‘Two Brazils’: Renegotiating Subalternity Through South-South Cooperation in Angola

Santos, Camila dos; Siman, Maíra; Fernández, Marta

doi:10.1590/1981-3821201900010007

Cited by 2 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…Countries such as Brazil, China, and India are vocal defenders of the idea of the ‘historical debt’ industrialised countries have with poorer nations in the South and the development‐related responsibilities they entail. They have equally avoided portraying themselves as ‘fully developed’ and completely ‘mature’ or ‘ready’ to take on greater global responsibilities, what Santos et al (2019) called a ‘Peter Pan Syndrome’. Across different policy issues, ‘SSC champions', and in particular rising powers, have carefully selected the responsibilities they wished to take on and those they would relegate to developed countries.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

‘It Takes Two to Tango’: South–South Cooperation Measurement Politics in a Multiplex World

Waisbich

2022

Global Policy

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This paper examines whether and how the imperatives of measuring Official Development Assistance (ODA; or development aid) are being translated to the policy world of South-South cooperation (SSC). Through a historical and political ethnographic account of a decade of global policy debates on Southern-led development cooperation between 2009 and 2019, the paper argues that growing conversations on 'SSC effectiveness', and how to measure it, reflect both prevalent 'measurementalities' in the field as well as 'traditional/Northern donor countries' continuous will to socialise and integrate '(re)-emerging Southern providers' into existing aid norms and practices. The paper also demonstrates Southern powerhouses'-such as Brazil, China, and India-agency in these accountability-related debates and their will to integrate differently into the 'aid system' by proposing alternative tools to measure SSC flows and initiatives in their own terms. Finally, the paper argues that unfolding negotiations over quantifying, reporting, and evaluating Southern-led development cooperation reflect the politicised consolidation of SSC in the second decade of the 21st century.Current impasses at the multilateral level, moreover, reveal unsolved North-South disputes over power, status, and responsibility in international development and international affairs, more broadly. | 335SOUTH-SOUTH COOPERATION MEASUREMENT POLITICS expanded, intertwined with a growing need to account and measure development and development cooperation flows (Fukuda-Parr & McNeill, 2019;Mitchell, 2002;Rottenburg, 2009). Rather than being static, understandings of responsibility and measurement in the field are currently being disputed and (re)negotiated in light of the major geopolitical shifts in the past two decades and the changing geographies of development across the North-South divide. The 'rise of the South' and of South-South Cooperation (SSC) is a major element in this changing landscape (Eyben & Savage, 2013).This paper provides an empirically based account of the ongoing disputes over whether and how to measure SSC. It examines two United Nations (UN) High-Level Conferences on South-South Cooperation (in 2009 and 2019) and treats them as 'diagnosis events' 1 for investigating how the imperatives of measuring Official Development Assistance (ODA; or development aid) are being translated to the policy world of SSC. 2 By doing so, it also examines the effects of growing 'international development measurementalities', as labelled here, on North-South power relations and on broader disputes over responsibilities in the field of global development.The paper makes three major contributions. First, it argues that growing conversations on 'SSC effectiveness', and how to measure it, reflect both prevalent 'measurementalities' in the field as well as 'traditional donor countries"-members of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development's Development Assistance Committee (OECD-DAC)-continuous will to socialise and integrate Southern countries into existi...

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

‘It Takes Two to Tango’: South–South Cooperation Measurement Politics in a Multiplex World

Waisbich

2022

Global Policy

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From Opportunity Seeking to Gap Filling: Reframing Brazil in Lusophone Africa

Seabra

2020

Brazil-Africa Relations in the 21st Century

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This chapter inquires whether Brazil's headways in Africa over recent years were organic in nature and in content or if, in fact, were achieved at the expenses of other previously established actors. By reframing Brazil's agenda towards African Lusophone countries in juxtaposition to the perceived external downturn of Portugal, the propitious context and consequences of a new player on the continent can be best brought into evidence. The pushand-pull forces enacted by both Brazil and Portugal towards Lusophone Africa are explored through the aftermath of the 2012 military coup in Guinea-Bissau and the adhesion of Equatorial-Guinea to the CPLP in 2014. The chapter offers a reinterpretation of Brazil's net gains in Africa and argues for its fragility and susceptibility to changing political-economic cycles.provide. This outcome further solidified a reverse of fortunes after a decade and half in which most observers would have had likely bet on an inverted dynamic.More strikingly, it came on the heels of an opportunity provided by a partner which Brazil had, witting or unwittingly, sought to circumvent in recent years. As Brazil significantly increased its profile in African Lusophone countries, it benefitted from an added erosion of Portuguese clout on the ground. Hence, and given the stark policy changes that have recently taken place in Brasília, this chapter inquires whether previously lauded headways towards Africa in the high-politics domain were indeed organic in nature and in content or if, in fact, were largely achieved at the expenses of other established actors. The geographic selection is set on where Brazil's priority has been more intense, whenever any wider African agenda was rolled out in contemporary history. This regional choice comes with one important caveat, i.e. inroads in the CAR will never be on the same plaining field as Brazil's track-record with, for example, Angola or Mozambique. Inferences that apply to the broader continent are therefore more difficult to extrapolate. That said, such clear-cut geographic preference still allows to explore the set of conditions that instilled Brazil's expanded profile in the first place.The core claim lies on the necessity to go against pre-established narratives of inevitability, that Brazil succeeded, succeeds or will succeed in Africa just because. A more critical approach is in need if the current debate is to move forward. I argue that Brazil has only been able to venture into Africa and will only do so once more whenever the right set of externally-driven conditions are in place. That includes not only taking advantage of unexpected opportunities but also in filling-in gaps made possible by other players competing for the same space of influence. In both cases, expansive cycles with corresponding material resources are paramount. Yet, if credible commitments are not dully provided across the Atlantic, any occasional upswing of the sort will invariably prove short-lived.Based on interviews, diplomatic cables 2 , and a review of previous literature, ...

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‘Two Brazils’: Renegotiating Subalternity Through South-South Cooperation in Angola

Cited by 2 publications

References 8 publications

‘It Takes Two to Tango’: South–South Cooperation Measurement Politics in a Multiplex World

‘It Takes Two to Tango’: South–South Cooperation Measurement Politics in a Multiplex World

From Opportunity Seeking to Gap Filling: Reframing Brazil in Lusophone Africa

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