The Internationalization of the state in Brazil has often been considered an effect of the country's recent rise as an emerging power, even when it could easily rather be seen as the cause of its mounting projection and leadership. This article summarizes the recent Brazilian debate on foreign policy decision-making, analyzing the role of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the President, the bureaucracy and the Congress. It also proposes an original comparative approach to their equivalents in Argentina. The results show that the lower levels of internationalization of the Argentinean state could easily be interpreted as diminishing the country's international influence in the last twenty years, while explaining Brazilian leadership in the region.
Argentine; Brazil; Internationalization; Foreign Policy; Leadership
