Brazil’s Geopolitics and Foreign Policy: two challenges for the 21st Century

The Institute for Foreign Affairs and Trade (IFAT) hosted an online event entitled “Brazil’s Geopolitics and Foreign Policy: two challenges for the 21st Century”. The invited expert was Nuno Morgado Ph.D., who is an Assistant Professor at the Corvinus University of Budapest, Department of Geography, Geoeconomy and Sustainable Development, and also an Adjunkt Professor at the Institute of Political Studies at Charles University, Prague. The discussion was moderated by Viktor Eszterhai Ph.D., Senior Research Fellow at IFAT.

Morgado Nuno held a presentation about domestic and international challenges that Brazil has to face. In terms of domestic challenges, the country faces a staggeringly high rate of violent crime, homicide, a low level of infrastructure hampering international trade, corruption, illiteracy and poor economic performance. Regarding foreign defiance, the sea or land orientation of Brazil remains the key issue which can be further described as a conflict between the radical left and the conservative, liberal camp.

Jair Bolsonaro was elected in 2019 to President of Brasil and his main agenda was to “return the country to the people”, crush corruption, liberalize the economy, fight drug traffickers along with guaranteeing individual rights and freedoms and strengthen the democratic system. The president’s foreign policy was to diminish the political vision of the Sao Paolo Forum. Despite promises, no radical change in policy is in sight.  But what caused this flinch? In Morgado’s opinion, no matter how supported the president is, his opposition is much organized and infiltrated in the state itself, thus this situation ties Bolsonaro’s hand.

Concerning the questions of the audience and the moderator, Morgado elaborated that Brazilian landowners, dealing with food production, are delighted to supply China with food that has enormous needs. This, in combination with the general anti-American and capitalist sentiment, has led to the involvement of BRICS to seek realignment from the United States.

For the full recording please click on the link below or visit our YouTube channel!