Lula’s Dangerous Foreign Policy
The popularity and influence of Brazil’s president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, knows no bounds. As Lula enters his final year in office, his popularity continues to hover near record highs. Interestingly, as his ruling Partido dos Trabalhadores gears up for next year’s election (in which his chief of staff Dilma Rousseff is Lula’s hand-picked nominee), the country’s most popular president in history seems determined to take up an ever greater role in foreign affairs.
Lula’s participation in regional politics most notably came to light when ousted Honduran president, Manuel Zelaya, was smuggled back into his country following a military coup in late June – at times in the trunk of a car – to take refuge in the Brazilian embassy in Tegucigalpa, placing the country on the brink of a violent escalation. Now that an election has gone ahead (rather peacefully I shall add) and Honduras’s congress voted against reinstating the ousted leader for the remainder of his term until January 2010, when the country’s President-elect Porfirio Lobos takes over, Lula finds himself in a bit of a diplomatic pickle. Initially Brazil refused to recognise the legitimacy of the election, in protest of June’s ‘illegal’ military coup d’état. However, with a very high voter turnout on November 29, Brazil risks isolation on this front, and overstepping its attempt to present a balanced foreign policy perspective in the region, counter to traditional US influence.
It seems that Brazil is currently in the process of reconsidering its position on the Honduran election and the incoming Lobos administration. Certainly, it seems that despite Lula’s popularity and successful diplomacy in Brazil’s vast regions, the president still has a fair bit to learn. Indeed, while the US government has embraced the smooth election last Sunday, it remained firm on its position on building consensus in the new government to resolve divisions, which could resurface and set a very bad precedent following the military’s move earlier this year.
What Risk Watchdog is trying to say here, is that Lula has been quick to seize his country’s newly acquired status of regional grandeur and economic powerhouse, to position himself strategically into a strong negotiating position in the international arena. Though this seems to have worked to some extent, Lula may be playing a dangerous game by adopting too much of a contrarian bias towards G7 foreign policy.
source:www.gulfnews.com
The Iran Connection
Controversially, Lula hosted Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Brasilia in November and is planning to visit Iran in the near future. Lula has also expressed his support for Iran’s nuclear programme.
Lula’s diplomacy will add another dimension to global efforts to find a diplomatic solution to resolving the Iranian nuclear issue.
Will this help secure Brazil a permanent seat on the UN Security Council? Or will Lula risk a diplomatic misalignment and an awkward relationship with Washington?
Both could be the quick answer, but I believe that the key ultimately lies in Brazil’s positioning relative to Latin America. Let’s face it, Germany, Russia and China are no more happy about the call for economic sanctions against Tehran, than Brazil, which is keen to maintain key bilateral trade and investment ties with the oil producing country.
A Fine Line
As such, we come back to Lula’s position on Honduras and what this reveals about Brazil’s foreign policy. Honduras has become the latest stage for an ongoing play in which Brazil’s government navigates a fine line between being friendly with the regional nationalist and populist governments of Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez and Daniel Ortega’s Nicaragua, and demonstrating regional political and economic prudence. However, Lula has sent a clear message to the world – aimed particularly at the global investment community: Emerging Markets (EM) is where it’s at, and forget G7.
The Brazilian leader endorses closer trade links with China, Russia, India and Iran, while equally promoting his own country as a top destination for FDI. When it comes down to it, therefore, Brazil is putting all its money on EM. The questions arises, therefore, will Lula be able to tread this line without tripping over into international isolation?
While next year’s election should be some guide on where Brazil’s foreign policy will ultimately be headed, Chávez & co will watch with great interest if Brazil will maintain its balanced approach, or if Latin America’s largest country could potentially be an ally in the making.
December 4th, 2009 at 9:12 am
Interesting article. I’ve been wondering for a while if Brazil’s foreign policy will change if Jose Serra gets elected.
Lula seems a larger than life figure whose personal initiatives have helped put Brazil firmly on the map (both in terms of investors and foreign policy). Serra clearly appears economy-focused, but will he continue Lula’s efforts to make Brazil a ‘leader of the South’?
December 4th, 2009 at 12:41 pm
Dear Roger,
It is difficult to see if a prospective Serra presidency would see Brazil maintain its current foreign policy course of promoting itself as the leader of the developing world, or if a more conservative centre-right government may produce an attempt to present a united front against left-leaning, populist governments in the region. Risk Watchdog believes that, while a Serra foreign policy may tone down Brazil’s willingness to receive any political leader – no matter how controversial – with open arms, Lula did succeed in position the country into a highly strategic position on the international arena. To forgo an opportunity to maintain Brazil as an instrumental negotiating partner – especially given the country’s aspirations for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council – would seem counterintuitive.
The role of Lula’s charisma, however, is a different subject, and neither Serra, nor Lula’s preferred successor, Dilma Rousseff, will likely be able to match that.