Abstract
The chapter analyses current factors that influence the security environment in the South Atlantic from a Brazilian perspective, focusing not only on ‘hard’ (or state-centred) threats, but also on ‘soft’ threats derived from actors at the sub-national level such as piracy, drug-trafficking, and other forms of transnational crime. In contrast with the widespread perception that recent oil and gas discoveries in the region have led to a fundamental change in Brazil’s approach towards security in the South Atlantic, the authors underline that preservation of peace and stability in the region has been a long-standing strategic objective from the point of view of the country’s foreign and defence policies.
O oceano impõe deveres
Rui Barbosa (‘The ocean imposes duties’. All other quotes from texts originally written in other languages were translated by the authors into English, for the convenience of the reader.)
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- 1.
- 2.
Júlio Soares de Moura Neto, ‘Defendendo o Pré-Sal’, in Nelson Jobim, Sérgio Etchegoyen, and João Paulo Alsina, eds., Segurança Internacional: Perspectivas Brasileiras (São Paulo: Editora FGV, 2010), 452.
- 3.
Antonio Ruy A. Silva, ‘O Atlântico Sul na Perspectiva da Segurança e Defesa’, Revista Marítima Brasileira 134, no. 07/09 (July–September 2014).
- 4.
Source: National Secretariat for Ports, Brazilian Ministry for Transportation, http://www.portosdobrasil.gov.br/home-1/noticias/portos-do-brasil-movimentam-98-6-das-exportacoes-em-2015.
- 5.
Pedro Seabra, ‘Dinámicas de Seguridad en el Atlántico Sur: Brasil y Estados Unidos en África’, Revista CIDOB d’Afers Internacionals 102–103 (September 2013): 202.
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United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, Review of Maritime Trade and Transport (2015 edition), http://unctad.org/en/PublicationsLibrary/rmt2015_en.pdf, accessed 19/4/2017.
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All figures on oil and gas reserves were extracted from the 2016 BP Statistical Review of World Energy, http://www.bp.com/content/dam/bp/pdf/energy-economics/statistical-review-2016/bp-statistical-review-of-world-energy-2016-oil.pdf, accessed 1/5/2017.
- 8.
Out of the 25 exploitation projects authorized by the ISA, only one is in the South Atlantic: a project on cobalt-rich ferromanganese in the Rio Grande rise, submitted by the Brazilian state-owned company Companhia de Pesquisa de Recursos Minerais (CPRM).
- 9.
Brazil, Agência Nacional de Petróleo. Anuário Estatístico Brasileiro do Petróleo, Gás Natural e Biocombustíveis de 2016 [National Petroleum Agency’s Annual Statistical Report on Oil, Natural Gas and Biofuels], http://www.anp.gov.br/wwwanp/images/publicacoes/Anuario_Estatistico_ANP_2016.pdf, accessed 25/2/2017.
- 10.
For a summary of Argentine official positions on the issue, see https://www.mrecic.gov.ar/es/la-cuestion-de-las-islas-malvinas, accessed 1/5/2017.
- 11.
Alejandro Sánchez, ‘How Peaceful is the South Atlantic?’ Center for International Maritime Security (online), http://cimsec.org/21903-2/21903, published 17 February 2015, accessed 5/2/2017; Timothy Walker, ‘Why Africa Must Resolve its Maritime Border Disputes’, Institute for Strategic Studies (ISS) Policy Brief no. 80, October 2015.
- 12.
For an informed and well-researched analysis of the political implications and scientific evidence pertaining to the Vela Incident see http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/nukevault/ebb570-The-22-September-1979-Vela-Satellite-Incident, accessed 2/4/2017.
- 13.
See T. V. Paul, The Tradition of Non-Use of Nuclear Weapons (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2009), chap. 5.
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Mikael Wigell and Mauricio Romero, ‘Transatlantic Drug Trade: Europe, Latin America and the Need to Strengthen Anti-narcotics Cooperation’, FIIA Briefing Paper 132. Finnish Institute of International Affairs, June 2013.
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Geoffrey Till, Seapower: A Guide for the Twenty-First Century (New York: Routledge, 2014), 306.
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Antonio C. R. Moraes, Contribuições para a Gestão da Zona Costeira do Brasil: elementos para uma Geografia do Litoral Brasileiro (São Paulo: Annablume, 2007), 33.
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- 18.
João Paulo S. Alsina Jr., Rio-Branco: Grande Estratégia e Poder Naval (São Paulo: FGV Editora, 2015), 344–345.
- 19.
Silva, ‘O Atlântico Sul na Perspectiva da Segurança e Defesa’.
- 20.
Neither Brazil nor France had ratified the Convention on the Continental Shelf at the time. France ratified it only in 1965, while Brazil never did so.
- 21.
José Viegas Filho, A Segurança do Atlântico Sul e as Relações com a África (Brasília: FUNAG, 2016) (originally published in 1982), 40.
- 22.
Clarence Hill, ‘United States Strategic Interests in the Southern Hemisphere and the Need for a Common Maritime Defense’, in Michael Zsag (ed.), Argentine–United States Relations and South Atlantic Security (Washington, DC: American Foreign Policy Institute, 1980).
- 23.
Luísa Barbosa, A Zona de Paz e Cooperação do Atlântico Sul (ZOPACAS): Criação, Projeção e Dimensão Político-Estratégica (MA Thesis). Porto Alegre: Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, 2015, 111.
- 24.
Silva, ‘O Atlântico Sul na Perspectiva da Segurança e Defesa’, 49.
- 25.
Filho, A Segurança do Atlântico Sul, 93.
- 26.
Ibid.
- 27.
Adriana Abdenur, Frank Mattheis, and Pedro Seabra, ‘An Ocean for the Global South: Brazil and the Zone of Peace and Cooperation in the South Atlantic’, Cambridge Review of International Affairs, online first, November 2016.
- 28.
Ibid.
- 29.
Ibid.
- 30.
Sean Burges, ‘Consensual Hegemony: Theorizing Brazilian Foreign Policy after the Cold War’, International Relations. 22, no. 1 (2008): 65–84.
- 31.
Pedro Seabra, ‘Política de defesa, política externa e grande estratégia do Brasil’, Nação e Defesa138 (2014): 336.
- 32.
Silva, ‘O Atlântico Sul na Perspectiva da Segurança e Defesa’.
- 33.
João Paulo S. Alsina Jr., ‘Síntese imperfeita: articulação entre política externa e política de defesa na era Cardoso’, Revista Brasileira de Política Internacional 46, no. 2 (2003).
- 34.
- 35.
Seabra, ‘Política de defesa, política externa e grande estratégia do Brasil’: 58–60.
- 36.
Adriana Abdenur and Danilo Neto, ‘Brazil’s Maritime Strategy in the South Atlantic: The Nexus Between Security and Resources’, South African Institute of International Affairs Occasional Paper 161 (November 2013): 6.
- 37.
Beatriz Mattos, Francisco Matos, and Kai Kenkel, ‘Brazilian Policy and the Creation of a Regional Security Complex in the South Atlantic: Pax Brasiliana?’ Contexto Internacional. E-pub, 8 May 2017, http://www.scielo.br/pdf/cint/2017nahead/0102-8529-cint-2017390200004.pdf, accessed 14/5/2017, 42.
- 38.
- 39.
Marco Cepik and Frederico Licks Bertol, ‘Defence Policy in Brazil: Bridging the Gap between Ends and Means?’ Defense Studies 16 (2016): 1–19 (7).
- 40.
Abdenur and Neto, ‘Brazil’s Maritime Strategy in the South Atlantic’, 11.
- 41.
Abdenur, Mattheis, and Seabra, ‘An Ocean for the Global South.
- 42.
Mattos, Matos, and Kenkel, ‘Brazilian Policy and the Creation of a Regional Security Complex in the South Atlantic: Pax Brasiliana?’
- 43.
Ibid.
- 44.
Most recently articulated in Barry Buzan and Ole Wæver, Regions and Powers: The Structure of International Security (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003).
- 45.
Pedro Seabra, ‘A Harder Edge: Reframing Brazil’s Power Relation with Africa’, Revista Brasileira de Política Internacional 57, no. 1 (2014).
- 46.
The 2009 Defence Cooperation Agreement with Namibia expanded and complemented the 1994 Naval Cooperation Agreement.
- 47.
AMAS is one of the four maritime areas of the Americas, as defined under the Inter-American Naval Conferences, and is based on the legal framework of the Inter-American Treaty on Mutual Assistance (TIAR). Out of the four areas, AMAS is the only one that is structured and operational. It was established in 1967 by mutual agreement of the Navies of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay, and has over the years specialized in facilitating cooperation and exchange of information in maritime traffic control. See http://www.coamas.org/historia.html, accessed 2/2/2017.
- 48.
Seabra, ‘A Harder Edge: Reframing Brazil’s Power Relation with Africa’.
- 49.
Pedro Seabra, ‘Brazil as a Security Actor in Africa: Reckoning and Challenges Ahead’, GIGA Focus Latin America 7 (December 2016).
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Soares, R.B., Leopoldino, C.M. (2019). Gateway and Neighbourhood: Brazilian Perspective on South Atlantic Security. In: Duarte, É., Correia de Barros, M. (eds) Navies and Maritime Policies in the South Atlantic. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-10600-3_6
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