COMING ATTRACTIONS

Sean W. Burges

Auto-estima in Brazil
The logic of Lula’s south-south foreign policy

Less than two weeks after Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva was sworn in as president
of Brazil, his newly appointed foreign minister, Celso Amorim, was asked
what would change in his country’s foreign policy. For seasoned national
observers the reply that Brazil would take an active role in world affairs was
a bit of a disappointment, representing little more than a reaffirmation of the
country’s longstanding position of pushing multilateralism as a device for
defending national autonomy. Subsequent suggestions by Lula that Brazil
might fill a middle ground between the north and the south as well as
Amorim’s detailed call for the use of multilateral institutions to democratize
international affairs contributed to the impression that, despite forceful
assertions to the contrary, little of substance had changed. Indeed, the reap-
pointment of Amorim as foreign minister—he served in the post from
August 1993 to December 1994—reinforces the long-term trajectory of
Brazilian foreign policy initiatives such as regional and continental integra-
tion, elaboration of an inclusive multilateral trading system, and the expan-
sion of linkages with other major emerging markets. These similarities
between the Cardoso and Lula policies aside, suggestions that everything
was changed so that all could remain the same are quite mistaken. Although

Sean Burges is currently a SSHRC postdoctoral fellow at the Norman Paterson School of
International Affairs at Carleton University and a senior research fellow with the
Washington, DC-based Council on Hemispheric Affairs.

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| Sean W. Burges |

Lula has maintained the tradition of continuity in Brazilian foreign policy, he

has precipitated a dramatic change in the psychological tenor of his coun-
try’s diplomatic efforts.
This article argues that the Lula government in Brazil is pursuing a psy-
chologically transformative foreign policy agenda in the global south. The
goal is not to overturn or delink from the existing international political and
economic system, but to prompt a change in how developing countries are
inserted into and view the system. In itself, this is not a particularly original
ambition and is firmly grounded in Cardoso’s persistent calls for reform of
international economic governance institutions to make them more inclu-
sive of the south. The originality lies in the strategy being taken to achieve
this end. Although Cardoso-style institutional reform and a commitment to
multilateralism remains a central facet of Brazilian foreign policy, it has
assumed a subordinate role to a conceptual agenda that explicitly questions
the neat division between developed and developing. Lula is consciously
attempting to reframe the development dichotomy, deliberately seeking to
reshape notions of southern and Brazilian identity in the international polit-
ical economy. Rather than presenting the country as a developing state in
need of aid, the emphasis is on Brazil as a complex and highly sophisticated
economy and polity that is working to overcome an inequitable internal
development pattern. The argument that emerges in Brazilian diplomatic
discourse is that neat categorizations of developed and developing bifurcate
countries into two camps. Implicit in this division is a packet of assumptions
about the capabilities of developing countries predicated upon a hierarchical
ordering that privileges the capabilities, markets, products, investments,
development practices, and socio-cultural norms of “northern” countries
over those found in the “south.”1
The result is not only a perpetuation of the socioeconomic dependence
outlined by Cardoso in 1971, 2 but also a psychological dependence on the

1 This argument is offered in more detail in Marie Suetsugu, “Japan’s development aid: A deriva-
tive discourse,” paper presented at the 45th International Studies Association Convention,
Montreal, March 2004.
2 Fernando Henrique Cardoso and Enzo Faletto, Dependency and Development in Latin America,
trans. M. M. Urquidi (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1979). The evolution of Cardoso’s
thought in the 1990s can be traced in the works on globalization and development included in
Fernando Henrique Cardoso with Mauricio Font, Charting a New Course: The Politics of
Globalization and Social Transformation (New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2001).

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 | Auto-estima in Brazil |

north that prevents developing countries from recognizing and exploiting

opportunities in the south. In a theme that strongly recalls the argument in
Frantz Fanon’s anticolonization text Black Skin, White Masks, Lula makes
constant reference to the auto-estima—self-confidence—that saw Brazilians
calmly elect as president a former union leader from the impoverished
northeast of the country who lacks a formal education. As will be outlined in
the first section of this article, the importance of auto-estima is that it is a sig-
nal that a people are making decisions on their own terms to address their
needs as they see them. The foreign policy priority created by auto-estima is
a recapturing and recreation of individual self-confidence in the south. Here
it is important to be clear that I am not arguing that Lula has embarked on an
idealistic developmentalist foreign policy. Although idealist notions of soli-
darity play an important role in Brazilian diplomatic discourse, they are
underpinned by a hard-edged interest analysis. Expansion of south-south
trade and investment is an important part of Brazil’s strategy for economic
expansion and development. Moreover, interest-based solidarity plays a cen-
tral role in the maintenance of developing country coalitions such as the G-
20 that Brazil has deployed with great effect in the WTO.3
A final caveat that needs to be added relates to the research methodolo-
gy used for this article. The emphasis here is on the message and percep-
tions that Brazilian foreign policy is attempting to disseminate both in Brazil
and throughout the global south. Attention has thus been firmly focused on
the officially released and recognized speeches, interviews, and articles
archived on the Brazilian foreign ministry website, working on the assump-
tion that they are a strong reflection of the image that Itamaraty is seeking to
project.4 My goal here is not to assess the effectiveness of the Lula adminis-
tration’s attempt at reshaping Brazil’s self-perception and international iden-
tity, and any such effort is tangential to an exposition of logic underpinning
the redirection of elements of Brazilian foreign policy. The implications that
Lula’s psychologically transformative agenda hold for both Brazilian foreign

3 The G-20 referred to here is not the informal forum of developing and developed countries that
Canada helped found to discuss international monetary and financial issues. G-20 in Brazilian
parlance refers to a flexible interest-based coalition of developing and emerging market countries
that are cooperating largely within the WTO to bring about major reform in agricultural trade and
support practices.
4 The Brazilian foreign ministry is often referred to as Itamaraty after the name of its original
home in Rio de Janeiro, the Itamaraty Palace, and its current headquarters in Brasília.

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| Sean W. Burges |

policy and the wider international system will be addressed in the conclusion
of this paper.

FANON AND PSYCHOLOGICAL CHANGE

The measured tone of the calls for north-south redistribution in Lula’s for-
eign policy speeches would appear to run against the Brazilian president’s
leftist credentials. Indeed, during a speech to the Council on Foreign
Relations in New York he went so far as to state flatly that Brazil—not Japan,
the EU, or the US—must bear responsibility for its skewed pattern of socio-
economic development. Taking the point further, he was clear that rather
than waiting for more aid to precipitate national development, Brazilians
must take charge of their own affairs and create their own solutions.5 The sug-
gestion is not that Lula is calling for a rejection of international aid or the
abandonment of attempts at reforming international institutions. Rather, it is
that in both Brazil and the global south he is embarking on an identity recon-
struction process similar to that advocated by Frantz Fanon in Black Skin,
White Masks.Indeed, the ideas set out by Fanon play a central role in the polit-
ical formulation of foreign policy in the Lula administration. The direct quote
from Fanon – “If you so desire, take it: the freedom to starve” 6—that Lula used
at the beginning of his speech opening the 2004 UN general assembly points
to the impact that the Martinican theorist has had on two key figures in the
Brazilian foreign policy establishment. The speech opening the UNGA is the
keynote event in the Brazilian diplomatic calendar and as such would be draft-
ed by a team led by the two central political architects of Lula’s foreign policy:
Marco Aurelio Garcia, an established Brazilian academic and Lula’s powerful
cabinet advisor on foreign policy, and Samuel Pinheiro Guimarães, secretary
general and second in command of the foreign ministry.
One passage of Fanon is particularly illustrative of the conceptual chal-
lenge being addressed by Lula’s foreign policy agenda:

Every colonized people—in other words, every people in whose soul

an inferiority complex has been created by the death and burial of
its local cultural originality—finds itself face to face with the lan-

5 Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, “Discurso no conselho de relações internacionais, Nova York,” New
York, 25 September 2003, www.mre.gov.br.
6 Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, “Statement opening the general debate of the 59th session of the gen-
eral assembly of the United Nations,” 21 September 2004, www.mre.gov.br.

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 | Auto-estima in Brazil |

guage of the civilizing nation; that is, with the culture of the mother
country. The colonized is elevated above his jungle status in pro-
portion to his adoption of the mother country’s cultural standard.7

Translating this observation of the individual psychological condition to

a discussion of foreign policy leads to an analysis that finds the policy pro-
posals of the north placed in a privileged position, causing economic and
social actors in the south automatically to look north for opportunities and
alternatives while simultaneously discounting the possibility that southern-
created options might be of equal or greater value. The fundamental prob-
lem, as Fanon explains, is that “to speak a language is to take on a world, a
culture,” 8 which in terms of development discourse implies not only an
internalization of the logic of the Washington consensus, but an unques-
tioning acceptance of existing patterns of trade, investment, political
activism, educational exchange, and cultural dissemination. The problem
set out by structuralist and dependency theorists such as Raúl Prebisch,
Albert Hirschman, and Cardoso, and recently reiterated and updated in what
might be termed a neostructuralist frame by José Antonio Ocampo and Juan
Martin, is that these existing patterns of interaction are asymmetrical in
nature, structurally favouring actors and interests in the north. 9
The apparent solution to the conundrum posed by Fanon as well as
structuralist/dependency theorists would be to delink from the core, to
actively reject the language, culture, and economics of the colonizer. An
immediate problem with this approach is presented by former Brazilian for-
eign minister Celso Lafer’s argument that a country’s foreign policy identity
is forged through an ongoing dialectical relationship with the external.10

7 Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks, trans. C. L. Markmann (New York: Grove Press, 1967),
18.
8 Ibid., 38
9 Raúl Prebisch, “Growth, balance and disparities: Interpretations of the economic development
process,” in CEPAL, Economic Survey of Latin America, 1949 (Santiago: United Nations, 1951);
Cardoso and Faletto, Dependency and Development; Albert O. Hirschman, A Bias for Hope:
Essays on Development and Latin America (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1971); José
Antonio Ocampo and Juan Martin, Globalization and Development: A Latin American and
Caribbean Perspective (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2003).
10 Celso Lafer, “Reflexões sobre a inserção do Brasil no contexto internacional,” Contexto
Internacional no. 11 (January-June 1990): 33-43; Celso Lafer, A Identidade Internationacional do
Brasil e a Política Externa Brasileira(São Paulo: Editora Perspectiva, 2001).

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| Sean W. Burges |

Indeed, the slow and measured approach Fanon takes in his text, culminat-
ing in the admonition that “fervor is the weapon of the impotent,”11 comes as
an explicit warning that it is impossible for the colonized to reject and exor-
cise the influence of the colonizer. And Brazilian foreign policy appears to
heed this warning. On the same day that Lula opened his country to accusa-
tions that it was seeking a revival of the north-south conflict with his Council
on Foreign Relations speech, Amorim explicitly stated in a Wall Street
Journal op/ed that “we are not interested in North-South confrontations,” 12
acknowledging that Brazil and the wider south need to remain an active part
of the existing international political economy.
Instead of a call for some kind of resurrection of the new international
economic order, the point being made in Brazilian diplomatic discourse is
much closer to Fanon’s strongly worded conclusion that “I am my own foun-
dation. And it is by going beyond the historical, instrumental hypothesis that
I will initiate the cycle of my freedom.” 13 Rejection of the other is simply not
possible because the existence and the fact of the colonized and the coloniz-
er are intimately intertwined, be it through the forces of economic globaliza-
tion or the subconscious impact of sustained international acculturation.
Thus, going beyond the “historical, instrumental hypothesis” does not imply
a rejection by the colonized of the colonizer, but rather an attitudinal shift by
the colonized that seeks to recast the rationale and operation of this relation-
ship by rediscovering the colonized’s own internal capabilities and opportu-
nities. At its simplest level the attitudinal shift sees the colonized choosing
deliberately to set aside the assumption that it cannot do for itself in its own,
self-directed fashion.

P R O M O T I N G AUTO-ESTIMA
Fanon effectively calls for what Brazilians refer to as auto-estima: belief in
oneself, belief in the values, ideas, practices, and possibilities that come from
one’s own culture and context. The suggestion that attitude is most important
was underlined by Lula in April 2003 when he noted that perhaps the key to
national development was recovering national self-confidence, believing that

11 Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks, 9.

12 Celso Amorim, “The real Cancun: Artigo publicado no Wall Street Journal,” 25 September
2003, www.mre.gov.br.
13 Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks, 231.

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 | Auto-estima in Brazil |

the country is competitive and can hold its own in the global political and
economic system.14 Amorim reinforces the rise of auto-estima in Brazil by
pointing to the very act of electing Lula as a sign that the people of his coun-
try have faith in themselves and in their own abilities. Moreover, less than
five months into the Lula administration, Amorim was clear that he was
seeking to incorporate the rise of auto-estima signified by the 2002 presi-
dential ballot result as a guiding principle in the conduct of his country’s for-
eign policy. 15 While Amorim continued on with the not-particularly-original
suggestion that Brazil would pursue a foreign policy commensurate with its
dimensions, substance was quickly added to these statements. Within days
Amorim had reversed decades of non-interventionist tradition by clearly
indicating that Brazil was not only willing to intervene when asked, but
would welcome the opportunity and devote concrete economic and human
resource to such projects.16
This returns us to the psychological shift that Lula is bringing to
Brazilian foreign policy. Throughout the Cardoso era there was a contradic-
tion between public statements forcefully disavowing leadership, especially
in South America, and a succession of actions and initiatives that belied a
propensity for Brazil to, in fact, lead. The sticking point for Brazilian diplo-
mats was a perception that equated leadership with a hegemonist approach
requiring coercion and imposition, which for historical reasons was anathe-
ma to Itamaraty. Although the linkage between hegemonism and leadership
had begun to weaken by the end of the Cardoso administration, with senior
diplomats quietly acknowledging that their country was more than happy to
organize and suggest but not impose, the clear attribution of a leadership
role to Brazil continued to cause diplomats noticeable discomfort.17 In part,

14 Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, “Discurso na solenidade de abertura do seminário Brasil-China: ‘Um
salto necessário’,” 30 April 2003, www.mre.gov.br.
15 Celso Amorim, “Entrevista concedida a revista carta capital: ‘A semente do projeto…’,” 28 May
2003, www.mre.gov.br.
16 Celso Amorim, “Entrevista concedida a revista Istoé: ‘Resultados, não prazos’,” 2 June 2003,
www.mre.gov.br. The most visible evidence of this change is the Brazilian command of UN oper-
ations in Haiti.
17 Sean W. Burges, “The political economy of consensual hegemony in South America: Brazilian
foreign policy in the Cardoso era, 1992-2002,” PhD thesis, department of politics and interna-
tional studies, University of Warwick, Coventry, UK, January 2004.

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| Sean W. Burges |

the shift caused by the rise of auto-estima involves a growing sense of confi-
dence in Brazil’s own capabilities and, more importantly, ability clearly to
communicate its intentions, the combination of which reduces fears that
obvious efforts by Brazil to lead will be confused with an imperial agenda.
A 27 September 2003 speech by Lula in Havana clearly marked a signif-
icant direction change brought on by the rise of auto-estima . Where
Cardoso’s foreign minister, Luiz Felipe Lampreia, was clear that Brazilians
lacked both the desire and capacity to devote concrete resources to projects
in other countries, 18 Lula launched a new stance by stating that Brazil would
have to be generous with its Mercosur partners if the bloc was to remain
healthy. 19 The point being made by Lula drew on his statement four days ear-
lier before the UN general assembly where he made clear Brazil’s intention
to strengthen Mercosur and build a wider community of South America.20
But, as critics have noted, Brazil has in the past proven reluctant to devote
solid resources to supporting its bloc partners in both institutional and eco-
nomic terms. With his Havana speech Lula committed his country to a new
policy tack requiring the external investment of national resources, particu-
larly the billions of reais in funds available each year through the Brazilian
national bank of social and economic development (BNDES).
Underpinning this shift to making direct instead of oblique offers of
assistance to the other Mercosur countries lay an attempt at initiating a deep-
er transformation in the Brazilian national sense of self, breaking free of the
developed/developing dichotomy. After giving his US$55,000 Prince of
Astúrias prize to the newly created UN anti-hunger fund, Lula told Kofi
Annan that Brazil would not be needing moneys from the fund because his
country is, with certain conditions, relatively rich. Here the intention was to
foster a new attitude in Brazil, to create a new conception of identity that ban-
ishes the image of the impoverished, prostrate developing country awaiting
a saviour from the north. In its place, Lula is constructing a more complicat-
ed and sophisticated identity, one that acknowledges not only Brazil’s ram-
pant poverty and yawning income divides, but also one that is clear that in
many areas Brazil is economically, culturally, and politically sophisticated.

18 Interview with Luiz Felipe Lampreia, 23 September 2002.

19 Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, “Palavras no encontro com estudantes Brasileiros,” Havana, 27
September 2003, www.mre.gov.br.
20 Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, “Statement at the opening of the general debate of the 58th session
of the general assembly of the United Nations,” 23 September 2003, www.mre.gov.br.

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 | Auto-estima in Brazil |

Returning to the Fanonist argument outlined above, the direct message is

that Brazil does not need to rely on others to solve its development prob-
lems. Rather than looking to the outside for solutions, Brazilians should be
capitalizing on their internal strengths to exploit external opportunities.
The commitment of Brazilian resources to the stabilization of both
Mercosur and a wider South America is a direct corollary of this attempt at
transforming national identity. An immediate problem with a presidential
decision to redefine national identity is that the citizenry must be convinced
to accept the change. Or, drawing on Fanon’s ideas discussed above, the
reconstruction of identity must represent an internal change that is also psy-
chologically believable and sustainable. Lula’s decision to commit Brazil to
extending external aid is designed to bring about this change. Contributing
to the economic growth of neighbours and southern partners is not quite the
same as committing state-based financial grant aid. Indeed, Lula and
Amorim are clear that the sort of development help that Brazil can provide
will not be in the form of a monetary grant, but technical, with a particular
emphasis on the sharing of best practices, provision of qualified personnel,
and the granting of advanced study scholarships at Brazilian universities.21
In identity terms the emphasis is squarely on highlighting the advanced
nature and capabilities of Brazil to Brazilians, and the potential for south-
south cooperation and mutual assistance to other developing countries.
The financial aspect of Lula’s offer of assistance comes in part from an
expansion of auto-estima into the business community and the attempt to
turn Brazilian firms into multinational corporations. During his Havana
speech Lula was clear that a central challenge facing his presidency was
changing the mindset of Brazilian business, convincing entrepreneurs to set
aside their fears of the international market and convert their firms into
multinational corporations. 22 The psychological shift involved in this task is
significantly greater than it might first appear. One of the legacies of the real
plan that Cardoso implemented to stabilize the Brazilian economy was the
privatization of state-owned firms and the opening of the economy to large
flows of foreign direct investment. The result was a massive transfer of

21 Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, “Discurso no encerramento do seminário empresarial Brasil-

Líbano,” 5 December 2003, www.mre.gov.br; Celso Amorim, “Entrevista com à agência Brasil,
‘para celso Amorim, Brasil vai redescobrir a África,” 1 October 2003, www.mre.gov.br.
22 Lula, “Palavras no encontro com estudantes Brasileiros,” Havana.

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| Sean W. Burges |

industrial, utility, and service sector ownership outside Brazil.23 This was
combined with a historical legacy from the import-substitution industrial-
ization years that had embedded an inward orientation in the Brazilian busi-
ness mindset. Indeed, the concentration on servicing the internal market
and investing within Brazil was so great that the central bank did not start
collecting data on national FDI-outflows to other countries until 2001.

POINTING BRAZIL SOUTH

Speeches and interviews given during Lula’s extensive travels throughout
the global south consistently emphasize the potential for Brazilian business
investment in other developing countries. But as is suggested by Lula’s
Havana admission that he needs to “provoke” firms into transnationalizing,
business is inherently conservative and will not act unless it sees real poten-
tial for profit. More significant is possession of the confidence, or auto-esti-
ma, needed to venture into new markets that operate with unfamiliar busi-
ness conditions. In effect the problem here is that while the auto-estima sig-
nified by the relaxed business attitude to Lula’s electoral victory is rising in
Brazil, it is nevertheless still fragile and in need of reinforcement. The pres-
idential response takes the form of a two-stage policy initiative that is
designed to bolster rising self-confidence through an outward extension of
Brazilian activities that will allow success to breed yet more success and over-
shadow the inevitable isolated failure.
In the first element state-owned corporations and finance organizations
are creatively deployed as path breakers for other Brazilian firms. Of partic-
ular interest to the foreign ministry is the potential impact that investment
by Petrobrás might have not only on the country’s oil security, but also on the
strengthening of a series of bilateral relationships in Africa. Underpinning
potential state-firm FDI is the continuation of export financing through the
BNDES, with particular attention given to the bank as an international
financing agency for Brazilian firms bidding on large public works projects
in other countries. More significantly, discussions are also underway to open
the extensive funds available through the BNDES (25.9 billion reais [approx-
imately $11 billion] were distributed between January and September 2004)

23 See, for example, Edmund Amann and Werner Baer, “Neoliberalism and its consequences in
Brazil,” Journal of Latin American Studies 35 (2002): 945-59; Geisa Maria Rocha, “Neo-depend-
ency in Brazil,” New Left Review no. 16 (July/August 2002): 5-33.

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 | Auto-estima in Brazil |

for the financing of Brazilian FDI in other countries and providing export
support to firms in other Mercosur countries.24
The second element underpins the attempt to internationalize Brazilian
business by making it physically easier to get to southern markets. Amorim
points to the problem posed by the awkward reality of travelling between
developing countries, asking why a businessman in Quito would set up a
partnership with a firm in São Paulo instead of the US if he had to travel
through Miami to reach Brazil. Similar logic underpinned the South
American regional infrastructure integration project launched by Cardoso at
the 2000 Brasília summit of South American presidents, where it was
agreed that a program of infrastructure development is the prerequisite for
expanded intra-continental trade. The addition Lula makes to the logistical
issues of physically getting goods to market is psychological in nature.
Drawing on the discussion of Fanon above, a need to travel via Miami to
reach other parts of South America or through London to reach Africa and
Asia emerges as implicitly embedding and reinforcing the notion of psycho-
logical dependency on the north, suggesting that access to these markets is
only possible through the agency of the metropole. A notable feature of
Lula’s statements during official visits to India, South Africa, and African
members of the Community of Portuguese-Speaking Nations is a commit-
ment to not only initiating direct flights between many of those countries
and Brazil, but also opening new direct shipping lanes to support an expan-
sion in physical trade. 25

NEW ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY

A frequent phrase in statements by Lula draws directly on the outcome
sought through the upgrading of south-south transportation links: changing

24 BNDES, “BNDES’s disbursements grow 48% between January and September of this year,”
press release, 10 October 2004, www.bndes.gov.br; Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, “Declaração à
imprensa, durante visita de trabalho do Presidente do Uruguai, Jorge Batlle Ibañez, ao Brasil,” 12
May 2002, www.mre.gov.br; Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, “Discurso na cerimônia de encerramento
do seminário ‘Brasil-Moçambique: Comércio e investimentos’,” Maputo, 5 November 2003,
www.mre.gov.br.
25 See paragraphs 1-10 of the “India-Brazil-South Africa (IBSA) dialogue forum: plan of action,”
www.mre.gov.br; and Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, “Discurso do presidente da república, Luiz Inácio
Lula da Silva, no encerramento do encontro empresarial Brasil-Namíbia,” Windhoek, Namíbia, 7
November 2003, www.mre.gov.br; “Pragmatism marks new south-south talks: The India-Brazil-
South Africa dialogue forum,” Oxford Analytica, 23 April 2004.

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| Sean W. Burges |

global economic geography. 26 The concern driving Lula’s call for a southern
reshaping of global economic geography is not directly related to the sort of
dependency arguments that dominated discussions in the 1960s and 1970s,
but rather a concern that developing countries are not doing enough to
exploit the opportunities of increased intra-south trade, cooperation, and
investment.27 Again, the focus is on auto-estima both in Brazil and the larg-
er south. Reshaping global economic geography is intended to provide the
internal architecture necessary to support an expansion of global auto-esti-
ma. Rather than arguing that close economic ties with the north are not nec-
essary, he suggests that they are neither sufficient nor structurally able to
provide the opportunities needed for sustained development. Instead of rely-
ing on new opportunities to be created in and approved by the north, the south
should actively look to form its own arrangements. This was precisely the point
Lula made during a Brazil-Paraguay presidential meeting when he flatly stated
that the FTAA was not necessary for either country to negotiate new trade
agreements. Why, he asked, should Brazil and its Mercosur partners not nego-
tiate agreements with the Andean Community, the Caribbean, Central
America, or any other region of countries at a similar level of development?28
The timing of these comments is particularly important because it pre-
saged a surge in Brazil’s international presence, particularly as a coordinator
of south-south activities. Just a week after Lula’s Paraguay meeting, the
Brazilian-led G-20 played a pivotal role in the collapse of the Cancun WTO
ministerial meeting by coordinating a joint position requiring deep liberal-
ization in agricultural trade before discussion could turn to the Singapore
issues. The sort of active coordination seen in the G-20 example was not a
novelty in Brazilian foreign policy, but mirrored the earlier success at mar-
shalling the Rio Group behind a joint position before the 1994 Miami sum-
mit of the Americas that launched the FTAA process. The significant point
for the auto-estima project was that the G-20 was created extremely quickly

26 Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, “Discurso no encerramento do seminário sobre negócios e investi-
mentos,” Damascus, Syria, 3 December 2003, www.mre.gov.br.
27 Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, “Discurso no encontro com lideranças empresariais indianas, co-
patrocinado pela Confederação das Indústrias Indianas (CII) e pela Federação das Câmaras de
Comércio e Indústria Indianas (FICCI),” New Delhi, India, 27 January 2004, www.mre.gov.br
28 Celso Amorim, “Artigo no jornal Gazeta Mercantil: ´´Brasil tem opções diferenciadas para a
integração´,” 3 September 2003, www.mre.gov.br.

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 | Auto-estima in Brazil |

and proved sufficiently successful to prompt Amorim to remark that it was

one of the most successful example of coalition formation in history. 29 While
Amorim was perhaps a touch self-congratulatory with his assessment, the
success of the G-20 provided an important precedent for the G-90 in 2004,
prompting both USTR Robert Zoellick and EU Trade Commissioner Pascal
Lamy to issue separate “special” offers if the G-90 members would approve
the US/EU approach to restarting WTO negotiations. 30
The dynamics of the EU/US/G-90 exchange are interesting because
they prompted Brazil to reveal much about the operation of auto-estima and
the reformulation of global economic geography. In response to the EU offer,
Amorim addressed the June 2004 G-90 mini-ministerial in Guyana,
emphasizing the importance of working collectively, of looking to each other
for opportunities and not taking the first seemingly attractive offer from the
north. 31 More significantly, Amorim was assiduously attempting to convince
the G-90 to accept a certain degree of leadership from the G-20. To this end
he repeatedly emphasized how the G-20 had modified its position to reflect
the interests of new members and adopted a hard line on cotton subsidies,
which eventually led to a WTO ruling against the US. The problem facing the
Brazilian foreign policy agenda was that G-90 intransigence on cotton sub-
sidies and retention of special and differential treatment (S&D) for the least
developed countries was threatening to completely collapse the Doha nego-
tiating round. In one sense the sudden forcefulness of the G-90 stance was
a vibrant demonstration of the auto-estima advocated by Lula.
Unfortunately, this expression of auto-estima lacked the pragmatism reflect-
ed in Amorim’s Wall Street Journal op/ed shortly after the Cancun ministe-
rial. Just as Fanon was clear that the identity of the colonizer and the colo-
nized become intertwined, the argument underpinning the Brazilian
approach to the global political economy was that north-south interchange is

29 Celso Amorim, “Entrevista concedida ao jornal Terra Viva: ‘O mundo se democratiza’,” São
Paulo, 13 June 2004, www.mre.gov.br.
30 Pascal Lamy and Franz Fischler, “Letter to G-90 trade ministers,” European Commission, 9
May 2004; Robert B. Zoellick, “Remarks of US trade representative Robert B. Zoellick at the open-
ing ceremony of the G-90 trade ministers meeting,” Mauritius, 12 July 2004; and “International:
EU, US apply pressure to the G-90,” Oxford Analytica, 16 July 2004.
31 Celso Amorim, “Statement by Minister Celso Amorim at the G-90 meeting,” Georgetown,
Guyana, 3 June 2004, www.mre.gov.br.

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| Sean W. Burges |

important. The challenge facing the south is to revive its internal inter-
change while simultaneously maintaining exchange with the north, but on
an equitable—not asymmetric—basis. Strong multilateral institutions, in
the Brazilian view, are essential to meeting this challenge, making preservation
and advancement of the WTO a key foreign policy priority for Brazil.
Efforts to reshape global economic geography stem from a need to direct
the loci of southern attention away from the north if auto-estima is to con-
tinue prospering both in Brazil and the global south. The challenge is to cre-
ate a stable and self-sustaining new economic geography. In part there is an
underpinning of utopia in this new south-south structure. Lula explicitly rec-
ognizes that not all countries have an international comparative advantage
and need S&D within the WTO,32 a point that is of particular concern to the
smallest members of the G-90. Significantly, the suggestion from Lula is not
that the application of S&D be something practiced exclusively by the north,
but that the richer developing countries should also strategically choose to
purchase slightly price-uncompetitive products from the poorest countries.
Again, this complication of the generally accepted roles of developed and
developing contributes to a redrawing of important lines on the economic
map. Although couched in terms of moral and ethical imperatives, there is
also an underlying psychological dimension to this discretionary trade poli-
cy, one that draws upon the possibility of mutual technical assistance to open
up the south as a viable source of development aid and support. As was the
case with Lula’s donation of the Asturias prize to the UN hunger fund, the
effect is to complicate the notion of “the developing” by highlighting the
complex socioeconomic reality of many southern countries.
The problem that Brazilian foreign policymakers foresee for both the
domestic and the southern auto-estima projects is a coming shift in interna-
tional economic relations. The expansion of the EU eastwards and the rapid
movement on free trade talks between the US and the Central American free
trade area have revived the concerns of a bi- or tripolar international eco-
nomic structure raised by Robert Gilpin in the 1980s.33 As Amorim noted in

32 Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, “Palavras em encontro com representantes do Fórum da Sociedade
Civil, na XI UNCTAD—part II,” São Paulo, 15 June 2004, www.mre.gov.br.
33 Robert Gilpin, The Political Economy of International Relations (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1987), chapter 10. In a Brazilian context, see Robert Abdenur, “A Política Externa
Brasileira e o ‘Sentimento de Exclusão,” in Gélson Fonseca Júnior and Sérgio Henrique Nabuco

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 | Auto-estima in Brazil |

2003, the prospect is strong that the 21st century will revolve around the two
economic super blocs of NAFTA and the EU, and Brazil has no desire to be
absorbed into either grouping.34 Indeed, given the simultaneously sophisti-
cated and impoverished nature of the Brazilian economy it would be difficult
for Brazil to enter either bloc as an equal partner. Moreover, entry into the EU
or NAFTA on equal terms would require the ceding of a significant measure
of national autonomy, something that Brazilian foreign policy has consis-
tently and in some respects successfully sought to prevent over the last one
hundred years.35 Reformulation of international economic geography thus
becomes essential not only for the continued bolstering of southern auto-
estima by providing a succession of positive examples, but also to provide a
third option for the future economic development of the south, one that will
not require a reaffirmation of the psychological dependency of the post-
colonial context.

INTERNAL TENSIONS
While the logic behind the reformulation of international economic geogra-
phy may be theoretically sound, this attempt to expand and entrench auto-
estima is accompanied by the same danger of hubris that collapsed the NIEO
and a succession of Latin America-wide free trade treaties. Two central exam-
ples of the successes and dangers of the transnationalization of auto-estima
come from the G-20 and creation of the India-Brazil-South Africa dialogue
forum (IBSA). The influence that the G-20 exerted on the WTO negotiation
process in Cancun forced a change in US and EU attitudes to both Brazil
and the south, leaving these central northern actors little choice other than

de Castro, eds., Temas de Política Externa Brasileira II, vol. 1 (São Paulo: Editora Paz e Terra,
1994); Celso Amorim, “O Brasil e a ordem internacional pós-golfo,” Contexto Internacional 13
(January-June 1991): 25-34; Rubens Antonio Barbosa, “O Brasil e suas opções internacionais: A
articulação entre o universo e o regional,” Política Externa 3 (December 1994): 101-16; Ribens
Antonio Barbosa and Luís Panelli César, “A integração sub-regional, regional e hemisférica: O
esforço Brasileiro,” in Júnior and de Castro, Temas de Política Externa Brasileira II, vol. 1.
34 Amorim, “Entrevista à revista CNI: Indústria Brasileira.”
35 See the forthcoming chapter on Brazilian foreign policy by Luiz Felipe Lampreia and Ademar
Seabra da Cruz Junior in Justin L. Robertson and Maurice A. East, eds., Diplomacy and
Developing Nations: Post-Cold War Foreign Policy-Making Structures and Processes (London:
Frank Cass, forthcoming).

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| Sean W. Burges |

to accept Brazil and its G-20 partners on their own terms. In effect, the US
denial of the legitimacy of the G-20 as a negotiating bloc in the WTO was an
attempt to sustain the existing hierarchical relations between the north and
the south that had first come under attack at the 1998 Seattle WTO minis-
terial. Significantly, the US position was not changed by confrontation, but
by southern lack of interest in a debate that it saw as being irrelevant.
The message from Brazil might be best understood in terms of Fanon’s
position that “from of the point of view adopted here, there is no black prob-
lem. Or at any rate if there is one it concerns whites only accidentally.”36 In
other words, the issue was not the state of relations between the north and
the south, but only the extent to which southern countries are able to get on
with looking after their own affairs on their own terms. The simple reality in
the context of US–G-20 relations was there was nothing to discuss for the
south, and that since there was nothing to debate energies were best direct-
ed elsewhere. This willingness by the south to look to its own agenda was
particularly apparent in the months before the US decided to engage the G-
20 in direct agricultural talks at the WTO. Building on the success of the G-
20, India, Brazil, and South Africa sought to push their political cooperation
into economic and scientific areas through the creation of IBSA. The most
notable characteristic of the soft southern regional project of IBSA is its
pragmatism, which explicitly seeks to advance natural areas for cooperation
while setting aside more contentious issues until mutual confidence and
interdependence underpin a larger sustainable agreement.
Although the technical and political cooperation at the heart of IBSA
demonstrates the growing self-confidence in southern abilities, capacities,
and future possibilities, it also highlights the implicit utopian dangers of
embedding auto-estima in Brazilian foreign policy. The principal risk is that
the sense of issue-centred pragmatism that marks both the G-20 and IBSA
might be overshadowed by the hopes and aspirations of political decision-
makers. Lula’s references to IBSA frequently lead to discussing an expan-
sion of the grouping’s membership to include Russia and China, forming a
sort of G-5 that might parallel the G-8. 37 In practical terms, this overlooks
existing tensions between China and India as well as Russia. Moreover, it
presupposes that both Russia and China share the identity and auto-estima

36 Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks, 29.

37 Lula, “Palavras no encontro com estudantes Brasileiros,” Havana.

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 | Auto-estima in Brazil |

concerns driving cooperation amongst the current IBSA members. Whether

Russia and especially China would be interested in participating in a G-5 is
far from certain. Indeed, the Chinese response to a succession of welcoming
and inclusive speeches by Lula during an official visit to that country belied
a very firm sense of national identity suggestive of a future neocolonial role
for China over Brazil. 38
This does lead to a certain tension in the project of auto-estima in
Brazilian foreign policy that is reflective of larger tensions within the halls of
Itamaraty Palace. On one side is a faction that is almost fiercely nationalistic
and pro-southern to the exclusion of the north, implying the sort of fervour
and active rejection of the other that Fanon counsels against in Black Skin,
White Masks. The logic advanced by Garcia and Guimarães results in such
statements as Lula’s overly optimistic suggestion that the G-20 should
become the basis for a new southern trade bloc.39 Opposing such utopian
suggestions with a pragmatism grounded in the foreign ministry’s institu-
tional experience is the softened position demonstrated during Amorim’s
clarification of Lula’s statement. In Amorim’s hands the call for creation of a
southern free trade area became a desire to reexamine existing patterns of
economic geography and explore the untapped potential of south-south trade. 40
The division between Garcia/Guimarães and Amorim on a possible G-
20 trade bloc points to the sustained internal tension that marks the consol-
idation of auto-estima. Implicit in the creation of a southern trade bloc is a
belief that rejection of the north is a requirement for southern socioeco-
nomic development. On a practical level this is not possible because, as
Lafer’s work on identity cited earlier highlights, the criteria, expectations,
and ideas underpinning national policy evolve in a dialectic relationship with

38 Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, “Conferência na Universidade de Pequim: “Política externa Brasileira
no século XXI e o papel da parceria estratégica Sino-Brasileira,” Beijing, China, 25 May 2004,
www.mre.gov.br; Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, “Discurso no encerramento do seminário Brasil-
China: Uma parceria de sucesso,” Shanghai, China, 26 May 2004, www.mre.gov.br; Luiz Inácio
Lula da Silva, “Programa de rádio ‘Café com o Presidente’,” Rádio Nacional (Radiobrás), 31 May
2004; “Brazil/China: Dependency dangers mark Lula strategy,” Oxford Analytica, 15 June 2004.
39 Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, “Discurso em encontro com delegações da reunião ministerial do G-
20,” Brasília, 12 December 2003, www.mre.gov.br.
40 Celso Amorim, “Entrevista à revista epoca: Ministro prepara-se para fechar detalhes da Alca e
crê quê negociação com EU ainda tem armadilhas,” Brasília, 5 January 2004, www.mre.gov.br.

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| Sean W. Burges |

the external. Rejection of the external implies a lack of confidence in internal

abilities to appropriate and reshape other influences in a manner consonant
with a self-directed sense of identity. In effect, rejecting the external requires
rejection of large aspects of the internal, which as Fanon points out requires
denial of oneself. The more pragmatic approach that Amorim advances by
drawing on the institutional experience of Itamaraty speaks of a greater
degree of self-confidence, an approach that recognizes that self-identity is
constantly evolving and is not something that can be controlled in isolation.
And this is the mark of true consolidation of auto-estima. It is achieved when
consideration is no longer given to the influence that the external is having
on national identity because the manner in which it is appropriated is a con-
tinuous and autonomous process that constantly reconstructs identity to
reflect changing national circumstances and aspirations, using elements of
both the internal and external as devices to fulfil these aspirations.

CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS

The centrality of auto-estima in Brazilian foreign policy and the specific proj-
ect of combating the psychological dependency that has characterized south-
ern relations with the north will inevitably result in reactionary statements
and initiatives, particularly from political figures. Above all, diplomatic rhet-
oric will continue to be marked by an idealistic tone of southern solidarity.
But as the subtle divide between the Garcia/Guimarães and Amorim state-
ments demonstrates, Brazilian foreign policy remains underpinned by hard-
edged interest. Indeed, a subtext that emerges from the examples and state-
ments cited in this article is the consistency and calculation with which the
national interest has been pursued through Lula’s psychologically transforma-
tive foreign policy agenda. Lula is not pushing auto-estima for the emotional
well-being of his people, but because, as Fanon notes, it is a prerequisite for a
people to maximize their own potential for their own purposes.
This holds several implications. The first point is that the Brazilian for-
eign ministry does not consider Brazil to be a developing country in the clas-
sical sense. Although Brazil is a land of contrasts between rich and poor, this
is seen as having little bearing on the country’s foreign policy. The principal
goal of the Lula administration—rapid advancement of basic human devel-
opment—is predicated on an expansion of trade and improved national
insertion into the international economy on a competitive basis. This leads
to the second point for policymakers. Brazil and its southern partners will
engage in forceful and assertive negotiating practices in international

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 | Auto-estima in Brazil |

forums. More significantly, Brazilians see no reason to be reticent about par-

ticipating in international negotiations and organizations, a trait repeatedly
demonstrated in the context of world trade negotiations. The point here is
not to confuse forceful defence of domestically formulated conceptions of
the national interest with wanton, reactionary obstructionism.
Policymakers in the north are, however, left with an important problem:
how are they to discern what interests Brazil will seek to advance in interna-
tional negotiations? Here this article’s initial attempt at using a postcolonial
approach to understanding Brazilian foreign policy may be instructive.
Although the Brazilian foreign policy agenda is predicated on advancing the
national interest, definition of the national interest has been extended
beyond territorial boundaries to encompass an attitudinal change that seeks
a recasting of southern and global structures. This will entail a sustained
investment of diplomatic and political effort as well as the redirecting of eco-
nomic resources. More importantly, what policy initiatives and actions will
result from this effort? The argument advanced in this article is that a Fanon-
based understanding of auto-estima provides valuable insight into the trans-
formative foreign policy agenda rising in major emerging markets such as
Brazil as well as possibly India and South Africa. Working with a postcolo-
nial lens shifts the meaning of Brazilian statements and actions, moving
them from a prima facie proclivity for confrontation to the outward mani-
festation of an ongoing process of recasting internal identity. Ultimately, as
Fanon implied with his dismissal of the “Negro mission and white burden,” 41
the shift Lula is pushing in Brazilian foreign policy is really a nudge in a
direction that it was already taking: a sophisticated international expression
of the interests and aspirations of an internally confident and ambitious cit-
izenry operating independently of concerns over developed and developing.

41 Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks, 228.

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