Cooperação educacional entre Brasil e Timor-Leste sob o paradigma do dom

Abstract

After the end of the Second World War, the custom of handing out foreign assistance to the underdeveloped countries emerged in the framework of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. This proceeding had the alleged objective of developing these fragile countries economically and socially. Throughout the years, due to the criticism in regard of the traditional proceedings of International Development Co-operation, the Global South nations built a perception of common identity, grounded on the idea of rivalry in relation to the developed North countries. Among the South nations, Brazil has built, since the late 1970s, its role as an international donor, with projects established, mainly, in association with Latin American and African countries. Regarding the later ones, there have been frequent educational projects involving the Portuguese-speaking African countries and, most recently, East Timor. In view of this background, this qualitative, bibliographic and documental research, employing the gift paradigm developed by Marcel Mauss, holds the hypothesis that the Brazilian official discourse about Brazil as an international donor, which is commonly explained in terms of principles of solidarity and historical affinities, does not embody the diversity of explanations that mold the international co-operation process. Therefore, this study aims to analyse the reasons, the context and the implementation process of the Educational Cooperation granted by Brazil to East Timor. Thus, this dissertation discusses the understanding that the Brazilian collaboration in regards to the South-South Cooperation would be based on a horizontal process and not on a replication of the traditional North-South asymmetric framework. We conclude that Brazilian foreign policy has political, strategic and economic interests in its co-operative efforts with East Timor, based on the fact that this country has a moral debt with Brazil, which needs to be compensated.