The Good Old Imperial Way: Indirect US rule in Venezuela

Many analysts, critics, and Trump himself, invoke the Monroe Doctrine, “Gunboat Diplomacy,” and the golden age of imperialism to explain or justify the new American policy. The parallels are unmistakable: arbitrary territorial claims, disregard for the law, use of force, and plundering of resources. But they becomes even more compelling when we examine the mechanics of this golden age, and such a perspective quickly reveals both the strengths and the limitations of the current adventure.

Some cite the attachment of peoples to sovereignty or Afghanistan and Iraq to suggest that the enterprise is doomed, but this misunderstands the political structures of empires when they are functioning properly. Because in marginal and fringe areas, such as Venezuela for the United States, it is by mistake or in their decline that Empires commit large numbers of troops and become directly involved, at great expense, and often without success. During its triumphant period, spanning almost two centuries, the British Empire relied on “indirect government” and “native administration” in such cases: an agreement was reached with a local potentate, leaving them free to choose the means to maintain order, which was then exploited to assert or protect a geostrategic position and grant our companies privileged access to resources. In short, what Sara Berry has called “hegemony on a shoestring.” In its post-colonial form, this method was similarly central to France's maintenance of strong influence in its African “pré carré.” But in the twentieth century, it was primarily Washington that favored this arrangement, scattering it across the globe, from Somoza's Nicaragua and Mobutu's Zaire to the Shah's Iran, with repressive and corrupt dictatorships whose "correct" alignment during the Cold War and openness to American investment were unwavering. A famous comment attributed to Truman, and regarding Dominican Republic’s Trujillo, aptly summarizes the logic of this arrangement: "He's a son of a bitch, but he's our son of a bitch."

This very much looks like the model the Trump administration hopes to implement in Venezuela. The kidnapping of Maduro and the disabling of the country's air defenses dramatically demonstrated the vulnerability of its leaders. But the grip on power of the regime Maduro used to lead remains intact. Clearly, it is Delcy Rodríguez that Washington wants to see in power, to maintain a modicum of order in the country, operate a geo-strategic realignment, and, as in the good old days, open the economy to American investment. Sending troops to bring Venezuelans to heel is certainly not ruled out, but the occupation or takeover of a chaotic and violent country whose infrastructure and economy are in ruins is clearly not part of Rubio and his associates' plans.

Less than three weeks have passed since the operation in Caracas, but the implementation of the arrangement seems to be progressing smoothly, and, as we have seen, the concept has proven effective. Now, are Trump's boasts about the success of the venture, and especially about its benefits for the United States and, incidentally, for Venezuela, justified?

Although incomplete, the available information about the regime, its operations, its control of the territory and its population, and the current state of its economy suggests that the venture seems destined, at best, to evolve toward a precarious stability: a mediocre status quo, but one nonetheless conducive to the sordid dealings that allow opportunists to enrich themselves and funnel a portion of their profits back to Trump and his family.

The first problem is that of the local potentate. What the Empire needs is someone flexible, fairly well established locally, since they don't want to invest too much to keep them in power, but who nevertheless remains vulnerable or dependent on its support. From this perspective, a popular leader like Maria Corina Machado, however obsequious she may be in the face of Trump, is far from ideal since, in the long run, she could win elections and, to do so, will also have to appeal to her electorate. Delcy Rodriguez, lacking popular legitimacy, shines by contrast with all her charms. The problem is that in post-Maduro Venezuela, there are two strongmen… and neither is in power. Vladimir Padrino López, commander-in-chief of the army and Minister of Defense since 2014, was under Maduro and without a doubt the most powerful political actor in the country. Without his support, stated from the outset, Delcy Rodriguez would not have lasted long in the presidency. The former military officer Diosdado Cabello, Minister of the Interior, former Vice President under Chavez, Maduro's rival for the latter’s succession, controlling the secret police and intelligence services (headed by his brother), but above all, leading the colectivos, the informal militias of the ruling party, represents a potentially immense threat to Rodriguez. Within the Chavista constellation, finally, and despite the presence of her brother Jorge as President of the National Assembly, Delcy enjoys little support. Banished from the highest echelons of power by Chavez himself, she owes her rehabilitation to Maduro and now to Trump her continued presence at the head of state. A deeply divided summit, in short, where trust has never prevailed, as evidenced by the massive presence of Cubans in Maduro's close protection detail, the arrest of the general responsible for his personal security and head of his counter-espionage services, the regular purges of the officer corps by Padrino López, and now the secrecy that apparently surrounds Diosdado Cabello's movements.

The second problem is that of the order that is supposedly being "maintained," a certain degree of which is necessary to revive the economy and rebuild the oil industry. The regime is stable, but the country is chaotic. Venezuela has one of the worst homicide rates in the hemisphere; its streets and countryside are dangerous; large swathes of the country and the outskirts of its major cities are not clearly under state control. The prisons themselves are mostly dominated by criminal groups. Above all, the stability of Padrino López and Cabello's military, police, and militia networks rests in part on the direct or indirect exploitation—through associations with criminal groups—of revenues from illegal activities, ranging from outright extortion to human and drug trafficking, including illegal gold mining and the mercury smuggling on which it depends, not to mention the embezzlement of oil revenues. This detail makes any offensive against "organized crime," and therefore any quick return to a minimum acceptable level of security for the public and… investors, unlikely.

The idea that, as Trump claims, the United States will now "lead" the country through its control of the highest levels of government must, in short, be significantly qualified. Given the credible threats from Washington, it is possible, but increasingly unlikely, that the regime will split and the country will be plunged into chaos. But the emerging arrangement bears little resemblance to a transmission belt that would ensure the White House's wishes are automatically fulfilled on the ground. On the other hand, Trump appears more credible when he says he will "control the money" from oil, since the mechanism he proposes—a monopoly on the import and sale of Venezuelan crude—while morally scandalous and probably illegal, seems relatively simple and easy to implement (the legal set up looks in fact quite clever).

Given the understandable reluctance of major oil companies to commit to a genuine revival of the Venezuelan oil industry, what seems to be emerging looks more like a minimal indirect government facilitating the exploitation, for the benefit of Trump associates, of readily accessible resources in the short or medium term. For Venezuelans, the lifting of the embargo and the revitalization of part of the oil industry could definitively halt the economic collapse, inject some money back into state coffers, and perhaps even facilitate a degree of recovery. But the country's return to prosperity in the near future seems illusory, and, above all, Venezuelans' dreams of the rule of law, democracy, and security appear to be nothing more than false hopes.

 (An earlier and slightly different version was published, in French, on February 8)

Mark Carney's election

Inter-American Dialogue asked me to answer the following questions (in 250 words altogether!): What ultimately decided the race for Carney and the Liberal Party? What policies will Carney prioritize as prime minister, especially regarding trade and international relations? What is the significance of the Liberal Party’s win in the context of global politics?

And here is my answer: Mark Carney won because many saw him as the best candidate to handle the Trump administration’s tariff war and his threatening signals about Canada’s sovereignty. His experience and obvious comfort in “globalist” circles, which shone in visits to France and the UK, contrast starkly with Poilievre’s narrow domestic focus and utter lack of international experience or interest. This is likely to matter because, notwithstanding both parties’ insistence on the elimination of inter-provincial barriers for the economic future of the country, much of the game will really be played out in negotiations with Washington and in desperate attempts to diversify the country’s trade and investment relations away from the US. From that standpoint, the virtual absence of references to the world beyond the Anglosphere in the Conservative platform and campaign were certainly dismaying. However, while Carney’s Liberals will clearly push beyond it to Europe as a whole, one only finds cursory references to free trade discussions with Mercosur and Asean in their formal plans. Perhaps most concerning, neither platform mentions CUSMA or Mexico which is Canada’s third largest trade partner and should be seen as a potential ally in the trilateral negotiations that will have to take place soon. Now, Carney announces plans for a new foreign policy, he will be hosting the next G-7 Summit in June and will no doubt be in South Africa in November for the G20. The world clearly matters to him and Latin America may even reappear on Canada’s radar screen under his watch.

Cf. here for other people's takes.

Les petits matins blêmes du président Lula

Les années Jair Bolsonaro (2019-2023) ont été pour le Brésil une époque de violence, de régression sociale et économique, de polarisation politique, et de désastres environnementaux. Elles ont vu sa démocratie chanceler sous la pression conjointe d’un président nostalgique de la dictature, d’une confrontation ouverte entre lui et la Cour suprême, d’un Congrès divisé et rapace, et d’institutions policières et militaires tentées par un retour à l’autoritarisme. Évidemment, la pandémie y était pour quelque chose : avec plus de 700,000 morts le pays se place en effet dans le peloton de tête des grandes économies—avec les États-Unis et la Grande-Bretagne—pour la proportion de la population affectée. Mais c’est chez Jair Bolsonaro lui-même qu’il faut chercher le ressort principal du désastre des dernières années, un règne de mépris de la décence, de l’humanité et de la bienveillance, copie tropicale de l’ex-président Trump.

Sortir de la nuit

De cette nuit cauchemardesque, le Brésil et Luiz Inacio Lula (2003-2011), élu pour un troisième mandat en 2023, n’émergent toutefois que dans un petit matin blême. Accueilli après quelques jours au pouvoir par une tentative de coup d’État, le « nouveau » président se meut pour ce nouveau mandat dans un marécage économique et politique qui lui laisse très peu de liberté de mouvement. Depuis son élection, il panse les blessures infligées au secteur public par son prédécesseur, réinvestit en éducation et permet aux agences environnementales de faire leur travail, et entreprend d’expulser les mineurs illégaux des réserves autochtones.

Malgré des problèmes de santé, il essaie, tant bien que mal, de rapiécer la société brésilienne. Mais l’économie ne se remet que lentement du choc d’une pandémie qu’avait précédé, sous son héritière Dilma Rousseff (2011-2016), la pire crise qu’ait connu le pays depuis cinquante ans. Masqués pendant les premiers mandats de Lula par l’explosion du prix des matières premières, les problèmes structurels du pays refont surface, des lacunes du système d’éducation à une désindustrialisation accélérée entamée dans les années 1990. Le pays voit les grands rêves de l’après-guerre, portés par la sidérurgie et l’industrie automobile, s’effacer pour faire place à la dominance d’un secteur tertiaire peu productif, pour l’emploi, et d’un secteur primaire, des mines et du soya à la production animale, pour la croissance. Son taux inespéré de 2.9% de croissance en 2023—dont la modestie est en soi révélatrice—est porté par le bond formidable (15%) de la production et des exportations agro-alimentaires, qui ne représentent pourtant que 7% du PIB du pays.

Le paysage politique n’est guère plus ensoleillé. Le Parti Libéral de Bolsonaro dispose du plus grand nombre de sièges dans un Congrès que se divisent 18 partis politiques et on s’entend maintenant, chez les spécialistes, pour dire qu’est en déréliction le « présidentialisme de coalition » avec lequel, tant bien que mal, on gouvernait le pays depuis la fin de la dictature en 1985: au marchandage de sièges au cabinet, de nomination dans les secteurs public et parapublic et, dès lors, de budgets à contrôler, s’ajoute maintenant une mécanique encore plus dysfonctionnelle centrée sur la concession systématique de fonds liés à des amendements introduits par des députés qu’encadrent moins que jamais les partis politiques.

Avec un secteur public déjà gonflé à bloc, une dette dont le service est de plus en plus contraignant et des perspectives de croissance anémiques, les options du gouvernement sont limitées. Pour le moment, le très capable ministre des Finances, Fernando Haddad, s’attache simplement à contrôler les dépenses tout en assurant le maintien des services publics et de santé, ce qui ne plaît guère aux militants du Parti des travailleurs de Lula, pour qui la discipline fiscale s’apparente avant tout à un complot capitaliste.
Accueilli après quelques jours au pouvoir par une tentative de coup d’État, le « nouveau » président se meut pour ce nouveau mandat dans un marécage économique et politique qui lui laisse très peu de liberté de mouvement”

Un passé encombrant

Lula doit par ailleurs composer avec une légitimité politique qu’entame encore le scandale milliardaire de Lava Jato. Il est maintenant clair que sa condamnation à 12 ans de prison et les 580 jours qu’il a purgés en captivité ont été le fait d’une machination politique menée par le juge Sergio Moro—qui devint Ministre de la Justice dans le premier cabinet de Bolsonaro et siège maintenant au Sénat—pour l’empêcher d’être candidat aux élections de 2018. Il demeure que des milliards de dollars de fonds publics ont été détournés alors qu’il était au pouvoir et le refus de Lula et de son parti d’assumer quelque responsabilité pour le scandale ont facilité leur association, dans la propagande de l’opposition, au crime et à la corruption.

Dans cette grisaille, Lula demeure populaire (50% d’approbation, selon les sondages) mais il semble un peu démuni. Il s’implique dans les micro-négociations dont dépend, au jour le jour, la gouverne politique du pays, mais ne domine guère l’agenda politique. Principale cible du coup d’État manqué de janvier 2023, il laisse à l’ambitieux Alexandre de Morais, de son siège à la Cour Suprême, prendre tout le crédit de la défense de la démocratie dans le pays. Il est aussi largement absent des débats entre son parti et Fernando Haddad sur la politique économique. Qui plus est, ses réflexes et idées ont quelque chose de suranné : ainsi de son programme de voitures populaires, de sa sympathie pour l’exploration pétrolière en Amazonie, de son refus de nommer des femmes à une Cour Suprême qui voit maintenant des hommes occuper 10 de ses 11 sièges ou, dans le même registre, de son silence dans le débat sur l’avortement, qui est toujours criminalisé au Brésil.

Une perte d’influence dans le monde

La politique étrangère, une de ses forces au début du siècle, ne lui sourit pas non plus. Ici aussi, ses vieux réflexes le trahissent. Victime lui-même du dévoiement d’un système de justice et ayant échappé in extremis à une horde anti-démocratique, il fait montre d’une indulgence gênante devant les frasques dictatoriales d’un Nicolas Maduro, au Venezuela, qui n’a de gauche que la manière, et refuse d’appuyer le Chili progressiste de Gabriel Boric dans sa condamnation des dérives répressives de l’ex-révolutionnaire Daniel Ortega, président du Nicaragua.

Sa remise en cause de la dominance de l’Occident dans les grandes instances internationales trouve aujourd’hui moins de sympathie dans des démocraties libérales dont aucun leader ne l’accueillerait, comme le fit Barack Obama, en le présentant comme « my man». Et si les BRICS et autres coalitions Sud-Sud du début du siècle apparaissaient comme des tremplins intéressants pour le Brésil, leur exploitation géopolitique de plus en plus claire, par une Russie imprévisible et une Chine de plus en plus impériale, amputent fortement le potentiel politique de ces alliances pour un pays qui demeure, militairement, une puissance très moyenne.

Même dans sa région, enfin, le Brésil ne semble pas pouvoir recouvrer l’influence et le prestige qu’il avait auparavant. Les présidents de gauche de la Colombie et du Chili, plus « modernes, » soucieux d’équité de genre et de protection de l’environnement, ont peu d’atomes crochus avec Lula. L’élection en Argentine de Javier Milei, un ultra-libéral déchaîné, ne promet aussi que des migraines, et la diplomatie luliste ne semble savoir que faire des velléités expansionnistes du Venezuela en Guyane.

Même l’Équateur, jadis partenaire du Brésil à l’époque de la « vague rose » des années 2000, cherche maintenant dans le petit El Salvador du brutal Nayib Bukele, plutôt qu’au Brésil, la solution à ses problèmes de sécurité. Le monde extérieur, en somme, jadis grand terrain de jeu où Lula pouvait exploiter la légitimité que lui confère une trajectoire personnelle extraordinaire et déployer son charme rustique et ses remarquables qualités de médiateurs, ne semble guère plus accueillant que sa cour arrière de Brasilia.

Tout cela étant dit, il reste que dans la sombre barbarie qui gagne le monde, la présence de Lula à la tête du Brésil représente une petite éclaircie. Car son pays–dixième économie, sixième population, puissance environnementale—est important, et parce qu’on peut parler et faire des choses avec cet homme décent, pacifique et soucieux de justice sociale.

[Publication originale: Conseil des Relations Internationales de Montréal]

The Brazilian gun lobby's er... dysfunctions

A funny one from my favourite Brazilian magazine, although, unfortunately, gun proliferation in Brazil is a sad, very serious and, literally, deadly problem: "To compensate for the new restrictions imposed on gun ownership, the "Bullet Lobby" is negotiating to get a decree on penis enlargement."Let me explain this one because, although the analysis may look a bit vulgar and simplistic, it is dead on about the whole gun lobby, whether in the US, in Canada, or in Brazil.

The Lula government has recently introduced a decree revising the extremely liberal regime of access to weapons that his predecessor Jair Bolsonaro had adopted, and which had led to a huge increase in the number of guns in circulation in Brazil. In many ways, it is very little, very late, and it is not even clear that it will survive congressional resistance. Given the government's weakness in congress, what little there is there probably is as much as can be done. The Congressional Gun Lobby ("a Bancada da Bala") has 267 members, out of 513 deputies in total, and it is predictably going to war over this. The government may still win, but they will literally have to buy votes to do so--freeing money for the pet projects of enough deputies.

The key is, most people affected already have guns, piles of them, and in may cases, they have bought a huge number of additional ones under Bolsonaro: the number of registered weapons went from 83,000 to 280,000 between 2018, when he was elected, to 2021, one full year before he was finally thrown out of power.

That's the context.

Now the text itself (revised Google translation):

"To compensate for restrictions in gun ownership, the Gun Lobby is negotiating a decree on penis enlargement.

TOMA LÁ DÁ CÁ ["Take here, give there": a Brazilian expression meaning patronage]– The system of checks and balances of democracy continues to function normally. Dissatisfied with the presidential decree that radically reduced the CACs' right to own and carry weapons [CAC stands for Caçadores, Atiradores e Colecionadores/Hunters, Sharpshooters and Collectors], the Gun Lobby obtained compensation from the federal government. In the next few days, Lula should sign a new decree to provide penis enlargement via SUS [Brazil's public health system], in addition to discounts on Ferraris, Porsches, pickups and SUVs for all CACs.

The solution was celebrated by federal deputy Alberto Fraga, from the PL [Bolsonaro's Liberal Party], who presides over the Bancada da Bala. “I had already been complaining that the restriction on the sale of 9mm pistols would cause a crisis in trade and a feeling of deep insecurity in the masculinity of the Brazilian shooter”, explained Fraga. “That consolation will be welcome.”

Taurus [a large Brazilian gun manufacturer] has already announced that it intends to change the production of rifles for that of penis enlargers, projecting a record profit for the next quarter."

https://piaui.folha.uol.com.br/herald/2023/07/21/para-compensar-corte-na-posse-de-arma-bancada-da-bala-negocia-decreto-sobre-aumento-peniano/
[About the picture: Sildenafil is the generic version of Viagra, and C.A.C. stands for Hunters, Sharpshooters and Collectors].

Canada's review of its Cannabis legalization policy

 [This short comment marks the return of the Little Crocodile, exceptionally, with Canadian content, but only because it is about drugs and drug policy. I am letting go of administrative responsibilities and will be posting more regularly from now on]

Cannabis legalization was to be reviewed after three years, that is, in 2021. The process was launched a year later and is still underway.

Like many things this government does, it is shrouded in secrecy. What would we do without nosy journalists (in this case from the Marijuana Business Daily)?

The report will be prepared under the direction of Morris Rosenberg, former head of the Trudeau Foundation and author of the recently published report on foreign threats to the 2021 elections, which, to say the least, was thin. 

Here is Andrew Coyne's take on it: "The report on foreign interference in the 2021 election by former Trudeau Foundation CEO Morris Rosenberg was even worse. O'Toole says Rosenberg did not interview any senior Conservative official for his report. Yet the report leaves the strong impression he did... The report says “[t]here was an opportunity to meet with representatives of major political parties” without saying who, refers to “interviews with party representatives” without saying which, even states  “party representatives were pleased with the thoroughness of briefings..."

Is there really no one else available for these things in Ottawa?

Bolsonaro and the Brazilian military

Reacting on Facebook to my recent piece on Lula in Open Canada, Fraser Taylor pointed out that, aside from the Covid situation, the key variable was the role of the military: "the role of the military. I think that a coup is unlikely but who will the military support and what deals will be made."

 

I answered that "the military issue is complicated. Bolsonaro's has strong support among the rank and file, as he does among the states-based "military police," which has its own command in each state, and 50% more members than the federal military. Officers are another story: Bolsonaro has talked the talk and brought several generals in his cabinet--and they have brought other officers in their own cabinets. When he talks about "his" military and disrespect standard rules of promotion, however, the establishment is reminded that he was expelled for violating military discipline as a captain, and they don't like that at all. Lastly: Brazil will be a mess for at least another decade and they may want to leave the management of the mess to civilians..."

 

Here is more meat around that bone: As the Thais Oyama suggests, the top brass are doing their best to protect the military from the increasingly broad backlash against Bolsonaro's criminal mismanagement of the COVID crisis.

 

Here is the Google translation of a column on a recent letter by the head of the Military Club and the link to the letter itself:

Thaís Oyama

Pazuello's summons to COVID Parliamentary Commission Inquiry [CPI] irritates the Army and makes the Military Club go wild

04/29/2021 11h52

The president of the Military Club, Reserve Division General Eduardo José Barbosa, published yesterday a text in which he defends the application, by the Executive Power, of the infamous article 142 of the Constitution - the one that talks about the use of the Armed Forces to guarantee "the law and the order "and which is brandished by President Jair Bolsonaro every time he feels run over by the Supreme Court.

In the text, General Barbosa points to the Supreme Federal Court, the National Congress, the press, Minister Gilmar Mendes [a Supreme Court Judge], ex-President Lula and Senators Omar Aziz (PSD) and Renan Calheiros (MDB) - President and CPI rapporteur for Covid. None of the characters was named in the article, entitled "The power of darkness in Brazil". In it, Eduardo José Barbosa also says that the criticized institutions "chickened out" and now want to blame President Jair Bolsonaro "for what they did not let him do".

The general's text needs to be read in perspective.

The Military Club, a bunker for Army reserve officers, is the Force's most strident political voice. There, the generals, free from the restraints of active duty, shout at will against whom and what they want. General Hamilton Mourão presided over the Club when he accepted to be candidate for vice on Bolsonaro's slate, when he called Colonel Brilhante Ustra, a former DOI-CODI [military investigation units during the dictatorship, infamous for their use of torture] chief and the first military man to be recognized by the courts as a torturer, as a hero.

But if General Barbosa's text is one or two shades higher than what even some of his most prominent reserve colleagues would adopt, it is certain that, at some points, it reflects precisely what even active duty officials think.

As one of them says: "It is intolerable to hear someone like Renan [the President of the CPI, a conservative anti-Bolsonaro who happens to be one of the most corrupt members of Congress] wanting to teach a moral lesson and summoning a uniformed general to testify".

Covid's CPI scheduled for next Wednesday the testimony of the former Minister of Health, General Eduardo Pazuello, who is still active and is now in the General Secretariat of the Army, in Brasilia.

Not that Pazuello is very prestigious in the ranks of the Force. The maskless parade he performed in a shopping mall in Manaus last Sunday even angered the Army High Command (those who attended the inauguration ceremony of the new commander, General Paulo Sérgio Nogueira de Oliveira, could see how the members of the institution take the recommendations of the anti-covid manual to the letter: with the exception of Minister Braga Netto [the new Minister of Defense], who took off his mask for a moment when speaking, no one was without it for a second).

Pazuello's display of nonchalance in the mall, therefore, was seen as deserving even of a public reprimand by the Force command, which did not happen.

But it is one thing for a general to suffer internal criticism from his peers and quite another to be "publicly embarrassed by people like Renan", as an active official in the government says.

General Barbosa's text may call attention to the stridency, but it contains a message shared by generals, from active duty and in pajamas: it will be noisy if Covid's CPI, when targeting Pazuello, hits the Army.

Lula is Back

Brazil is going through the worst crisis of its modern history. As of this writing, the pandemic has killed more than 400,000 Brazilians, with 60,000 COVID-related deathsin March alone, and reaching 20,000 per week in April. Mortality is on an explosive growth path as hospitals are running out of oxygen and now of the painkillers needed to intubate patients. Thousands are waiting for admission into intensive care units while people are treated and die on hospital floors. Bodies are piling up in morgues and cemeteries, and funeral homes are running out of caskets. Infection levels are such that the country threatens to turn into the world’s foremost incubator of COVID variants.

Meanwhile, the president who bears much responsibility for the scale of the crisis and the awful government response to it tells Brazilians to stop “whining,” complains Brazil looks like "a country of fags” and publicly mocks people gasping forair.

Incredibly, Jair Bolsonaro’s political prospects were, until recently, not that bad. The opportunism of the centre-right coalition that dominates Congress, the deep divisions that plague the opposition, the relatively good growth expectations for next year (+3.6%), along with incumbency and a still sizable core group of fanatical supporters gave him solid chances to win a second mandate in the fall 2022 presidential elections.

On March 8, however, a Supreme Court judge nullified the criminal conviction of former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, ruling that the tribunal that condemned him did not have the jurisdiction to do so. His decision was endorsed in April by the full Court, which also ruled the judge who presided his trial, SergioMoro, had been partial and decisions he made during the proceedings were tainted. A new trial will take years to complete. In the meantime, the 76-year-old da Silva is free to face off against Bolsonaro next year.

Lula, as he is universally known, is by far Brazil’s most popular politician of the last 50 years. He ended his second mandate in 2011 with an 80 per cent rate ofapproval, though corruption allegations have tarnished his reputation since. He was president when billions of dollars of public monies were diverted to political parties and intermediaries in exchange for their support for hispolicies. Evidence that he benefitted financially is evaporating by the day, but the scale of the scandals and the involvement of several of his closest advisors make his claims to be the victim of a full-fledged conspiracy difficult to swallow.

However, out of resignation or cynicism, Brazilian voters tend to see corruption as an inherent part of their national politics, especially if it is tempered with meaningful action or change. And on this front, Lula is untouchable.

Helped by the explosive increase in China’s demand for natural resources in the early 2000, he presided over the fastest period of growth since the mid-1960s and, crucially, the largest and broadest reduction of poverty in the history of the country. While his progressive outlook doesn’t make him the first choice of the business sector, he has proven to be remarkably pragmatic and credible rumours already signal his interest in recruiting a centrist business person as candidate for vice-president. Brazil’s economic elites would not fear a radical turn to the left in the country’s economic policies were Lula to return to the presidency.

For all these reasons, he is Bolsonaro’s worst nightmare. Polls show Lula and Bolsonaro neck-and-neck when it comes to Brazilians’ voting intentions — and this is without any campaigning by Lula, or even a formally declared candidacy.

* * *

Interesting, you might say, but why should the prospect of an electoral victory by Lula more than 18 months from now matter to Brazil, the Americas and Canada?

Lula’s return matters in Brazil because it changes the calculations of all political forces in the country. On the Left, presidential hopefuls must now know that they have to wait until at least 2026 to even think of winning, because their current supporters will most likely vote for Lula in a polarized 2022 contest,.

Things are more complicated on the right. The Brazilian Congress is fragmented, with 24 parties dividing up 513 seats in the Chamber of Deputies, and 81 in the Senate. The government’s core coalition is made up of only 150 deputies and 12 senators, while the opposition has 170 deputies and 18 senators. The balance of power is held by the so called “Fat Centre.” Members of this group have no well-defined ideology and are almost purely opportunistic. For them, their families, friends and financial backers, bargaining every one of their votes, and getting re-elected to keep doing it, is all that counts. With Lula in the picture, the price of their support for Bolsonaro’s policies will increase and he will need to demonstrate that supporting him in 2022, instead of Lula, will increase their chances of winning.

All this has shaken up President Bolsonaro’s life and weakened his electoral prospects. He’s panicking, and it shows on several fronts. One year into the COVID-19 pandemic, he’s finally announced the creation of a committee to fight it. He’s replaced several of his ministers. He’s tried — and failed — to increase his own executive power while reducing that of Congress. He’s also tried to get the explicit support of the military hierarchy for his opposition to the restrictive COVID-19 measures imposed by some governors and mayors and in his fights with the Supreme Court. These efforts backfired, however, when the commanders of the army, navy and air force resigned following the dismissal of the Minister of Defense, himself a four-star general, who was resisting Bolsonaro’s pressure to involve the military in the politics of pandemic management.

The long-term domestic effect of Lula’s return would obviously depend on how he does in the presidential elections. Were he to win, it is easy to see a period of Joe Biden-like calmness and moderately progressive policies that would help stabilize the country. Lula’s Worker’s Party doesn’t have a great reputation for competent economic management. Party member Dilma Rousseff, who succeeded Lula as president in 2011, squandered much that Lula had achieved. Still, it is difficult to imagine anything worse for the country than the utterly anachronic hyper-liberalism of Paulo Guedes, Bolsonaro’s current finance minister, whose narrow obsession with privatization comes straight out of the 1980s.

Lula’s return clearly matters for South America. In the short term, Brazil’s numerous neighbours are bound to benefit from a more rational pandemic policy born out of Bolsonaro’s growing fear that someone will capitalize on his mismanagement of the COVID crisis. In the mid- and long-term, the prospects of Lula’s regaining power would be encouraging in a region where Venezuela remains the epicenter of the worst refugee crisis in the America’s history, where democratic crises are multiplying and where an experienced diplomatic bridge-builder is sorely needed. Over his eight years in power, he was the linchpin of a golden age of pragmatic regional problem-solving through presidential diplomacy, and the face of a Left as committed to democracy as it is to social justice.

Canada should also root for Lula. Ottawa’s attempts to pressure Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro to hold open elections and stop violating human rights, along with similar efforts directed at President Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua, are hampered by the presence on its side of a Brazil led by] Bolsonaro, an authoritarian and overt apologist of military rule. While Lula’s diplomacy never quite aligned with Canada’s core strategic interests, its pragmatism, its support for multilateral diplomacy and its commitment to a humane world order certainly accorded well with Canadians’ values and international outlook. Conversely, the re-election of Bolsonaro or, worse, a coup in the face of probable defeat, would definitely plunge South America as a whole into a period of instability and democratic decay, an outcome clearly at odds with both Canadian interests and values.

[This piece was first published in Open Canada]

Thinking clearly about Amazon protection

The world has suddenly rediscovered the Amazon. After a summer of record heat waves in Europe and North America, thousands of fires and a climate-sceptic, obnoxious, sexist, racist and proudly authoritarian Brazilian president have put the Amazon and its protection on the global to-do list and, more pointedly, on this past week’s G7 Summit agenda.

This is great. The Amazon is the world’s largest rainforest and its largest reserve of biodiversity. It plays an important role in the planet’s carbon cycle and its destruction would have a massively negative impact on climate change. And yet, a fast-growing part of it is being destroyed on President Jair Bolsonaro’s watch.

Over the last two weeks, as demonstrations were taking place the world over, a huge wave of aid offers, threats and advice have flooded the media, and the usual clique of universal experts and global spotlight grabbers — from Stephen Walt and Leonardo DiCaprio to our very own Lloyd Axworthy — have jumped in the fray. Most of the suggestions, however, seem to assume that the development of the region can still be largely stopped while others have been frankly counter-productive — for instance, sending "multilateral green helmets [...] across the Brazilian border."

For the current energy not to evaporate as the rainy season starts in the Amazon and as temperatures drop in the Global North, it may be useful to drop those views and consider a few basic things that any serious endeavour to save as much of the forest as possible should take into account.

First, and most importantly, the Amazon is huge: larger than Western Europe and, at 5.5 million square kilometres, as large as Canada’s 10 provinces together. Depending on how one defines it, between 20 and 30 million people live in the 60 percent of the Amazon that lies in Brazil, and millions more in the Colombian, Peruvian and Bolivian Amazon. Most of those people are poor and, with very few exceptions, their current livelihood and long-term life prospects are not consistent with the transformation of the Amazon into a huge forest reserve.

The protection of forest thus calls for the creation of options for those people. This will be costly, and it will take time. Consider for instance that the US$20 million G7 aid offer represents less than a dollar per capita for Amazonians — or less than the carbon tax on 20 litres of gasoline that many Canadians are loath to pay. It also probably means that, even in the best of cases, a substantial portion of the forest will be destroyed in the meantime.

Being serious about the Amazon means being ready to invest massive amounts of money into the long-term and necessarily slow and muddled re-engineering of its economic development. Roberto Mangabeira Unger, who managed Brazil’s Amazon policy from 2007 to 2009, speaks for instance of a knowledge-based economy for the region, an appealing prospect, but one that is also not realistic in the short or medium term.

Third, the G7 countries’ track record on climate change commitment is patchy at best: Germany’s main source of electricity is still coal; Canada is building pipelines to export thick and dirty oil; the gilets jaunes movement in France was driven in part by opposition to a carbon tax; the Trump administration is doing its very best to keep the country’s energy matrix as dirty as possible; and so on.

In other words, a serious attempt at tackling the problem calls for a long-term outlook, a willingness to invest large sums of money, a sizable degree of humility and the recognition that the main players will be Amazonian countries themselves. Now, with a man like Bolsonaro in charge of the largest chunk of the forest, some prodding will obviously be needed too, but the latter must be cleverly applied.

This means leveraging the will and interests of local players. Brazilians are proud and protective of the Amazon and, as Robbert Muggah recently noted, most are shocked and ashamed at the current government’s policies and actions. The governors of Amazonian states and significant sectors of the Brazilian Congress are pushing the central government to fight the fire and enforce existing regulations, and they want to prevent Bolsonaro from weakening the latter. Powerful counter-forces must obviously be tackled — the large and powerful congressional “cattle caucus” for instance — and for this, sensitive pressure points must be exploited.

The most obvious of them is Brazil’s sizable dependence on foreign agricultural markets. Brazil is the world’s top exporter of sugar, coffee, soy, orange juice and chicken, and it ranks third for beef and eighth for cotton. Credible threats of boycotts could thus in theory work wonders. The agro-business lobby in Brazil understands this and is already pushing the government to enhance the monitoring of illegal logging and enforce existing regulations.

To have any hope of success, however, such pressure needs to be completely de-linked from any challenge to Brazil’s sovereignty, and tied to a credible and substantive offer of cooperation.

A very promising avenue is being opened by Colombia and Peru’s call for a summit of Amazon countries on September 6. The G7 summit may be now over, but if leaders of those countries are serious about action on the Amazon, they should engage with this effort, commit to supporting effective action with significant resources, and make it clear that, while the effort must be led by Amazon countries themselves, inaction or worse could have real economic consequences.

[This post was first published on the Open Canada website]

Lava Jato: beware throwing the baby with the bathwater

The trove of documents that The Intercept is posting online shows increasingly clearly that Lava Jato Judge Moro and key prosecutors were targeting Lula to make sure that he would not run in 2016, thus opening the way for a victory of the Right.
Those who denounced the impeachment of Dilma and the arrest of Lula as a coup--among whom I was not--look increasingly right. The whole affair, well beyond clownish, violent and vulgar Bolsonaro, points to deep flaws in the country's institutional make-up and to strict limits to its supposedly democratic status.
It would be tempting, therefore, to dismiss Lava Jato as a scheme, as the pure artefact of an attempt by the Right to get back to power, which would be a mistake.
Let's indeed not through the baby with the bathwater: though the proof against him personally look increasingly fraught, corruption was rife under the governments of Lula and his chosen successor, Dilma Rousseff (against whom nothing has been found) government.
As the latest issue of David Fleischer's Brazil Focus (August 17-23) reminds us, the scale of those scandals is just mind boggling. In one of the latest instalments of the investigation, two of the PT's finance ministers are targeted: Antonio Palocci, who is already in prison and collaborating with the police, and Guido Mantega, "the longest-serving finance Minister in the history of Brazil," still free.
The latter is accused by Palocci of having received $R50 million Reais (about US$15 million) from Odebrecht, the big engineering firm that was at the core of the scandal. As Palocci is clearly trying to save his skin, this may or not be true, but in the meantime, judges and the Swiss authorities, on the request of Brazil, have frozen the bank accounts of Mantega: $R 50 million in Brazil, and $US 50 million in Switzerland, for a total of about US $65 million dollars.
Mantega should obviously be considered innocent until proven guilty, but this guy is the foreign-born son of Italian immigrants, he has a BA in Economics and a PhD in Sociology from the University of São Paulo. He has been close to Lula since the 1990s, he has taught in universities, worked for think tanks, and he was, for a while, an advisor in the PT administration of the City of São Paulo. His only real claim to fame is this long stint as Finance Minister for Lula and Dilma. And now, no doubt among many other assets, he has US$50 million in a Swiss bank account?
As the evidence piles up, of Moro's scheming and of engineering firms, banks and PT operators' getting immensely rich, Lula--and possibly Dilma too--looks increasingly like a pathetic tool cleverly used by a cynical mafia of conservative political entrepreneurs and long-time "friends" and "collaborators."
It is to cry.