the decision-making

process. Seldom, however, they followed these expectations in

reality.

From 1946 to 1958 we can detect some characteristics.

First, is the level of engagement representatives from

economic groups had on the decision-making process. In the

preparatory phase, they participated in all formal and

informal arrangements – usually big representatives like

Federação das Indústrias do Estado de São Paulo (FIESP),

Federação das Indústrias do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (FIERJ),

Confederação Nacional da Indústria (CNI) and Confederação

Nacional do Comércio (CNC), but also professors from academic

institutions. In these early days, the state apparatus had

few resources to adequately prepare the Brazilian position.

22

The government consequently used these actors to gather

information, prepare policy positions and assess proposals

from foreign government. This opened the door to translate

participation into influence. We can see this dynamic in

1946, when Roberto Simonsen, a powerful industrial

representative and senator, worked from his home in São Paulo

several propositions that would shape the Brazilian stance –

at least three participants of these meetings would later be

integrated in Brazilian delegations8.

The maximum influence can be seen in the work of

Comissão Consultiva para Acordos Comerciais (CCAC), created

in 1950. It had nine members, three from the private sector.

These representatives participated in most sessions, and

voted in the proceedings – something that would never repeat

thereafter.9 In this early period, the government already

noted that opening the decision-making process would increase

the leverage of powerful interest groups. To counter this

trend they designed innovative participatory arrangements. In

1948, with the creation of CCICE (Comissão Consultiva de

Intercâmbio Comercial com o Exterior) the government

8 Proposta brasileira à Conferência de Londres. Diário Carioca. 5/11/46; Conferência Internacional de Comércio. O Economista. Setembro de 1946. Ano XXVIII. No 318. Pág. 13-14; Kafka: 1998, 42-9; Almeida: 1947; Phillips: 1946, 96.9 Teve repercussão favorável na indústria de São Paulo a criação daComissão Consultiva de Acordos Comerciais junto ao Itamarati. Folha daManhã. 22/3/50; Colaboração oportuna. Jornal do Brasil. 20/3/50; Ata da614a sessão do Conselho Nacional de Economia. 3/12/57. 1U. Lata 102.Arquivo Nacional; Flávio da Cunha Bueno. Relações comerciais externas doBrasil. I Congresso Brasileiro de Comércio Exterior. Associação Comercialde São Paulo. 1956. Arquivo FIESP (Campinas); Bastos: 1953, 62.

23

delegated to the Ministry of Finance the responsibility to

represent the interests of consumers. One decade later, with

the creation of CPA (Conselho de Política Aduaneira) the

government decided to give one seat for a workers’ union

representative. Despite the innovation, there is no record of

influence of both initiatives in the decision-making process.

Participation did not result in influence.

Second, there was great variation on who was the

coordinator in the bureaucratic decision-making process and

what this role entailed. The coordinator had great

importance. He could set the agenda, invite participants,

choose the order of business and consolidate the meetings’

results. Several public organizations battled to have this

role. Itamaraty led the way in 1948, when Congress mandated

the creation of a task force in the organization to review

the 1947 tariff concessions. This situation was briefly

reversed. The Carteira de Comércio Exterior do Banco do

Brasil (CEXIM) managed to snatch the coordination role for

herself and negotiated several trade treaties without the

participation of Itamaraty. Soon afterwards, Itamaraty

managed to regain the responsibility with CCAC. But it was a

short-lived victory. In 1954, the Ministry of Finance created

the Comissão Consultiva dos Assuntos do GATT (CCAG). In

GATT’s Kennedy Round (1963-67), however, the coordination

went back to Itamaraty and despite several attempts to change

this situation, until today diplomats remain at the

24

frontline. They were not an impersonal and neutral aggregator

of preferences from government organizations and citizens.

They had predilections of their own. It was common to hear

complaints from the private sector about how CCAC own

Secretaria Executiva (in Itamaraty) already drew the

decisions and the Commission only approved them.

At the end of the Kennedy Round, a new law gave to the

Conselho Nacional de Comércio Exterior (CONCEX) the

prerogative to decide what position the country would defend

in multilateral trade negotiations. Despite being coordinated

by the Ministério da Indústria e do Comércio (MIC), Itamaraty

managed to control the proceedings in this theme and the

meetings – attended by representatives of ten different

government institutions – usually served to rubberstamp the

diplomats’ policy papers. Hence, participation did not lead

to influence. It should be noted that when CONCEX was created

there was already three other venues that could strive for

being the coordination forum – CCAG, CPA and also the Grupo

de Trabalho para as Negociações Kennedy do GATT, created in

Itamaraty. The coordinator might also has a role of

organizer, delegating responsibilities and just consolidating

what each area has to offer. During the Kennedy Round,

Itamaraty created subgroups responsible for framing the

Brazilian position in specific topics. With this structure,

the Ministério Fazenda had a major role in controlling the

tariff offer the country made.

25

Third, even when not participating directly in the

decision-making process other actors had influence. Three

cases are important in demonstrating this effect, each one

representing a different pathway by which one can influence

without direct participation. The first is the Economic

Commission for Latin American (ECLA). It had great influence

on the domestic decision-making by the appeal of its ideas,

the activism of its employees, the meetings it promoted and

the technical assistance it provided to the Brazilian

government. It did not need a seat, as it had something more

important: the minds of mid-level decision-makers. In topics

such as regionalism and commodity agreements the Brazilian

position was clearly influenced by policy papers circulated

in Santiago10. The second is the role the Parliament had. Even

without participating in the preparatory work, they

influenced decision-makers. The reason is plain simple.

Several congressmen owned, managed or represented firms that

would be affected by these negotiations. They actively

undercut diplomatic efforts by changing, delaying or simply

refusing to approve multilateral trade initiatives. The third

case is the profusion of telegrams, letters and visits from

10 See De Miguel Ozório para Barbosa da Silva. Abril de 1953. DivisãoEconômica. Informações e relatórios. 1953. AHI-RJ; De João Carlos Munizpara Raul Fernandes. III Sessão da ECLA. Confidencial. Nova Iorque,20/5/50. Maço 6.751; Desptel 2 para Delbracies. 7/1/48; Tel 2 daDelbracies. 8/1/48; Desptel 1 para Delbracies. 9/1/48. AHI-BSB; PauloNogueira Batista. Cooperação Econômica Interamericana. PNB pi Batista,P.1966.06.00; O desenvolvimento econômico e o setor externo.Conferência pronunciada pelo Bem. G.A. Maciel na ESG em 7/7/69. GMA pi69.07.07.

26

private companies and their associations. The general rule is

that they directed their resources to the government

institutions perceived to have more power over decisions and

also to the institutional environments more receptive to

their demands. They tried to nudge decisions to other

bureaucracies or empower more sympathetic corners of the

government. In 1949, several firms in São Paulo used the

connection with FIESP and CNI to resist and suggest tariff

concessions; in the early 1960’s firms from Rio de Janeiro

managed to change some commitments Brazil made at GATT. In

this period, if the preferences of Itamaraty or even the

Ministry of Finance clashed with those from society, they

could use the parliament and other public organizations –

like CACEX – to influence the position the country would

defend externally11.

In the second period, from the Tokyo Round onwards,

things changed. Itamaraty acquired a higher level of power in

the coordination mechanism. It tried to exclude from the

decision-making process three traditional participants from

the private sector – CNI, CNC and CNA – but had to step back.

During the six years of negotiations, the plenary of Unidade

11 Circular 47/49. São Paulo, 5/3/49. Centro das Indústrias do Estado deSão Paulo. Circulares FIESP/CIESP; Circular 57/49. São Paulo, 19/3/49.Centro das Indústrias do Estado de São Paulo. Circulares FIESP/CIESP.Arquivo FIESP (Campinas); Memorando de Genival de Almeida Santos paraRaul Fernandes. Relatório da Comissão de Estudo da III Reunião das PartesContratantes do Acordo Geral sobre Tarifas Aduaneiras e Comércio.11/3/49. Maço Temático Classificado 660.(04) (GATT/50-55). AHI-BSB;Circular 47/49. São Paulo, 5/3/49. Centro das Indústrias do Estado de SãoPaulo. Circulares FIESP/CIESP. Arquivo FIESP (Campinas).

27

de Negociação (UG) met officially 21 times. UG also relocated

to Geneva several times, where members participated directly

in the negotiations12. It would be the last time the private

sector would have a seat in the formal decision unit.

In the subgroups, despite Itamaraty being the

coordinator of all of them, it usually delegated power to

technical ministries. An important aspect of the interaction

within the Executive from the Kennedy Round to the Uruguay

Round is the fact that when Itamaraty’s preferences clashed

with those from others, the organization usually lost the

bureaucratic battle – even when the matter went to the

Presidency. But the big picture demonstrates a clear

advancement of diplomats over other sectors of the

government. They fought and won the right of controlling the

instructions sent to delegations, and also the power to

nominate the delegates – in the past it was a regular feature

big industrial organizations nominate and pay the expenses

for “their” delegates in Brazilian delegations.

In the Uruguay Round (1986-1994), Itamaraty mantained a

firm grip over the decision-making process, especially in

deciding who would shape the Brazilian position. In this

period we can detect a characteristic that is still common

practice in the Brazilian government: the promotion of

“selective participation” of citizens, companies and social

12 Ofício ao Presidente da República João Baptista de Oliveira Figueiredo.GATT. NCMs. Avaliação. 8/11/79. Maço especial da Divisão de Assuntos Internacionais do Itamaraty.

28

groups. This undertaking usually starts with the premise that

a decision was already reached inside the government, but

needs to be supplemented by a layer of legitimacy. To obtain

it, government officials invite targeted organization to

participate in meetings. The format is usually the same. The

government invites actors who will support a particular

position; the agenda is diffuse; the connection with the

actual multilateral negotiations, narrow; a group of

diplomats gives bland and superficial presentations about the

status of negotiations; and rarely give any feedback about

how the meetings influenced the final outcome. A good example

is the informal meeting promoted by Itamaraty with 21

companies and government agencies in the topic of

international trade in services in the beginning of 1984. All

participants had a position similar to Itamaraty’s in the

topic and the ministry used a survey to gather information

about the preferences of participants. Not surprisingly, the

result was a consensus on a policy already devised and

maintained by Brazilian diplomats13.

The ministry, therefore, would act as the gatekeeper

responsible to “listen” and translate domestic interests,

necessities and values into the external activities of the

Brazilian state. It would only accept individual demands from

companies, citizens or groups if they were convergent with

Brazilian national interests. But it was the ministry itself

13 Tel 15 para DelBragen. GATT. Serviços. Reunião Informal. 06/03/84 (confidencial). PNB ONU G II 1983.03.00. Pasta IV.

29

who would judge what was the national interest, if

participation would take place, who would participate and how

(and if) this participation would influence policy.

With the creation of CAMEX (Câmara de Comércio Exterior)

in 1995 it seemed that Itamaraty would decrease its role in

managing the Brazilian position in multilateral trade talks.

The hopes were short-lived. A diplomat headed the body in the

strategic period of preparation for the Doha Round and its

coordination activity would later be curtailed. The tendency

of excluding citizens and its representatives from the

decision-making – a new feature in the Uruguay Round –

happened again. Originally, CAMEX comprised six ministries –

others could be invited – but not society actors, unlike all

instances from 1946 to 1979. Only in 2003 the Conselho

Consultivo do Setor Privado (CONEX) was created, an instance

with private actors who could suggest changes in Brazilian

foreign trade policy. CONEX participants received scant

information about ongoing negotiations, had limited access to

the agenda of trade talks, could not appraise if delegates in

Geneva were heeding to their advices and, finally, had no

instruments to hinder government officials in case of

divergence (Benítez: 2012, 85).14 By putting citizen

participation on a different track than the actual decision-

making process, state actors managed to maintain their

freedom while creating an “empty ritual of participation”

14 I Reunião do Conselho Consultivo do Setor Privado – CONEX. 1/2/2006. CAMEX.

30

(Arnstein: 1969, 216). The episode of the formulation of

Brazil's position in pharmaceutical patents dispute against

the United States in 2001 constitutes an important exception.

There were intense interaction between Itamaraty, other areas

of the government and interest groups. This, however, is not

the prevailing interaction to shape the Brazilian position at

the WTO (Oliveira e Moreno: 2007).

The preparations for the Millennium Round in the late

1990’s again demonstrated the leadership of Itamaraty. In a

bureaucratic move to rollback CAMEX, it managed to create

GITCIMS (Grupo Interministerial de Trabalho sobre Comércio

Internacional de Mercadorias e de Serviços), a coordination

mechanism headed by diplomats. It is interesting to note that

neither CAMEX or GITCIMS became a permanent coordination

mechanism during the Doha Round. Like the Uruguay Round, most

process took place in informal meetings between government

agencies, when Itamaraty deemed relevant. Available evidence

from CAMEX proceedings indicates that despite some activism

between 2003-2006, most meetings where trade negotiations

were discussed, Itamaraty presented its view of the

negotiating process and other ministries only took note and

acquiesced to the decisions made.

Another initiative of the period was the creation of

Coalizão Empresarial Brasileira (CEB) in 1996. Launched with

great fanfare and extolled by academic works since then as a

novelty, the initiative brought together businessmen to

31

engage with the government the agenda of trade negotiations.

The format of interaction was usually the same. A group would

travel to Brasília and attend meetings, public hearings,

symposium and workshops with senior policy makers. They were

not engaged in the actual decision making process; neither

could they have access to classified material about the

negotiations.

A central aspect to explain how participation in the

past delivered influence and why today this is not true is

the role of information, the proneness of key government

officials to heed to advice and the access to the real

decision-making process. In terms of information, until the

Kennedy Round the private sector and other government actors

had more access to confidential information about

negotiations than now. This reflected the lack of expertise

in the government to engage in these negotiations and a

willingness to engage with these actors. They knew what was

happening at the multilateral level and the interaction had a

problem-solving orientation. Now, Itamaraty filters

information more aggressively from multilateral negotiations

and updates are not shared swiftly (when they are shared). In

CAMEX meetings, when the theme of multilateral trade

negotiations is on the agenda, it usually means Itamaraty

will update participants of the latest developments.15 With

this arrangement, other actors cannot keep track of the

15 A good example is Ata da XXXIX Reunião do Conselho de Ministros da Câmara de Comércio Exterior – CAMEX. 11/8/2005.

32

crucial fact of how Itamaraty integrate their preferences

into the position Brazil presents to its trade partners. The

fact that society actors are not at the table – they were

sidetracked into an innocuous arena – adds another layer to

the decrease of influence. Asymmetry of information between

state and private agents, besides high monitoring costs

deeply affects how influent you can be (Dür e De Bièvre:

2007, 4). It is not surprising that participation now means

just “exchange of views” and speeches rather than effective

engagements based on real influence.

One of the best portrays of how the interaction between

government and society happened in the late 1990’s is one

interview of José Botafogo Gonçalves, a diplomat who had a

central role in interacting with representatives from civil

society. For him, the activity was relevant because it showed

the size of the mine negotiators would later have to walk on.

His role was predominantly informing these actors, giving

presentations to them and gathering their reaction. For him,

the whole effort was effective, but limited because most

actors consulted were protectionists. Their influence was

restricted to demonstrate that the defensive position already

taken was the right one (Gonçalves: 2010, 13-6).

In Brazil, most diplomats saw – and still sees – the

engagement in the international arena as a source of

constraints. Brazilian foreign policy is conceived as a

cautious and usually passive effort to not disturb the status

33

quo, and not as a mirror of the broad set of ideas and

aspirations of Brazilian citizens. The state is not

completely autonomous or can shape interests; it can’t choose

any course of action it desires. There is a range of policies

that cannot upset specific domestic interests. Commitments

outside these veto points might jeopardize their freedom,

their relative autonomy and in more extreme cases their own

preeminence in the decision-making process. They would follow

the preferences of other actors in case of potential

punishment and when they don’t have preferences themselves.

Composition of Delegations

It was not the final step when coordination arrangements

draft the instructions to Brazilian negotiators. Usually

instructions were imprecise, bypassed and interpreted by

Brazilian delegates. That is why we should pay attention to

what happens at the international arena. The table below

displays the composition of Brazilian delegations to

important international trade meetings. The result is similar

to what we saw in the last section. Until the 1950s, we see

representatives of industry, agriculture and commerce and

university professors sitting alongside diplomats and

government officials as delegates. They provided an important

role as advisors – a situation that remained until the end of

the 1970s. Today, Brazilian delegations are far more

concentrate in the government and in Itamaraty.

34

We should, however, be careful in examining the table as

there are several pitfalls we can run into. The first is case

selection16. If we are looking for who shapes public policy,

we need to find relevant junctures in which strategic

decisions are made. In addition, if we are looking on how

actors historically interact we need to be sure about the

comparability of our sample. In our table we have some

problems regarding both issues. First, are these critical

junctures in which Brazil participated in multilateral trade

negotiations? No, they are not. The Tokyo (1973) and also the

Marrakesh (1994) meetings, for example, were mostly

ceremonial – decisions were taken informally before. If we

want to know who participated and had influence in the

decision making process we should examine the period before

the meetings in these cases. Second, are all cases

comparable? No, they are not. The first four (Geneva, Havana,

Annecy and Renegotiation of List III) are not ministerial

meetings. They do not gather high-level decision making

personnel like the last five (Tokyo, Punta del Este,

Marrakesh, Doha and Cancun). In fact, they encompass all

negotiation process in one single and long event – usually

lasting several months. Trying to compare just ministerial

meetings would be inadequate as they also differ in important

aspects and because the first GATT ministerial meeting

16 Although our focus is not review the literature, some references arerelevant: Bennett e Elman: 2006; George e Bennett: 2005; George: 1979;Matz: 2004; Shively: 2006.

35

occurred only in 195717. Third, how accurate is the data? It

is sure not indisputable. We used the official list of

representatives, but they are issued before the meeting takes

place. It is common that several people listed either did not

travel to the meeting or were substituted by others. In the

end though these list are the most accurate source we have.

The second pitfall is the understanding of what does the

information displayed on the table means and the limits of

our interpretation. The table only informs us who

participated in the meetings. We cannot rely on this

information to state that a particular institution had

necessarily more influence in the proceedings – or that the

government was more open to society. We can only know this

when we have much more sources. And that is what we got to

back our argument in this paper.

To exemplify this pitfall we can compare the

parliamentary participation in Brazilian delegation in the

Renegotiation of List III in Geneva (1958) and in the Seattle

Ministerial Meeting (1999). While in the former senators and

deputies comprised 15% of the delegation, in the latter this

number jumps to 25%. Without doing a careful review of other

sources, this could lead us to think that the Brazilian

Congress was more active in the second meeting then in the

first. Based on books, articles and primary sources we

actually know that the 1950’s were the heyday of

parliamentary intrusion in foreign trade policy. It was not17 See GATT/MTN.GNG/NG14/W/4. 12/6/1987.

36

just a matter of debates; the Executive was severely

curtailed by congressional activities. Several deputies and

senators had knowledge on and interest in the theme and used

various instruments not just to participate but also to

influence how Brazil acted. This is a situation clearly

different from the Seattle Ministerial Meeting, when the

majority of representatives had scant experience on the

negotiations and few instruments to influence the Executive.

They were invited, in fact, to participate in a separated

meeting just with congressmen from other countries and not in

the negotiations themselves.

Participating in delegations increased dramatically the

potential to influence Brazilian activities in multilateral

trade negotiations. First, it gave participants an

exceptional opportunity to learn how trade diplomacy operated

and what themes were discussed. This knowledge was crucial in

educating a generation of bureaucrats, scholars, congressmen

and businessmen. This formative feature was lost in the

1970s. Afterwards, even if they managed to be invited to

participate in trade talks in Geneva, this activity was

different from the one conducted in the past. Before, they

could nominate “their” delegates in Brazilian delegations

(resembling the domestic coordination arrangement); they had

access to confidential information; and they could also be in

the rooms where negotiations actually happened. Now, when

invited to go to Geneva, they usually face a situation where

37

they are lectured about negotiations and what the Brazilian

position is; they are not there to influence, their purpose

is to learn and, if possible, support at home the decisions

already taken.

Second, with direct access to the final arena where

Brazilian position was presented they could monitor if

government officials were heeding to the suggestions made in

previous interactions at the domestic level. It was a crucial

asset. In the 1947 and 1958 Geneva tariff talks, when

representatives from the industrial sector disagreed with

offers and immediately contacted their allies and superiors

in Brazil, these lobbied congressmen and government officials

to change the position. And if this did not work, they even

managed to rollback concessions in the ratification

procedure. In 1948, during the approval of the results in

Congress several tariff offers were cancelled; the same thing

happened in 1960, when congressmen appraised the

renegotiation of Brazilian commitments in GATT. The periodic

refusal to accept multilateral commitments was a permanent

incentive to government officials engage in genuine

consultations with congressmen, businessmen and organized

interest groups. Here participation really brought influence.

This situation contrasts starkly with what happened later.

During the Uruguay Round the parliament never gave credible

threats in order to the Itamaraty engage actively with other

actors in Geneva. When one congressman wanted to participate

38

in the negotiations as a delegate, Brazilian diplomats deemed

the initiative useful to increase the knowledge of

congressmen about international trade talks and pave the way

for the future approval of results – and not as a source of

influence into the decision-making process, as they

explicitly disapproved his engagement in real negotiations.

When they were presented to Congress in June 1994, most

congressmen could not know what was written, because parts of

the text were in French and English18.

The power to appoint delegates to international trade

negotiations has great significance to ascertain who will

participate and ultimately influence. Part of the explanation

of why from the 1940s until the 1960s we have more diversity

in the composition of delegations is the fact that Itamaraty

did not have the power to appoint all delegates. In fact,

until the end of the 1950s it was the Ministry of Finance who

paid the costs of Brazilian participation in GATT meetings

and had great leverage in deciding who would be invited to

the delegations19. 18 Diário da Câmara dos Deputados. 26 de janeiro de 1996. Pág.: 2590; Tel965. GATT. Rodada Uruguai. Tarifas. Agricultura. Observador parlamentar.10 de julho de 1991.

19 Negociações tarifárias. Lista III – Brasil, do GATT. Instruções. 22 deoutubro de 1960. Do ministro Horácio Lafer para o embaixador EdmundoBarbosa da Silva. Confidencial. Temático Classificado 660.(04) (GATT/55-60). AHI-BSB; Memorandum de Paulo Leão de Moura para o chefe substitutodo Departamento Econômico e Comercial. Delegação do Brasil às negociaçõestarifárias brasileiras no GATT. Instruções e regimento interno. 11 defevereiro de 1958. Confidencial. Memorandos classificados (1958). AHI-BSB; Ver despacho no documento Memorandum de Milton Telles Ribeiro para oSr. Chefe, interino, da Divisão Econômica. 3a série de negociações

39

Having delegates from several branches of the government

and even from the private sector voicing and deciding how

Brazil acted brought several problems in terms of hierarchy

and coordination. But these problems were minimized with some

policies directives. First, the head of delegation had the

primacy and ultimate responsibility on how the instructions

from Brazil had to be interpreted. Second, there was suppose

to be only one official channel of communication with

Brazilian authorities. Third, before any pronouncement and

official interaction with other delegates the head of the

delegation had to approve the initiative.

Conclusion: how participation could bring influence?

In the field of human rights, environment and social

policy the interaction between social groups and the state

brought clear changes to public policies (Cohen: 2003, 450).

Can the same kind interaction bring similar results to the

field of multilateral trade negotiations?

Discussing the degree of citizen’s participation on

foreign policy is particularly relevant to the literature on

tarifárias e V reunião das Partes Contratantes do Acordo Geral sobreTarifas Aduaneiras e Comércio. Torquay. 8 de fevereiro de 1951. DivisãoEconômica. Informações e relatórios (1951); ver despachos das chefias doórgão em Memorandum de Hugo Gouthier, chefe interino da DivisãoEconômica, para o Chefe do Departamento Econômico e Consular. Preparaçãodas negociações tarifárias a serem realizadas na V Reunião das PartesContratantes do Acordo Geral de Tarifas e Comércio em Torquay, emsetembro de 1950. 12 de julho de 1950. Divisão Econômica. Informações erelatórios (1949-1950). AHI-RJ.

40

international relations theory. Realist thinkers abhorred the

idea of public opinion encroaching into the domain of foreign

policy. These grievances are partially right. We should be

cautious in linking practices and arrangements from other

policy areas, as foreign policy is a domain with different

systemic forces, rules and actors (Nohlen e Fernández: 2011,

235). This, however, should not be an excuse to exclude the

legitimate grievances of citizens, especially because daily

life is increasingly affected by decisions taken at the

international sphere.

This paper presented a conceptual framework for

understanding the interaction of government and society

actors in the making of public policies. Our purpose was to

disaggregate influence from participation. We showed in a

case study that from 1946 to 1979 all institutional

arrangements introduced civil society associations formally

or informally in the decision-making process. Today, the

Brazilian position presented to trade partners is less

democratic than what it was in the first seven rounds of GATT

negotiations. In the age of innovative arrangements to

integrate citizens and social groups into state activities,

Brazilian positions in multilateral trade negotiations are

the result of a highly impervious decision-making process.

How the government should act in order to promote

meaningful participation? Promoting influence-based

participation is not easy and there is no perfect method to

41

organize the interaction of several government branches and

receive the input from citizens (Neshkova e Guo: 2012, 275).

Government officials should think thoroughly on the dilemma

of size and who might be excluded. More participants bring

fresher ideas, but it is a burden to the decision making

process. There is always the risk of information leaking and

the dilemma of time pressure.

The most important thing is being honest with all

stakeholders in presenting what is the purpose of the

exercise and work to transform participation in a meaningful

exercise. This should involve four tasks – policy appraisal,

policy participation, government action and feedback. First

the government should frame the task and also the nature of

the decision, give notice of the policy problem and assess if

any collaboration is appropriate and how it should be

conducted. A more forceful initiative would be notify the

society about the issue under decision and open channels for

receiving suggestions. This could involve using the Diário

Oficial da União (DOU) in all stages and may be the first

step towards transparency. It would certainly not be new. The

Conselho Federal de Comércio Exterior and CCAC published

notices on DOU and on national newspapers about its meetings

and the ongoing agenda of trade negotiations.

After, it is important to decide what kind of

participation and influence other actors should have.

Government officials must be genuinely committed to this new

42

policymaking process, even it means having their own

preferences being downplayed, criticized or discarded. Public

employees should choose a participation activity, identify,

select and invite stakeholders and inform them of what is the

problem and what is expected from their activities. In case

of meetings, all interested parties should express their

opinions and the government should answer any question in the

most detailed way possible and provide all documentation

asked.

One recurrent idea to reduce the insulation of the

process is separate who negotiate abroad from who coordinates

the domestic position. Itamaraty would retain the

responsibility for the first part, but would have to

relinquish its domestic role as coordinator – a domestic

agency would be responsible for the activity20. In the past,

however, this did not work. As we saw from our empirical case

study, autonomous action by Itamaraty cannot be curbed with

stricter legal requirements to consult other agency before

specific policy decisions are defined. In the Kennedy Round

CONCEX became an arena to rubberstamp Itamaraty’s policy

papers and instructions. The creation of CAMEX also had no

impact in constraining Itamaraty. The main reason for the

lackluster results of these initiatives is the fact that

diplomats have the monopoly on information. It only shares

selectively the content of the plethora of telegrams and

policy papers with other actors, even inside the government. 20 A similar suggestion was made in the American government Goldman, 652.

43

Facts, statistics, knowledge, policy proposals and news

on ongoing negotiations are essential to any meaningful

participation. Any organizational arrangement aimed at

meaningful participation should provide access to inside

information about trade negotiations even when such

information is classified to its members. Actors engaged in

these activities should not be treated as mere listeners and

spectators. The interaction should not be limited to a

specific stage. It should be fused into the decision making

process the notion that the involvement of society and other

governmental actors is not an episode; it is a continuous

dialogue. A first step towards this objective is setting up

terminals in other ministries in order to all have access to

telegrams about trade negotiations; interested actors from

society should also be briefed. With this, all participants

would know what is going on at the multilateral level and the

government interaction would be less about Itamaraty

lecturing on what is going on and more about how other actors

can contribute in a timely manner to the decision-making

process.

A second activity is to take note of all contributions

and provide objective explanation of if and how they were

assimilated to the position Brazilian authorities defended

abroad. This involves the compilation of extensive records of

their activities. The purpose of this “on-the-record

decision-making” is having material to properly monitor

44

government activities. This task is crucial. If participants

engage in activities discover crucial information was omitted

(or biased) and that their efforts were irrelevant or

selectively used based on unknown criteria they will stop

respecting this initiative. Participants should also be

communicated of all significant departures from their advices

and recommendations, even if this is offered afterwards.

A third dimension that must be tackled is the

qualification of participants in the decision-making process.

During the early decades of GATT, a small group of

bureaucrats and representatives of the private sector

developed great expertise in international trade

negotiations. They attended GATT sessions in Geneva,

established lasting links with decision-makers in Brazil and

abroad and engaged regularly in the domestic interactions

that shaped decisions. This background was lost and today

seldom can outsiders (or even government officials from some

ministries) understand what it at stake or even provide

meaningful orientation to principals besides general

guidelines. To overcame this challenge, the best strategies

are: develop deep knowledge, build networks and participate

for extended periods of time. Influence is seldom achieved in

a single interaction. Usually the policy entrepreneur has to

barge into meetings, convince principals and transform ideas

in feasible plans. They should know how the policy subsystem

work – who is involved, how a issue is appraised, what

45

information is strategic, how decisions are made, what

vocabulary is used. They must be above all patient and at the

same time active, helping to create the conditions for

politics, policies and problems streams to align (Kingdon:

1995). There is no single time frame in which the role of

other actors might influence. If we divide the decision

making process in problem representation, option generation,

policy selection and policy implementation we have several

venues for acting. The easiest route to influence is when

policymakers are already looking for expertise knowledge. In

this case, however, the policy course is usually decided and

the influence is restricted to how a particular proposal

should be phrased or what evidence the partner can give to

substantiate a position already taken. But it is certainly a

first step.

Without dealing with the information gap, providing

proper feedback on how the country acted abroad and

increasing the level of interested parties and participants

it will not be possible to democratize the policy arena.

Despite being a rigorous and arduous proposal to a policy

arena currently unaccustomed to this level of interaction, it

is not impossible. Some of these features already existed in

Brazil from the 1940’s until the 1970’s. In the U.S., more

than 800 industry representatives served on the advisory

committees during GATT’s Tokyo Round. There were no case of

leaks and the American position wasn’t compromised externally

46

because of this impressive act of openness (Goldman: 1994,

673).

Fears of capture by interest groups should not be

downplayed as Brazil has a long history of state-society

relations based on privileged corporatist and clientelism

(Nylen: 2003, 20). We should not be naïve to think a

democratic society means everyone will participate and they

will have the same level of influence. People have different

interests, motivation, resources and political standing.

There would be naturally an imbalance in any arrangement to

meaningfully integrated society actors into the decision-

making process, no matter who coordinates it. But how prevent

unbalanced influence? In the 1950’s and 1960’s CPA and CONCEX

solved the issue by proxy – giving to the Ministry the

Finance and worker’s unions the role of representing the

silent majority of consumers. Today PROCON and also CADE

might perform the same role. To withstand the problem of

capture decision makers should also have a mandate to

subsidize the participation of specific groups and use less

costly channels of interaction.

47

Table 1: Composition of Brazilian delegations to multilateral trade negotiations.21

Genebra(1947)

Havana(1947-48)

Annecy(1949)

Torquay

(1951)

ListaIII(1958)

Genebra

(1964)

ListaIII(1967)

Tokyo

(1973)

Puntaldel Este(1986)

Marrakesh

(1994)

Seattle

(1999)

Doha(2001)

Cancun

(2003)

Congress 3% 0 0 0 15% 0 0 0 0 0 24% 0 0

Itamaraty 18% 36% 6% 36% 15% 58% 17% 50% 92% 100% 55% 60% 53%

Ministryof

Finance25% 17% 44% 7% 24% 14% 33% 21% 9% 0 0  0 12%

Othersfrom

government

22% 17% 25% 21% 20% 14% 33% 29% 9% 0 15% 40% 35%

Setorprivado

and

29% 30% 25% 36% 26% 14% 17% 0 0 0 0 0 0

21 UN/E/PC/T/INF/11/Rev.3; De Braga para Fernandes. Havana, 28 de Novembro de 1947. CPDOC. Arquivo Roberto Campos (RC 47.10.10). Pasta 1; Relatório (Annecy). 1949. GATT. Ofícios (1949-1954). AHI-RJ; Relatório (Torquay). 16 de março de 1951. GATT. Ofícios (1949-1954). AHI-RJ; GATT/TNB/INF/5 e Relatório da Renegociação da Lista III (1959). Acervo Geral daBiblioteca Nacional; Diário Oficial da União. 9 de fevereiro de 1967. P. 1627; Diário Oficial da União. 19 de novembro de 1964. P. 10527; GATT/MIN(73) INF/4/Rev.1; GATT/MIN(86)/INF/3; GATT/MTN.TNC/MIN(94)/INF/3/Rev.2; GATT/WT/MIN(99)/INF/8; GATT/WT/MIN(01)/INF/15/Rev.1; GATT/WT/MIN(03)/INF/14.

48

academia

Government (total) 70% 70% 75% 64% 74% 86% 83% 100

%  100% 100% 100% 100%

 100%

49

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