‘Old friend’ Lula’s election victory no guarantee of warm Brazil-China ties of yesteryear
- Lula’s victory over Jair Bolsonaro brings back a president with a pro-Beijing record, but the geopolitical context has changed since the early 2000s
- Rather than repeat the past, Lula will try to attempt to balance relations with the US and China while pursuing greater regional integration
He also made a bold statement to the international community: “Brazil is back.”
Messages of congratulations from world leaders flooded in shortly after Lula’s victory was declared on Sunday evening. The speedy congratulations sought to head off any attempts by Bolsonaro to dispute the results of the election, but it’s likely they were also heartfelt.
Besides his popularity with Obama, Lula is known in Beijing as an “old friend”. Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian expressed hopes that Lula would take the China-Brazil partnership to a “new level”. Lula put China at the top of his foreign policy agenda during his first two terms as president, framing his first trip to Beijing in 2004 as the most important foreign visit of his presidency.
He oversaw the intertwining of China and Brazil’s economies and designated China as a strategic ally in the fight to reform what he saw as an “international system marked by inequality”. Lula also helped create the BRICS grouping in 2006, combining the major emerging economies of Brazil, Russia, India, China and later South Africa.
But Lula’s China-friendly record could prove a false indication of things to come. Lula’s official platform repeats the foreign policy priorities of the president-elect’s first two terms, but the geopolitical landscape has shifted dramatically since Lula was last in office. The 2020s are a very different place to the 2000s, and Lula’s 2000s-era policies will be trickier to navigate in the current climate of US-China tensions.
With the US less sure of its position at the head of the table these days, Lula will have a tougher time shaking hands with everyone and remaining the most popular politician in the room.
What does Brazilian presidential run-off hold for ties with China?
There are still people in Lula’s left-wing Workers’ Party who feel some ideological sympathy for China. Lula himself still demonstrates some anti-US sentiment, but he is also a pragmatist. He is not going to risk Brazil’s relationship with the West for China’s stake.
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But even if it rhymes, history rarely repeats itself and Lula won’t embrace China as closely this time around. He is hamstrung at home by right-wing politicians and abroad by geopolitical realities. Conscious of US-China tensions and aware that China is a very different beast, he is unlikely to align himself too closely with Beijing.
Jacob Mardell is an analyst at the Mercator Institute for China Studies