Debunking Brazilian Exceptionalism in its Africa Relations: Evidence from Angola and Tanzania

Abstract

From 2003, President Lula heralded a new dawn in Brazil's expanding African relations. Brazil was claimed to be unlike other exploitative powers because of its cultural, geographic and historic connections; Africa's true brother. Despite the passing of two decades and a number of scandals, this narrative of exceptionalism remains. Studies on Brazil-Africa relations tend to focus on the Brazilian state as the key, essentially benign agent. Our analysis uses the case studies of Angola and Tanzania to debunk the idea of Brazilian exceptionalism. We demonstrate the significant, overlooked agency of corporations in shaping and implementing Lula's Africa Policy, and determining its developmentally dubious outcomes. Additionally, the paper shows how political elites in Africa directed Brazilian government and companies into their political and business norms. Thus, Brazil-Africa relations replicated much of the typical economic patterns of the continent's trade, with oft-controversial and corrupt investment in commodity extraction and infrastructure.

Brazil’s Boom and Bust in Tanzania: A Case Study of Naivety?

“…Additionally, smaller firms like Queiroz Galvão established themselves, for instance in Ghana where its own-petroleum driven boom between 2008-2012 helped pay for motorways in Accra and elsewhere 4 . The commodity boom was also a major bonus for Brazil, increasing the government's budget for diplomatic ventures, South-South development cooperation and subsidised loans for infrastructure (Carmody 2013;Seibert 2019a;Dye and Alencastro 2020). Equally, the bust in commodities in 2014 is an important factor explaining Brazil-Africa's fall, reducing the profitability of mineral and petroleum projects and squeezing the budgets of the companies and governments of Brazil and many of those in Africa (Marcondes and Mawdsley 2017).…”

“…Whilst not the initiators of the PT's original Brazil-Africa vision, infrastructure and resource-extractive companies like Odebrecht, Camargo Correa, Queiroz Galvão, Petrobras and Vale were key agents shaping and implementing the PT Africa policy. They were increasingly seen by the PT as the agents capable of delivering the Brazil-Africa agenda (Dye 2018;Alencastro 2019;Dye and Alencastro 2020). Petrobras for instance, brokered many deals with minimal state support, arriving 4 in Tanzania, for instance, before the embassy reopened in 2005.…”

The Politics of Transnational Advocacy Against Chinese, Indian, and Brazilian Extractive Projects in the Global South

“…2.That said, as others have found, South-based business and political elites do have considerable negotiating power to shape BRICS engagement and financial flows (Dye & Alencastro, 2020; Mohan & Lampert, 2013). Our thanks to an anonymous reviewer for this point.…”

Introduction: Turnaround and Let-Down – Making Sense of Brazil and Africa after the Surge

“…An airport built by Odebrecht with BNDES financing in Nacala, Mozambique, that had been inaugurated in 2014 remains closed and empty after the Mozambican government defaulted on the loan, amidst accusations of corruption by Odebrecht and over-estimation of the prosperity that would emerge out of coal exports from the region. Back in Brazil, the Car Wash (Lava Jato) investigations exposed the extreme lengths to which national corporations went to in order to become structurally entwined with policymaking at home and abroad, as PT's tenure wore on (Dye & Alencastro 2020). This, in turn, laid the ground for the beginning of a strikingly different political cycle, heralded by the election of Jair Bolsonaro on October 2018.…”