BBC Radio 4 presenter Robin Lustig has written an interesting blog post on his recent trip to Rio for a politically-themed conference on Brazil's emerging place in the world.
I have written my own reaction in the comments section. But to elaborate, I think that Brazil as a country is uneducated in the ways of the world and about the sometimes necessary evil of war (having only fought one, not very tough war in its history). Former President Lula displayed this naivety and lack of moral compass when he tried to cosy up to the evil Iranian regime, but in doing so he was exhibiting a widespread Latin American weakness: equating anti-Americanism and failed revolutionary socialism with Islamic and Arab despotism.
Brazil may have been blessed with few external enemies but, internally, it remains a society very much at war. Why else do the rich live in fortress-like ghettos ?
PS: The other thing about wars is they tend to help define you as a nation - what you stand for and against, which hard-won principles and values you will defend to the death. What does Brazil stand for ? Laid-back, colour blind multiculturalism ? A myth. Friendliness ? Fine, except it's a nebulous quality that could be partly ascribed to other traits, such as docility or non-confrontationalism, neither of which are good on a societal level. Football ? No question that here, at least, Brazil has excelled. But sport is the icing, not the cake.
I have written my own reaction in the comments section. But to elaborate, I think that Brazil as a country is uneducated in the ways of the world and about the sometimes necessary evil of war (having only fought one, not very tough war in its history). Former President Lula displayed this naivety and lack of moral compass when he tried to cosy up to the evil Iranian regime, but in doing so he was exhibiting a widespread Latin American weakness: equating anti-Americanism and failed revolutionary socialism with Islamic and Arab despotism.
Brazil may have been blessed with few external enemies but, internally, it remains a society very much at war. Why else do the rich live in fortress-like ghettos ?
PS: The other thing about wars is they tend to help define you as a nation - what you stand for and against, which hard-won principles and values you will defend to the death. What does Brazil stand for ? Laid-back, colour blind multiculturalism ? A myth. Friendliness ? Fine, except it's a nebulous quality that could be partly ascribed to other traits, such as docility or non-confrontationalism, neither of which are good on a societal level. Football ? No question that here, at least, Brazil has excelled. But sport is the icing, not the cake.
I've taken the liberty of copying a comment posted on the BBC Robin Lustig blog, just because it seems such an important one, which for reference I would like to have here as well:
ReplyDelete"12. At 15:51pm 13th Apr 2011, MrRipley wrote:
Luiz from Curitiba some of what you are saying is equally misleading.
You said, "ALL THE TECHNOLOGY for deep water oil drilling used in Brazil is national. Petrobras is a world reference on that, unlike BP. In fact, oil companies have come to Brazil to buy this technology;"
This is false. Most of the equipment used by Petrobras is American, British or French. Petrobras are very good drivers of the vehicles (the rigs) but quite frankly your comment shows a complete disregard for the partnerships Petrobras has formed with other companies. Petrobras are junior partners from a technological perspective. Petrobras didn't discover the "pre-sal" ... BG Group did .. A British company.
Your second remark, "Embraer is the third biggest manufacturer of airplanes in the world; just behind Boing and Airbus. This is an extremely high tech industry. How could we have this industry (and its suppliers) if we had no education at all?"
Embraer does not manufacturer the entire aircraft... it assembles them. The engines for example used in the commercial and private jet aircraft are a mix of Rolls Royce and General Electric Engines. And your remark shows a complete disregard for the populations lack of access to education as a whole.
The discussion is not about the frankly isolated occurence of highly skilled professionals from the political and economic elite in Brazil. Those who can afford to pay for an education can indeed progress a limited number of companies to greatness.
One of the major problems is that investment in young people is low. The total transfers to the wealthiest individuals and public sector employees continues to rise. The government gives a little to the poor and takes away with the other hand. People are borrowing more money in Brazil.. 20% annual credit expansion.. The investment in young people (part of what economists to as the enabling environment) is still very low. And bolsa familia has clearly distracted the Brazilians as a population (who are largely uneducated) from the conclusions of successive world bank/imf etc reports. And that is that total transfers to young people (despite bolsa familia etc) have still been falling relative to total transfers to the older and richer parts of society. That means if you are not increasing the investment in education but you are systematically increasing the pensions and pay of the rich.. you will leave a legacy even worse.
The Brazilian government are one of the worst for government wastefulness and unfortunately whilst the rich continue to buy homes in Miami, the poor face an uncertain future because when revenues fall away from government (when the resources they are increasingly relying on for government spending do not earn so much - and that always occurs eventually) the government will be forced like others to print or borrow money. To inflate the currency (a tax against the poor) or to condemn Brazil once again to even higher interest rates. Servicing debt will mean even more fortune is squandered.
Brazil - the country of accumulative tax of 70% - and african levels of service."