Abstract:
This paper offers an overview of the Brazilian foreign policy during the first decade of the present century, devoting special attention to president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s years (2003-2010). It is based on an understanding of the Brazilian foreign policy as a policy founded on tradition with important traces of continuity and sees the inflections that still exist as a result from different governmental choices. A systemic approach is proposed, which leads to the understanding that the change in the Brazilian foreign policy is a result of two factors: the ideational and the pragmatic one. Both control political decisions that lead to conflicting directions. The result of such conflicting pressure is a series of foreign policy positions scattered over time. This analytical model is visually represented by a pendulum sketch, whose movement between two extreme positions represents many political possibilities.
Keywords:
Brazilian foreign policy; Autonomy and development; Continuity and inflections
