Brazil Election and the Latin American Left

Earlier this month I noted how both Marina Silva and Dilma Rousseff favored moving closer to the United States. Silva also favored pushing Cuba on human rights. And it seems she is making the left nervous. See this op-ed by Emir Sader, reprinted at Telesur.

It's a little strange to read, with Rousseff given the role of a radical who is fighting for Latin American independence. Silva is the U.S. toady and Cardoso clone, and the campaign is the epitome of the fight between social justice and neoliberalism. Plus, Silva is not sufficiently what you might call "pro-institutions that exclude the United States":

Las dos –Dilma y Marina– tienen significados radicalmente opuestos. Dilma, la continuidad y profundización de las trasformaciones realizadas por el gobierno Lula y por su propio gobierno. La consolidación y extensión de los acuerdos de integración regional que Brasil impulsa, del Mercosur a los Brics, pasando por Unasur, Celac, Banco del Sur y Consejo Suramericano de Defensa.

It made me wonder what the Venezuelan and Cuban governments think of this race. They may well see the stakes this high as well. Silva has in fact received pushback for her Cuba comments. Everyone is trying to guess what diplomatic direction she might take.

This reminds me a bit of other elections, such as Peru, where speculation raged about Ollanta Humala. In 2011 Greg Grandin wrote, "Add Peru to the list of Latin American countries that have turned left." That meant moving more toward Brazil and away from the United States.

In terms of foreign policy, Humala’s election is another victory for Brazil in its contest with Washington for regional influence. If Fujimori had won, she would have aligned Peru politically with Washington and economically with US and Canadian corporations.

Three years later, Peru is joining the Pacific Alliance and will be part of the Trans-Pacific Partnership,

In Brazil, we'll have to wait and see. Rousseff has rebounded so this may all be moot.

Marina Silva and Foreign Policy

Marina Silva said in an interview that she would seek improved ties with the United States and also would push Cuba harder on democracy and human rights.

In a wide-ranging, hour-long interview, Silva said that as president she would seek bilateral trade deals and better relations with the U.S. and Europe, and would push for improved human rights in allies such as Cuba. 

Asked whether she would continue Brazil's strong investment in and political support for regimes like Cuba, Venezuela, China and Iran, Silva said that dialogue is essential with each — but that her personal convictions mean Brazil would be more vocal in pushing human rights. 

"The best way to help the Cuban people is by understanding that they can make a transition from the current regime to democracy, and that we don't need to cut any type of relations," she said. "It's enough that we help through the diplomatic process, so that these (human rights) values are pursued.

Both of those are nice to hear. Dilma Rousseff has already been smoothing over relations with the U.S., so it appears that U.S.-Brazilians will improve no matter who wins. At least as long as there are no more revelations of counterproductive U.S. behavior.

Further, it is refreshing to hear this about Cuba, which is too rarely heard around Latin America. It is entirely possible to engage a country while also saying it should be more democratic and respect the human rights of its own people. 

The U.S. and Brazil's National Truth Commission

Peter Kornbluh at the National Security Archive discusses the documents that Vice President Biden gave President Rousseff when he visited for the World Cup. It's awful stuff. Brazil tends to get less attention for human rights abuses because the intensity of repression during the dictatorship was not as severe as in Argentina and Chile. But it deserves more scrutiny:

It's sickening to read. All of this helps Brazil's National Truth Commission, which is working on documenting the period. This is a great step for the United States government--it has the benefit of being the right thing to do while also improving U.S.-Brazilian relations (and indeed the naysayers paid no attention to it).

During his meeting with President Rousseff, Biden announced that the Obama administration would undertake a broader review of still highly classified U.S. records on Brazil, among them CIA and Defense Department documents, to assist the Commission in finalizing its report.  “I hope that in taking steps to come to grips with our past we can find a way to focus on the immense promise of the future,” he noted.

That's good news.

Bad News for Rousseff

Wow, look at these numbers from PewResearch. They show broad and deep dissatisfaction with Dilma Rousseff on, well, just about everything. The conclusion is that the World Cup has been a real loser for her.

Brazilians aren't happy and they aren't thrilled with the World Cup.

Brazilians don't like how Rousseff is handling things:

Her only good news is that Brazilians still see her as preferable to any other candidate:

The presidential election is in October so it's premature to say much beyond the obvious point that the outlook for Rousseff is a lot less rosy than it was, say, one year ago. The World Cup begins in a mere nine days and lasts a month, which means her government will be in the global limelight for a long time. As with the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Twitter and the mainstream media are awash in pictures, snide remarks, and stories about Brazil not being ready. Unlike Vladmir Putin, however, Rousseff actually faces real elections.

The Invasion of Veracruz and Beyond

One hundred years ago today, the United States invaded Mexico, specifically Veracruz. Enrique Krauze has a very nice summary in the New York Times. Like so many other U.S. invasions, it did not achieve its goals and in many ways generated unnecessary resentment. However, I don't buy this:

Will an American president be willing to examine this long history of resentment and distrust, the better to construct a “happy ending” to these conflicts with “the other America”? Concrete actions are required: to pass long-awaited reforms of immigration laws, increase commercial relations and encourage mutual understanding, nourish cultural exchanges, lift the embargo on Cuba, close Guantánamo, and to be much more attentive and respectful toward Latin American countries and not treat them as the mere backyard of the nation they call “the Giant of the North.”

There are a few problems. One is that Mexicans' view of the United States is not easily characterized as "resentment and distrust." That sentiments were more common in the aftermath of the invasion. Similarly, today Americans are not angry at Germans for the Zimmermann Telegram. The same is true in many other places where the U.S. invaded: there is currently no rancor in the Dominican Republic, Panama, and elsewhere. The governments most antagonistic toward U.S. policy suffered no invasions at all (though certainly there was intervention). You don't hear Hugo Chávez or Nicolás Maduro rail on about the 1895 crisis.

I am also not so sure that anything will change if immigration reform is passed or if Guantánamo is closed. My hunch is that Latin Americans don't care very much about them. Maybe the embargo, but even that would not necessarily be earth-shattering.

Instead, I would juxtapose this op-ed with another in the New York Times on the importance of strengthening U.S.-Brazilian relations. A state visit was all lined up and what happened? The revelations of spying, which backed Dilma Rousseff into a corner. Immigration reform isn't going to change that and neither will cultural exchanges. Those things are important, but not sufficient.

The more question is how much you're stabbing your allies in the back while talking about the end of the Monroe Doctrine. It's about how hard you make it for allies to stick with you. Multiple recent studies have shown that Latin American views of the United States are positive, much more than most media reports would have you believe. The real trick is to translate that positive energy into higher levels of government.

Declassification as Diplomacy

Peter Kornbluh writes about the 50th anniversary of the Brazilian coup (which of course the U.S. strongly supported) and "declassification diplomacy."

The U.S. government has, in fact, practiced the art of declassified diplomacy in a number of nations—reviewing and releasing thousands of records stored in the “secure compartmentalized information facilities” (SCIFS) of the CIA, the Defense and State Departments among other national security agencies—as diplomatic gestures, as well as to advance the pursuit of human rights, truth and justice. Like other foreign policy tools—economic aid, trade, and diplomatic support–these historical records can provide a potent contribution to advance U.S. interests in stability and a peaceful and more just global community.

I was aware of the timing of the Chilean declassification but hadn't thought about it in a more comparative context. And I didn't know this:

In Ecuador, for example, despite tensions with the populist government of Rafael Correa, the administration of George W. Bush made an important gesture of a special declassification of State Department records to assist the Ecuadoran truth commission.

So it even trumped ideology, which saturated the Bush administration. It would be fun to see what patterns are there--when does this happen and why? What is it intended to accomplish? In general it seems a very low cost but potentially high impact endeavor. There is no good reason to keep 50 year old documents secret--they remain classified just to prevent powerful people and institutions from getting embarrassed by their lies, poor judgment and callous indifference to human life.

Brazil and Venezuela

Brian Winter makes some good points about Brazil's position vis-a-vis the Venezuelan crisis. I had argued not long ago that there was really no evidence to suggest Brazil was critical of the U.S. response to Venezuela, and what he does is show how Brazil shows clear signs of wariness toward Maduro.

The upshot here is that regional support is by no means unanimous and it is by no means strong. What remains to be seen is whether a statement like this helps convince Maduro that some sort of mediation is necessary:

"The path Maduro is on is full of risks," one official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. "We've been trying to encourage him to change."

I still can't think of any means except mediation to resolve this in the short term. The protests may eventually peter out but they've lasted a long time. The government has not been serious about dialogue despite its rhetorical insistence that it is (which is accompanied by insults, often bizarre) and the opposition seems to remain convinced that it's popular despite plenty of evidence to the contrary. So how much are Latin American governments, and especially Brazil given its influence, working behind the scenes toward this end?

More on Snowden and Brazil

Edward Snowden's desire to obtain asylum in Latin America remains news. Lourdes Garcia-Navarro has a story on NPR surveying the landscape in Brazil on the matter. I wrote about this a few weeks ago, and in general agree with Julia Sweig's conclusion.

Julia Sweig, director of Latin America studies for the Council on Foreign Relations, says while Snowden is a popular figure in Brazil, his fate is not at the top of the agenda. 

"I don't think the Brazilian public is, by and large, looking to pick a big public fight with the United States," she says, adding that asylum for Snowden would be a "bridge too far" for Brazil.

I am still skeptical with the generalization that he is a "popular "figure" but maybe he is. Either way, a very relevant point the story makes is that Dilma Rousseff has already responded by not coming to the United States for a state visit and making critical remarks. It is entirely possible that she feels there is nothing more to say or do. Snowden, meanwhile, still has not actually requested asylum, choosing instead to do a little dancing to see if he can prompt Brazil to state its willingness before receiving a request, though it has already indicated it won't do so.

Sorting this out requires one basic question--what does Rousseff have to gain by giving Snowden asylum? We know it will create a problem with the United States, but what political boost does she get? Mostly it would mean confirming anti-U.S. and independent-minded bona fides, but I can't see how that gets her much more than what she already has.

In all this, we should also keep in mind that Snowden already had an offer from Venezuela. I can't say for certain it is still on the table, but it doesn't take a genius to see that it's not a stable place to be. He also had offers from Bolivia and Nicaragua, and as far as I know never even acknowledged them. Ecuador and Cuba have already made clear they're not eager to have him, but I guess he wouldn't want either country anyway.

Tengenix

Brazil's Foreign Policy Challenges

Oliver Stuenkel writes about Brazil's foreign policy challenges. Since it is a list, and end of year lists tend to have 10 items, so does his. I am glad to see, though, that he acknowledges this dose of abitrariness!

One point I agree with is the need to make a commitment to the nitty gritty of foreign policy by making sure the diplomatic corps is not understaffed. Wikileaks cables even show how the U.S. was aware of that problem. You can't be a player without it.

One point I am not sure about is the need to commit to the BRICS concept. He notes there is skepticism, and I tend to share it. These countries are just lumped together without much rhyme or reason. Plus, Russia is in fact a power that has declined rather than one on the rise. What leverage does this give Brazil? High profile meetings don't hurt, but they don't necessarily matter.

Snowden and Brazil

Edward Snowden apparently is still looking to Latin America and there is plenty of parsing his open letter to Brazil. He's careful not to make a formal request, which would box Brazil in and possibly make it even less willing. But he says:

Many Brazilian senators agree, and have asked for my assistance with their investigations of suspected crimes against Brazilian citizens.

I have expressed my willingness to assist wherever appropriate and lawful, but unfortunately the United States government has worked very hard to limit my ability to do so -- going so far as to force down the Presidential Plane of Evo Morales to prevent me from traveling to Latin America!

Until a country grants permanent political asylum, the US government will continue to interfere with my ability to speak.

I read that as a quid pro quo.

Dilma Rousseff would have to decide that a long-term break with the United States is desirable. Whoever takes Snowden cannot have good diplomatic relations, period. Therefore we would expect a government to do so only if it saw long-term gain in antagonizing the U.S. It's hard to see that in Brazil.

Of course, the U.S. will be sending private signals not to accept, but let's see if it does anything public. Screwing around with planes helped lead to Nicolás Maduro's asylum offer, which originally was not forthcoming.

Isn't it interesting, too, that Snowden wants Brazil, which has not said yes, instead of Venezuela, which already has? Venezuela is just not a stable enough place these days.

Assessing U.S.-Brazilian Relations

We all know by now that Dilma Rousseff is not coming for her planned state visit. We can characterize the responses more or less as follows, in no particular order:

1. It's a positive assertion of Brazilian sovereignty.

2. It's bad for the United States (just Google "Brazil snub"!).

3. It's bad for Brazil.

4. It's bad for both countries.

Curiously, at least from what I've seen no one seems to be saying that it won't really matter all that much. In part that could be because the Obama administration is trying to spin it that way--it's a "postponement" and not a "cancellation" and so maybe our instinct is to assume that the spin must be false.

What I'd like to see, though, is analysis of the concrete effects of state visits (or their cancellation/postponement). Do they matter as much as commonly assumed? They are, of course, highly symbolic, but technology makes communication easy without visits and there is a tremendous amount of lower level cooperation going on all the time no matter who visits whom.

For example, in 2009 the Japanese Prime Minister cancelled a state visit, yet as far as I can tell--being an informed observer rather than any kind of expert--U.S.-Japanese relations have not suffered long-term consequences. Are there other examples?

In short, we assume it matters because we all say it matters. We have lots of opinions, some very logical, about why it should matter but little empirical evidence to support it.

Iranian Trade With Latin America

I've written a lot about the overblown specter of Iran in Latin America, and here is another interesting note: trade with Venezuela remains low. Its three biggest trading partners are Brazil, Argentina, and Mexico (two of which the NSA is bugging the crap out of).

Thanks to a strong increase in trade with Mexico, that country now ranks as the third-largest Iranian trade partner in Latin America. It also ranks Iran's top market in Latin America. Mexico's Iran trade reached 133.8 million last year compared to only 9.97 million in 2011

That is not a part of the story you hear very often, since Iran's trade is supposedly a political ploy with leftist governments. Instead, you see the very economic reason Latin America likes Iran: it runs a big trade deficit, I assume soaking up commodities. If trade with Mexico grows, however, I would expect to hear assertions that it is all about hooking up with Drug Trafficking Organizations.

Garcia-Roza's Blackout

Last month I read Luiz Alfredo Garcia-Roza's The Silence of the Rain and wrote that it was nicely written but with a terrible ending. I decided to give the second book in the series, Blackout, a shot. And there was a similar problem (though the ending was just very mediocre rather than terrible). It is the story of a homeless man murdered in a wealthy and steep Rio cul-de-sac.

You've got this great writing and wonderfully clear images of Rio de Janeiro. Chief Inspector Espinosa is something like Columbo--not flashy, a bit rumpled, dogged, and always with one more question. Garcia-Roza's Espinosa mysteries are also like the Columbo show because he reveals things about the crime(s). The problem is that you end up pretty much knowing who is the murderer. Audiences accept that with Columbo because they like watching how cleverly he figures things out. But that doesn't really happen with Espinosa. There's good tension but then it falls flat with events that just aren't likely and unsatisfying logic.

Garcia-Roza's The Silence of the Rain

I read Luiz Alfredo Garcia-Roza's The Silence of the Rain. It is a crime/mystery novel set in Rio, with Inspector Espinosa the protagonist. I had an unusual reaction to it--I thought the plot was cool, with plenty of turns and smooth changes of narrator voice. You get into all different parts of Rio, from the working class to the very rich. And Espinosa is an interesting character.

But. The ending sucks. The plot moves moves you right along to...what the hell was that? Are you serious? Also, in mysteries I don't generally expend much brainpower trying to figure out the killer--I just let the story take me there. In this one, I felt like the answer was really obvious, and I was actually going to be surprised if I was wrong. I wasn't.

Nonetheless, I will read more of these novels (this was the first of a trilogy) because that first 99% of it was really good. There is so much commentary as well. Espinosa is always lamenting the fact that forensic tools so common in the United States are simply absent in Brazil or just too expensive, so it is much harder for police to do their work. I also kept thinking that the entire plot would be different if Espinosa just had a cell phone, which I suppose he could not afford. Meanwhile, police corruption hangs over everything. Espinosa is careful about what information he gives fellow officers, who may well not be on his side.

Protests in Brazil and Chile

Patricia Rey-Mellén asks at Salon whether Chile will be next after Brazil with regard to national protests.

Student revolts became viral in 2011, and have continued at a low intensity since then. For the first time now, other sectors of society have joined in the cause. Copper miners protested in Calama, north of Santiago, where they blocked Chuquicatama, the biggest mine in the country. Similar events happened in El Teniente, south of the capital. In the coastal towns of Talcahuano, San Antonio and Valparaíso, fishermen kept over 2,000 boats on shore.

The dynamics are different from Brazil. In Chile there is a well-defined protest movement that has been around for several years that is trying to spread, whereas in Brazil it is almost the exact opposite, with a quickly mobilized and ill-defined movement that has already spread.

What Chilean students need to do, then, is to attract more people with their own grievances. This gets more difficult when the protests are violent, though in both Brazil and Turkey it can help if the state is seen as the more violent partner--at least right now, though, I don't get the sense that Chileans believe that yet.

There is an electoral difference as well. Today Chileans go to vote in presidential primaries, and they will have to address the protests directly. Michelle Bachelet is the favorite, and is popular, so her political job will be to pre-empt those connections. Rest assured she has been watching Dilma Rousseff closely to see what seems to work and what doesn't.

Corruption and Constitution in Brazil

For discussion of Dilma Rousseff's response to the protests, see Colin Snider, Boz, the Rio Times, and lots of others I am missing. I want to pose a skeptical question about the correlation between constitutional reform and reduction of corruption. There are lots of details still to be worked out, of course, but in my Latin American politics class I joke about "constitution-itis," whereby Latin American presidents too often feel that rewriting the constitution will cure more ills than it possibly can.

It is not inevitable that corruption will remain as pervasive as it is, but constitution writing is a very tricky thing. Alfred Montero* has written about the three "logics" of the Brazilian state:

1. It is both an arena for political actors to fight over authority and resources and a provider of resources to a broader arena of social and economic life.

2. The tendency for patronage politics to create ongoing political networks among individuals.

3. Patrimonialism.

Changing these logics is complicated, because they touch on electoral rules, federalism, executive-legislative relations, the courts, budgeting, and a host of other issues that go beyond what we typically think as being connected to corruption.

Rousseff's idea is to make sure the constitutional rules go from "paper to practice." But if this just means putting in some anti-corruption laws without changing the fundamental nature of the political system, then don't expect much change.

But there is hope. For Brazil, research suggests that electoral accountability can change corrupt behavior, audits can have an effect, as can party system competitiveness (on the flip side, though, Brazil has tons of parties but lots of corruption). In a sense, perhaps something much less grand than constitutional reform would be more effective.

More cynically, we could also argue that this is all smoke and mirrors anyway, a way for Rousseff to show--as so many presidents around the world feel the need to do--that she is doing "something" to deflate the protests.

*Alfred Montero, Brazilian Politics (Cambridge, MA: Polity Press, 2005): 28-29.

Explaining Protests in Brazil

People are scrambling to understand the massive protests in Brazil. Unfortunately, we tend to get a well-meaning laundry list of ills, so that inequality, growth slowdown, weak currency, and stock market drops are all mushed together as causes.

In academia, people have been working to figure this out. Why do people protest? Party fragmentation (a major issue in Brazil) can matter, weak institutions matter, economic liberalization (which happened quite a long time ago in Brazil, so timing is iffy here) can matter, as can use of social media. This is just a quick scattering of studies.

I don't have a great answer. But the research on protests should caution us not to focus excessively on conjunctural factors at the expense of structural ones. In other words, it is tempting to witness a protest, then just walk backwards to identify what conditions were present, then correlate the protest with those conditions. Just because an economy slows down does not mean people protest. Otherwise there would be far more protests than there are now.

It is also useful to keep relative deprivation in mind, and many news articles are at least hinting at this. Economic slowdown, inequality, etc. matter much more when people believe they should be doing better. This does not necessarily mean they are "middle class" hoping for better, which also pops up in media accounts. Rather, it just means that whatever their socio-economic level, they figure they should be doing better and at a certain point (timing is so hard to pinpoint) they mobilize. James Davies' famous theory of revolutions could shed light on Brazil. There is no revolution going on in Brazil, but if we take it down a notch to protests, then we are seeing years of growth/expectations followed by a sharp reversal.

Learning Portuguese

Vincent Bevins links to video statements by John Kerry and Brazil's Foreign Minister Antonio Patriotra. His English is incredible.

So here's the problem. The U.S. government talks all the time about how important Brazil is. Huge economy, tons of potential. But almost nobody speaks Portuguese.

Closer to home, we have a problem--one I have heard echoed elsewhere--convincing the university that Portuguese matters. In part I suppose because it doesn't come up in immigration discussions. But people, we need our students to learn Portuguese! This would open up all kinds of opportunities for them, but we struggle to offer more than the bare basics.

At a time when Humanities is getting a bum rap, we should also emphasize the economic development benefits of foreign languages. It's not just reading books, but it is learning a culture you can navigate in a way that others cannot.

And to my students, go find a language to double major in.