Condução da política externa brasileira na Unasul: o modus operandi do Brasil nas reuniões extraordinárias entre 2008 e 2014

Abstract

South America has become an important geo-strategic axis for Brazil’s Foreign Policy, during the twenty-first century. With the creation of Unasur, in 2008, regional cooperation initiatives were potentiated, conducted by the auspices of the Brazilian presidential diplomacy. Unasur is an institution with multi-dimensional character, but has great accomplishment in managing regional political crisis, by convening an extraordinary meeting. Thus, the aim of this work is to analyze how Brazil has conducted its foreign policy in resolving regional disputes, which accounted for destabilization of the democratic order. Four political crisis were chosen: disputes over resources of hydrocarbons, Bolivia (2008); insurrection of the National Police, Ecuador (2010); impeachment of President Fernando Lugo, Paraguay (2012); far-right politics demonstrations in Venezuela (2014). The time frame analysis covers the period between 2008 and 2014, which corresponds to the governments of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Dilma Rousseff. The methodological approach adopted is qualitative and inductive, with exploratory, bibliographical and documentary basis, covering two major areas of International Relations: Foreign Policy Analysis and Regional Integration. The Hermann’s Model (1990) of Foreign Policy Change is adopted as a theoretical approach, aimed at understanding the decision-making process of Brazilian Foreign Policy in the analyzed cases. These reflections on the action lines in Brazil are relevant to identify their standard of performance in the regional political crisis, managed by Unasur.