Brazil's International Relations at the Dawn of the Twenty-first Century

Latin American Politics and Society, Spring 2005 by Cruz, José A da

Brazil's International Relations at the Dawn of the Twenty-first Century Almeida, Paulo Roberto de. O Brasil e o multilateralismo econômico [Brazil and Economic Multilateralism], Porto Alegre: Livraria do Aclvogado, 1999. Tables, bibliography, chronology, 328 pp.; paperback.

Brigagão, Clóvis, eel. Estratégias de negociações internacionais: uma visão brasileira [Strategic International Negotiations: A Brazilian Vision]. Rio de Janeiro: Aeroplano, 2001. Tables, figures, notes, bibliography, 380 pp.; paperback.

Lafer, Celso. Comércio, desarmamento, e direito humanos: reflexões sobre uma experiência diplomática [Commerce, Disarmament, and Human Rights: Reflections on a Diplomatic Experience], São Paulo: Paz e Terra, 1999. Bibliography, 202 pp.; paperback.

Ribeiro, Wagner Costa. Relações internacionais: cenáriospara o século XXI [International Relations: Scenarios for the Twenty-first Century], São Paulo: Scipione, 2000. Photographs, bibliography, 103 pp.; paperback.

George F. Kennan, in his book Around the Cragged Hill: A Personal and Political Philosophy (1993), places Brazil in the category of "monster country" for its geography and demography, its economic and political potential, and the magnitude of its problems and challenges. Brazil's twenty-first-century challenges include, but are not limited to, the security of its borders, drug trafficking, inflation, and a huge foreign debt legacy from the authoritarian years of military dictatorship, along with domestic problems such as unemployment, education, and health care.

Brazil is also a regional superpower. It has the world's eighth-largest economy and fifth-largest amount of territory. It is a global trader. As Paulo Roberte de Almeida states,

Brazil is one of the few peripheral nations that has actively participated in the construction of a new economic international order in various epochs, through its diplomatic presence at multiple multilateral conferences that presided over the conception and birth of those intergovernmental organizations of cooperation. (Almeida, 21)

Despite these characterizations, however, little has been written about Brazil's place in the international system of the twenty-first century. The study of international relations in Brazil still is relatively new; it has blossomed only since the 1990s. As Clovis Brigagâo points out,

[S]ince the 1990s there has been an increase in the number of international relations courses being offered in Brazil . . . but the number of Brazilian international negotiators [negociadores internacionais brasileiros] is still relatively too small to deal with the complexity of the post-Cold War international system and Brazil's problems. (Brigagâo, 7)

Written from different perspectives and approaches, the books under review here represent the first genuine Brazilian attempt to address Brazil's place in the international system.

The main objective of Wagner Costa Ribeiro's Relações, internacionais: cenários para o século XXI, according to the author, to inform readers about the international system and its various world orders. The international system is the product of old and new world orders, an aggregate of new social agents, new technologies, and also a great concern for the environment. The book is divided in two parts. The first part addresses how readers can understand the international system; the second deals with the new international system in the post-Cold War system of the twenty-first century. The author argues that in order to understand the contemporary world of international relations, the importance of the United Nations cannot be ignored; nor can the role played by a number of nongovernmental organizations be discounted. The international system has changed dramatically since the collapse of the Soviet Union in December 1991. Today, idealist values, such as representative democracy and neoliberal economic ideas (market values), dominate the old values of ideological rivalry and conflict that plagued the Cold War period.

The international system of today is the interaction of nation-states and multinational corporations (MNCs), as well as other international actors and agents, such as nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). (Ribeiro, 22)

However, it is hard to be sanguine about the perspective that the international system today has finally reached the "end of history," as Francis Fukuyama argues in his seminal essay (1992), or that the world is facing a "clash of civilizations," as proclaimed by Samuel Huntington. Ribeiro disagrees with both contentions. He points out that despite Huntington's claim, international conflicts show that national security interests, not cultural differences, remain the most prevalent reason for war. And contrary to Fukuyama's "end of history" thesis, Ribeiro reminds us that more than one billion people live in the socialist regime of China, which contains about one-fifth of the world's population (Ribeiro, 55-56).

Ribeiro also notes that given the number of ongoing conflicts in the international system today, the idea that we live in a world of peace after the collapse of the Cold War is misleading. He argues instead that we have more guerras quentes [hot wars], which have more destructive outcomes and more casualties. Despite the claims made by some that the world is becoming more unified-because of the internationalisation of English as the lingua franca of business and education and also because more young people are wearing jeans and T-shirts-that is far from sufficient for the universal acceptance of other cultural values and traditions. The international system of the post-Cold War period will be more chaotic and the nature of the problems facing the nation-state will be more complex, thereby requiring greater cooperation among nations in the twenty-first century.