As Brazilian President Lula da Silva embarks today on his state visit to China, in which he plans to raise issues of global significance and put Brazil forward as a global leader, the City of London mouthpiece, The Economist throws a rug-chewing fit at what it says is Lula’s outsized ambition. Under the headline “Brazil’s Foreign Policy Is Hyperactive, Ambitious and Naïve,” they suggest that Lula should get real—understand that Brazil is very polarized, that he won his election only by a small margin, that there is a war in Europe, and that China, once an emerging power, is today a world power.
So, the world has changed and “all this has increased the costs of being chummy with everyone.” Hence, the Brazilian leader shouldn’t delude himself into thinking he’s going to do something great. Lula should have “learned his lesson” from his efforts years before, when he tried to broker a deal over Iran that “irked” Washington, The Economist warns. Yet here he is, trying to set up a “peace club” to mediate an end to the Ukraine war, an effort that “annoys both the West, which believes Lula has been too soft on Russia, and Xi Jinping who has tabled his own plan.” By trying to play the role of global peacemaker, the message is, “Lula risks looking naïve rather than an elder statesman.”
The City of London’s voice of usury asserts that so far Lula’s non-alignment “seemed rather one-sided,” complaining that when his top foreign policy adviser Celso Amorim traveled to Russia recently to meet with President Putin, he didn’t also visit Kiev. It quotes a professor from the Getulio Vargas Foundation who warns that there’s a perception that Lula’s peace initiative won’t have the desired effect, but, more importantly, “there is actually a risk that it could undermine Brazil’s relationship with Europe and the United States.” Other experts interviewed advise Lula to limit himself to addressing local or regional issues.
The Economist’s final word of advice to Lula? Stick with climate change, where Brazil can play “a leading role.” Brazil “is already a global power on the most important issue for humanity’s future. Lula’s legacy may be better served by spending his energy on areas where Brazil has clout, such as the environment, rather than on grand political topics where it has little or none.” (https://www.economist.com/the-americas/2023/04/10/brazils-foreign-policy-is-hyperactive-ambitious-and-naive )
