Lula’s Foreign Policy: environmental and international security aspects
Angelo Raphael Mattos
Abstract: the article aims to present and discuss some priorities and main lines of Lula’s foreign policy, especially on environment and international security. Within those areas, it is possible to see the connection between domestic policies, which have been created since his first mandate and reinforced now, and international arena.
Diplomacy is essential for international relations and for domestic politics. The two-level game theory, from Robert Putnam, highlights the connection between internal and international arenas, since diplomacy, an instrument of foreign policy, may represent the difference between peace and war ultimately. Taking it into account, in this century, Brazilian diplomacy has prioritized, among other realms, environment and international security on its agenda. It may be explained, possibly, due to the fact that environment and peace, regional or internationally considered, are fundamental to strengthening other foreign policy’s fields, once diplomacy is multifaceted as international relations are. In this way, Lula’s current mandate has been especially aware of it, as a means of putting Brazil in the international spotlight again, as a proactive and fundamental actor within those areas and negotiations.
Brazil has about 20% of world biodiversity and is home of the biggest tropical forest on the planet. Being conscious of that, the country launched, in 2016, the National Commission for Sustainable Development Goals to implement the 2030 Agenda under the aegis of the United Nations. This initiative seeks to mobilize the dialogue between the government, at different levels domestically, and the civil society. In this regard, between 2017 and 2019, Brazil created an Action Plan to enhancing public policies on environmental issues also aiming to accomplish the 2030 Agenda’s goals. The Plan has four main guides, which are dissemination, internalization, follow-up, and monitoring the implementation of those goals. Brazil has also made official its host of the COP30, that will take place in Belém in 2025.
This brazilian diplomacy act calls attention to the past and to the future at the same time. Brazil hosted the UN Conference on Environment and Development in 1992, which originated the COPs. And the next year’s meeting in Pará reinforces the importance of strengthening the Amazon Cooperation Organization, which was created in 1995. This one and the treaty of Amazon of 1978 are crucial to fight against deforestation, land grabbing and fires in the region. Those actions are quintessential for countries’ commitment. Towards clean and efficient energy, Brazil created the National Energy Efficiency Plan in 2007. It seeks to implement and achieve technical-economic use of electrical energy, and proposes the change of the current Brazilian matrix from predominantly road to a mixed model of road, rail and water.
Lula’s government announced, in 2023, a package of measures on environment, which helped to take back the European’s financing in this area, such as that of Norway, related to the carbon credits. That package about environmental protection has worked out mainly by presidential decrees as that one to create the National Park of Serra do Teixeira in Paraíba. Besides, the government, within that package, enlarged the Chocoaré-Mato Grosso reserve located in Pará. Another concrete measure under that announcement was the update of the Low Carbon Industry Technical Committee to Promote the Transition of the Productive Sector to the Low Carbon Economy. On that occasion, president Lula (2023) emphasized, once more, that the environment is priority in his government and also in terms of foreign policy. He stated that “Brazil once again has an active and proud foreign policy and is a protagonist in major discussions involving climate change.”
Furthermore, in this realm, president Lula passed the bill that extends deadlines for joining the Environmental Regularization Program and vetoes provisions that weaken the Atlantic forest. In addition, the government is considering the resumption of the program called Green Bag, which offers a payment to some families who live in a vulnerable situation to help to preserve the local environment, which has clearly a global impact regarding climate change. Still in 2023, the minister Marina Silva handled a Plan on Amazon Deforestation Prevention and Control to Lula. That one presents a specific strategy to all Brazilian biomes to prevent and mitigate deforestation.
Peace is crucial for international relations as well. Considering that, the chancellor Mauro Vieira, on the occasion of taking office in this current Lula’s government, mentioned that Brazil intents to maintain a strategic and constructive dialogue with other nations and collaborating within UN peace operations, including the Women, Peace and Security Agenda. The foreign minister also affirmed that Brazilian diplomacy is retaking its protagonism on disarmament and nuclear non-proliferation by valuing treaties related and by cooperation with other countries, since Brazil believes that development is inseparable from peace. The country is keeping its position for the reform of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC). Brazil also supports a negotiated via for the conflicts in the Middle East and in Ukraine. In the latter, Brazilian foreign policy got a little longer to state a position, yet always supporting diplomacy as the main tool to restore peace, which is, by the way, coherent with Brazilian constitutional principles (article 4th).
During the Brazil’s stay as president of the UNSC last year, it tried a resolution condemning the attacks in the Middle East and urging for a ceasefire. Already out of the presidency of the Council, but still strongly advocating for peace, Brazilian diplomacy also condemned the current attacks of Israel on the refugee camp nearby Rafah. The Itamaraty, in a note, asked for a ceasefire and also for “the urgent provision of adequate humanitarian assistance to the population of Gaza”.
As Putnam (1998) once stated, the domestic dynamic is key to be successful in the international negotiation. The Brazilian actions, by their turn, highlight that prioritizing the environment and international security, among other subjects related, demonstrates a holistic and intelligent view of the respected Brazilian diplomacy in the international arena.
References
BRASIL. Desenvolvimento Sustentável e Meio Ambiente. Ministério das Relações Exteriores. Taken from: <https://www.gov.br/mre/pt-br/assuntos/desenvolvimento-sustentavel-e-meio-ambiente>.
______. Discurso do presidente da República, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, na celebração do Dia Mundial do Meio Ambiente. Taken from: <https://www.gov.br/planalto/pt-br/acompanhe-o-planalto/discursos-e-pronunciamentos/2023/discurso-do-presidente-da-republica-da-republica-luiz-inacio-lula-da-silva-na-celebracao-do-dia-mundial-do-meio-ambiente>.
______. Governo anuncia pacote que amplia proteção ambiental. Taken from: <https://www.gov.br/planalto/pt-br/acompanhe-o-planalto/noticias/2023/06/governo-anuncia-pacote-que-amplia-protecao-ambiental>.
______. Nota à impresa nº 216. Ministério das Relações Exteriores. Taken from: <https://www.gov.br/mre/pt-br/canais_atendimento/imprensa/notas-a-imprensa/ataque-israelense-a-campo-de-refugiados-nas-proximidades-de-rafah>.
PUTNAM, R. Diplomacy and domestics politics: the logic of two level games. International Organization, v. 42, n.3, p. 427–460, summer 1988.
VIEIRA, M. Discurso do Embaixador Mauro Vieira por ocasião da posse no cargo de Ministro de Estado das Relações Exteriores — Brasília, january 02, 2023. Taken from: <https://www.gov.br/funag/pt-br/centrais-de-conteudo/politica-externa-brasileira/discurso-do-embaixador-mauro-vieira-por-ocasiao-da-posse-no-cargo-de-ministro-de-estado-das-relacoes-exteriores-brasilia-2-de-janeiro-de-2023.>.
About the author
Angelo Raphael Mattos: Doutor e mestre em Relações Internacionais pelo Programa de Pós-Graduação San Tiago Dantas (UNESP, UNICAMP, PUC-SP). Professor nas Faculdades Integradas Rui Barbosa (FIRB) e pesquisador na Rede de Pesquisa em Política Externa e Regionalismo (REPRI).
