Radical plans, risks in foreign policy of Brazil’s Bolsonaro
SAO PAULO — Brazil’s President-elect Jair Bolsonaro has often expressed admiration for Donald Trump and appears poised to follow the U.S. president in a radical overhaul of his nation’s foreign policy — a move that experts warn could ultimately isolate and hurt Brazil.
Bolsonaro, who takes office Jan. 1, has promised to pull Latin America’s largest nation out of the Paris climate accord, join the handful of countries that have moved their embassies in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and take a hard line against President Nicolas Maduro in neighboring Venezuela.
The former army captain, who gained notoriety as a congressman for violence-laden language and offensive comments, has also frequently bashed China, Brazil’s largest foreign investor.
The broad brushes of his plans have diplomats, political analysts and former government officials warning that such moves could isolate the regional powerhouse instead of opening new markets, which Bolsonaro has said he wants to do by enacting widespread privatization of state industries.
“If Bolsonaro does what he says, Brazil will quickly become a pariah in the global community,” said Rubens Ricupero, a former finance and environment minister.
“Brazil has 50,000 problems to solve. He wants to give us problems we don’t have in exchange for nothing.”
A deeply polarizing figure at home, Bolsonaro has also ruffled feathers abroad. He called refugees fleeing to Europe “human waste,” raising eyebrows in African and Middle Eastern countries, and irritated China by visiting Taiwan, which Beijing considers to be a breakaway province.
And, like Trump, he has also said Brazil would scrap or try to renegotiate trade treaties, including the South American common market Mercosur.
Besides Bolsonaro’s aggressive statements, analysts don’t know exactly how he will operate.
He has not said who he might name as foreign minister, and aside from his hyperbolic campaign rhetoric, his official platform was heavy on generalities but light on actual policy.
“The structure of the Foreign Ministry needs to be at the service of values that were always associated with the Brazilian people,” it reads.
“The other front is to foster foreign trade with countries that can add economic and technologic value to Brazil.”