Guest post: Brazil’s advancing democracy

Paulo Sotero – Financial Times, 10/19/2012

Democracy is not for the faint-hearted… It requires hard work, constant attention, takes a lot of time to build and can easily be undermined by political polarization, regressive campaign finance rules and deficient laws on political representation. This month, two major events shed light on both the successes and failings of Brazil’s quarter century old, vibrant democracy.

On October 7, municipal elections brought over 115m voters to the polls to elect mayors and councilors in 5,568 cities and towns. A few days later, the country’s Supreme Court returned guilty verdicts in the largest trial of political corruption in Brazilian history.

The municipal elections were the first since the adoption of a new law barring candidates with criminal records. Cast in electronic ballot boxes, votes were tallied and results were published four hours after voting booths closed. There were no legal challenges. In 50 municipalities, including 17 of the 26 states capitals, where no candidate cleared the absolute majority of 50 per cent plus one, the two top candidates will go into a second round on October 28. The top prize is São Paulo, Brazil’s economic capital and home to the country’s third largest public budget.

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Oscar Niemeyer Hospitalized: Brazilian Architect At Hospital Samaritano

Associated Press/Huffington Post, 10/17/2012

Renowned Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer was hospitalized in Rio de Janeiro’s Hospital Samaritano, but his doctor said Wednesday that he was “fine” and in stable condition.

Niemeyer, 104, entered Rio’s Hospital Samaritano on Saturday, according to spokeswoman Bruna Tenorio.

The architect’s doctor, Fernando Gjorup, said by telephone that Niemeyer “is fine.”

“He’s a bit dehydrated. He entered the hospital complaining of nausea, but little else. He’s on a saline drip, that’s all,” Gjorup said.

The physician gave no forecast on when Niemeyer might leave the hospital, where he spent nearly two weeks in May being treated for pneumonia and dehydration. Last year, he was treated for a urinary infection there.

Niemeyer designed much of Brazil’s futuristic capital, Brasilia, and Rio’s Sambadrome, where the annual carnival parade is held. He also helped design the United Nations building in New York City.

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Analysis: Brazil’s Vale’s challenges go beyond iron ore

Jeb Blount – Reuters/Chicago Tribune, 10/11/2012

Roger Agnelli, who was forced out as chief executive of Brazil’s Vale in May 2011, may have been lucky to leave the world’s second-largest mining company when he did.

Since Murilo Ferreira replaced him as CEO, a series of setbacks have raised questions about Vale’s ability to increase sales and profit and maintain its place as the world’s top producer of iron ore, the main ingredient in steel.

Costs are soaring, new mines are behind schedule and growth in China, Vale’s largest market, is slowing. The price of iron ore, responsible for nearly three-quarters of the Rio de Janeiro-based company’s sales, recently sank to three-year lows.

Making matters worse, Brazilian laws and government interference threaten to hobble Vale, the country’s biggest exporter. Vale shipped $42 billion of raw materials in 2011, 16 percent of exports from the world’s sixth-largest economy.

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A rupture with Brazil’s culture of cordiality

Gregory Michener – Al Jazeera, 9/22/2012

After a six hour trip from Rio de Janeiro to Belo Horizonte, our bus crawled at a snail’s pace as we winded our way to the terminal. The problem wasn’t traffic; the problem was that the bus driver kept stopping to let passengers off at the side of the road, in contravention of the rules. Unable to say “no” to half a dozen or so glib entreaties, the driver delayed us and everyone else.

This typifies the famous culture of cordiality in Brazil. Cordiality can be a mark of chivalry, but it can also be a foil for a culture in which conflict is studiously avoided. Brazilians don’t do well with conflict. Filipe Sobral of Brazil’s Fundação Getúlio Vargas University and Dean Bisseling of the University of Amsterdam analysed teams of Dutch and Brazilian professionals to test responses to “emotional and task conflict”. Brazilians saw conflict as having significantly undermined their team performance and overall satisfaction, whereas it had no such effect on the Dutch.

Conflict avoidance has its costs. This is particularly true in politics, where vigorous inter-branch and inter-party competition-cum-conflict can have a healthful effect on institutional accountability. A culture of cordiality involves not giving offence, and a desire not to offend can lead to accommodation – uneven applications of the rule of law and a reluctance to force critical reforms forward by confronting vested interests.

The mensalão trial – a rupture with political accommodation

In many ways, Brazil’s ongoing mensalão trial (see “Brazil’s ‘trial of the Century’“) represents a dramatic rupture with this institutional tradition, a culture in which the political elite rarely if ever convict and sanction those of their own kind. The trial centres on a political vote buying and money laundering scheme involving more than 35 defendants – bank executives, legislators, even former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s Chief of Staff. The mensalão itself – big monthly payments to legislators in exchange for votes – is an expression of the culture of cordiality: unwilling to assume the bully pulpit and shame legislators into yielding votes for the government’s mandate, the President’s men opted for the quiet consent won of bribery.

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Two Brazilian cities, two games, halfway to the 2014 World Cup

Christopher Hunt – Sports Illustrated, 9/13/2012

On the belvedere atop Corcovado mountain, tourists crowd the railings for a God’s-eye view of the world’s most beautiful cityscape. Standing under one Rio icon, the open-armed statue of Christ the Redeemer, they aim their phone cameras at another: Pão de Açúcar (Sugarloaf Mountain), the granite outcropping that resembles a giant cat crouching at the edge of Guanabara Bay.

Off to the left, though, is a Rio landmark of equal significance, at least to futebol fans: Maracanã, the largest stadium in Brazil and the site of the 2014 World Cup final.

Even from as far away as Corcovado you can see the cranes poking out of Maracanã’s huge oval. The stadium, like many others around Brazil, is closed for renovations to meet FIFA specifications for the quadrennial blowout of the world’s most popular sport. Maracanã, which hosted the 1950 World Cup final, is being refurbished not only for the 2014 World Cup but also for the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics.

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Insight: Taking on the “toga-wearing bandits” in Brazil’s courts

Brian Winter – Reuters 9/6/2012

Eliana Calmon takes great delight in provoking people. But even she didn’t realize at first what a bomb she had dropped.

“Look, I use a lot of colorful language, so when I said it, it didn’t seem that bad. But then the interview ended,” she recalled, starting to chuckle, “and I peered over at my aide, and he looked like he had seen a ghost! … And that was when the whole storm started.”

The offending phrase: Calmon, who serves as a kind of ombudswoman for Brazil’s judicial system, said her work was being undermined by “bandits who hide behind their togas” — corrupt judges who, she said, favor special interests and line their pockets with cash while doing as little work as possible.

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Rio de Janeiro’s Olympics: The countdown starts, Compare and contrast with London

The Economist, 8/18/2012

SO NOW it is Rio de Janeiro’s turn. Brazil’s photogenic, chaotic and traffic-choked former capital has just four years left as it prepares to match London’s happy and well-organised Olympic games. A large number of Brazilian officials, starting with President Dilma Rousseff, visited the London games to pick up tips. But they stress that Rio faces different challenges.

The International Olympic Committee has expressed mild concern that work has not yet started on building the main Olympic Park. It has been delayed by arguments over where to resite a motor-racing track, and opposition from residents of a favela who don’t want to be uprooted. But city officials insist the stadiums will all be ready by 2015.

Rio is also committed to building a new metro line and three bus rapid-transit (BRT) links. The federal government plans to use private investors to improve the city’s airports. One BRT line began operating in June. “The hardware will be ready,” says Eduardo Paes, Rio de Janeiro’s mayor. But the city will have less time than London had to get it operating smoothly, he adds. The Olympic effort also involves private investors building 10,000 new hotel rooms and boosting telecoms capacity.

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The Week in Review, 8/17/2012

Each Friday, through the Brazil Portal feature “The Week in Review”, the Brazil Institute will highlight Brazil’s news topics in one concise summary.

Photo credit: Reuters

To conclude the Olympic Games this year in London, President Dilma Rousseff ceremoniously received the Olympic flag as a token of her nation’s honor to host the upcoming summer Olympics in 2016 in Rio. While four years away, Rio is not shy about discussing future plans for both the Rio Olympics and the World Cup games. Although Brazil won a record amount of medals this year at the Olympic Games, Brazil announced it would be tripling its funding for athletics in order to ensure their continued performance when they host the Games. While Brazil wants their nation and athletes to shine in the 2016 Rio games, they also want to shed light on the theme for the games revolving around our world’s one race. As an initiative to end racial discrimination, Brazil is offering free genetic testing to prove there is no genetic basis for race, (or that race is social constructed), and hopes to offer the genetic testing for both the 2014 World Cup and 2016 Olympic Games.

The Games also give Brazil good reason to increase spending on infrastructure within Brazil. Brazil is now set to spend US$66 billion on developing highways, railways and new systems of infrastructure. Not only will the project deliver the necessary transportation systems for World Cup spectators, but according to President Rousseff it will help Brazil to modernize and become more competitive. Indeed, despite recent lags in the Brazilian economy, the nation has been defying the slow-down by promoting its labor market. The consumer freedom of the emergent middle class has been driving the economy in the right direction, as well as a recent demand for cars in Brazil has brought automotive industries to invest in manufacturing in Brazil. Indeed, this marks a trend for increased foreign investment in Brazil, which has tripled since 2007.  Nevertheless, Brazil will have to maintain good production patterns as it did during its commodities boom to ensure its economy continues to prosper.

Brazil confident ahead of Rio 2016

Will Smale – BBC News, 8/13/2012

While millions of people around the world simply watched and enjoyed the 2012 Olympics, for Brazilian officials it was a vital opportunity to learn what worked – and what maybe did not.

With the next summer Olympics being held in Rio de Janeiro in 2016, Brazil’s organisers were in London over the past two weeks to observe how the Games were run.

Brazil’s Vice Minister for Sport Luis Fernandes told the BBC that while he was generally very impressed, he had spotted some mistakes to avoid.

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Brazil creates its own economic woes

Susan Kaufman Purcell – The Miami Herald, 8/2/2012

Brazil’s economic future does not look nearly as bright as its recent past. Since 2010, when the country registered GDP growth of 7.5 percent, its economy has slowed dramatically. Last year, the country’s GDP growth reached only 2.7 percent. Brazil’s central bank expects growth for 2012 to reach only 1.9 percent, while Credit Suisse projects only 1.5 percent growth.

The most obvious cause of Brazil’s poor economic outlook is the collapse of the commodities boom, which had greatly benefited Brazil — a major exporter of energy, raw materials and food. The boom had been driven by China’s increasing demand for these commodities as a result of a decade of annual GDP growth of 9-11 percent. Brazil became a major exporter to China. Unfortunately, the U.S. recession reduced U.S. demand for Chinese exports, which in turn caused the Chinese economy to contract. Europe’s economic meltdown exacerbated China’s problem. As a result, Brazil’s exports to China decreased by more than half during the first six months of 2012.

New breakthroughs in energy technology also have begun to raise questions about Brazil’s ability to become an energy superstar, despite the country’s discovery of billions of barrels of offshore “pre-salt” oil and gas reserves. For years, energy experts have known that vast quantities of oil and gas were trapped between the layers of shale rock deposits. A process called horizontal drilling has brought down the cost of recovery from between the layers of shale.

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