Brazilian Foreign Policy of the 1920s

Tupy, or not tupy: that is the question.

– Oswald de Andrade

Brazilian modernism is a movement that represented a profound change in Brazilian art at the turn of the 19th century. Drawing inspiration from the European avant-garde, groups of artists came together to devise alternatives to the traditionalism that had influenced Brazilian artistic production. Of the various manifestos that emerged at the time, perhaps the most influential was the Antropófago Manifesto, which sought to incorporate European inspirations into national artistic production. It is from this manifesto, written by Oswald de Andrade, that the epigraph to this text comes. This manifesto says much about what he hoped for Brazilian art, but, in retrospect, it also represents how Brazilian foreign policy (PEB) was being conducted in the 1920s: redefining alliances and priorities in a world in transition. Modernism in the arts and PEB reveal sides of the same elite proposing new perspectives on the world and Brazil. In the arts, the legacy is undeniable and celebrated. In PEB, it has only recently been revived.

Over the following few pages, I argue that the primary purpose of Brazilian diplomacy in these years was to utilize its position in the American hemisphere as a means of enhancing its leverage in European negotiations. The primary reference in this study is Eugênio Vargas Garcia, a Brazilian diplomat who wrote the book "Between America and Europe: Brazilian Foreign Policy in the 1920s" (2006). By revisiting this understudied period in Brazilian foreign policy, it is clear that Brazilian diplomatic activity during this period was proactive and innovative, leveraging its ties with the United States to strengthen its claims in Europe. However, the lack of success in more strategic projects and the writing of seminal works for the field of Brazilian Foreign Policy in the 1950s and 1960s, heavily influenced by the political strife of the time, have tainted the study of this period, limiting its understanding.

It is worth noting that the consideration of the 1920s used here is similar to that used by Vargas Garcia (2004, 2006), for whom the time frame is dictated more by the sequence of events than by chronological rigor. Thus, the text analyzes the period that begins in 1917, when the torpedoing of Brazilian ships occurs, and ends in 1930, with the rise of Vargas. The foreign policy of the 1920s occupies one of the most ungrateful spaces in Brazilian foreign policy. While, on the one hand, it succeeds the chancellorship of Baron of Rio Branco, considered the patron saint of modern Brazilian diplomacy, on the other, it precedes the foreign policy victories of the 1930s achieved by Afrânio de Melo Franco, Macedo Soares, and Oswaldo Aranha. The peaceful definition of national borders and the ability to successfully navigate the polarization between Nazi Germany and the US government were uncontested victories that represented a significant shift from the uneven competition of the 1920s.

This decade marks the fourth period in republican foreign policy. José Maria Paranhos Júnior's chancellorship (1902–1912) marks a milestone in the structuring of the Itamaraty (Cheibub 1984; Cervo & Bueno 2008; Pinheiro 2004), following the initial period of the Republic characterized by erratic diplomacy and considerable instability among ministers of state. The outbreak of World War I in 1914, almost concurrently with the end of Rio Branco's term as Minister, marks the third significant period in republican foreign policy. Brazil's involvement in a major war, the first since the Paraguayan War of 1870, with the dispatch of troops to Europe, was a milestone that established the domestic and foreign policy conditions for Brazil's international performance in the 1920s.  

HÉLIO JAGUARIBE AND JOSÉ HONÓRIO RODRIGUES: EVALUATING THE PEB OF THE 1920S THROUGH THE PEB OF THE 1960S

Both Hélio Jaguaribe and José Honório Rodrigues are Brazilian intellectuals who actively participated in the political debate of the 1960s. Both contributed to discussions about Brazil's insertion in the most heated debate of the 1960s: its role in the Cold War. These authors, who played a pioneering role in a field of study that would take its first steps toward institutionalization in the 1970s, brought the US-occupied space to the center of the discussion in the Brazilian Foreign Ministry. In this sense, it is clear that there was no concern with recovering the period between Rio Branco's chancellorship and Vargas's presidency to construct a reasoned analysis. Both texts intended to extol foreign policy in the 1960s, and the 1920s, due to its lack of significant successes, was the ideal period to serve as a counterpoint. 

Hélio Jaguaribe, one of the founders of the Higher Institute of Brazilian Studies, published in 1958 "Nationalism in the Brazilian Present," an important work for contextualizing what some authors, such as Pinheiro (2004) and Cervo and Bueno (2008), point to as a transition between an Americanist Brazilian Economic and Social Movement (PEB) and a new paradigm in Brazil's international activities: globalism [1]. Jaguaribe's understanding is that, after World War II, the dimension of national development entered the lexicon of Brazilian diplomacy, and this opened the PEB's horizon to alternatives to the alliance with the United States. 

It is clear that the author's main interest is an interpretation of its context and, in an attempt to provide a retrospective of the history of PEB, he systematizes it into three intervals: from the arrival of the Portuguese in Brazil to the end of the chancellorship of Baron of Rio Branco; the interval between this and the end of World War II – which he characterizes as the search for valorization in relation to Europe ( Jaguaribe 2013, 290 ); and the period that followed the War, the two reference points being Rio Branco and Vargas. 

Jaguaribe (Jaguaribe 2013, 294) recognizes that there is a tension in the PEB:

(…) Brazil [of the 1920s] persists, however, not without a dose of naive malice, considering its relations with the United States as equal relations, of bilateral interest, regulated by Pan-American solidarity. The cultural Europeanism of the Brazilian ruling class maintains, in this period, a sophisticated contempt for the North American lack of culture and primitiveness, viewing North American culture through the eyes of the Sorbonne humanists and fostering the illusion that the Brazilian elites, although reduced, had an intellectual formation far superior to that of the North Americans.

The construction of foreign policy was significantly influenced by the cultural dimension, marked by the intellectual identification of the Brazilian elite with European elites. However, the commercial dimension that brought Brazil closer to the United States from the late 19th century onward was not indifferent to Brazilian Foreign Policy. In this sense, Jaguaribe points to the tension between these two forces present in foreign policy. The point is that the actors of Brazilian foreign policy in the 1920s were also aware of this tension and sought, on several occasions, to leverage their proximity to the United States to further their agendas in Europe. Thus, the view that Brazilian diplomacy was "driven by an essentially ornamental and aristocratic attitude" (2013, 290) constructs a critique based less on an analysis of the events of the period, a topic that will be addressed in the following section, and more on the lack of success and, consequently, visibility of the initiatives—although it cannot be ignored that, in fact, the aristocratic dimension was an important facet of the Brazilian Foreign Policy of the time (Cheibub 1984).

José Honório Rodrigues is the author of another important book that constructs the idea that the Brazilian Foreign Ministry of the 1920s was politically apathetic and predominantly pro-bachelor. He recognizes the continuity in foreign policy between the Empire and the Republic. However, he denounces the Americanist approach that was allegedly adopted within the Brazilian Foreign Ministry, allegedly based on a republican ideology, which was not supported by a change in the country's political elite (Carvalho 1987; Alonso 2002). 

Rodrigues's judgment on the US's political and diplomatic option stems from a telegram sent by Foreign Minister Lauro Müller to Domício da Gama, the Brazilian ambassador in Washington, on February 23, 1912. In this letter, the Brazilian foreign minister demanded that the Brazilian representative consult the US Secretary of State to determine what measures Brazil should take in response to a revolt that had broken out in Paraguay. Domício da Gama responded by refusing to do so and defending the idea that the country should pursue its own foreign policy (Rodrigues 1966 & Barreto 2001).

Based solely on this exchange of correspondence, Rodrigues characterizes Brazilian foreign policy, without considering the possibility that this correspondence may be a consequence of the succession of the chancellery centered on Rio Branco (Cheibub 1986) after his death. Paranhos died on February 10, and Lauro Müller took over on the 14th, sending the fateful telegram on the 23rd.

Beyond his bachelor's degree—a counterpoint to a political vision—Rodrigues (1966) also speaks of Brazilian diplomatic inaction "from 1913 to 1955." This interpretation, which the following sections of the text demonstrate, is even more difficult to sustain given the volume of proposals—most of which failed—advanced by the Brazilian government. In this sense, Érika Uhiara's ( 2014) argument about the presentism Rodrigues developed from the 1960s onward indicates that the author's combative tone may say less about the Brazilian Foreign Policy of the 1920s and more about the role of the United States in Brazilian foreign policy at the beginning of the 1964 military government. This moment has entered historiography as a "step out of step" in Brazil's excessive alignment with the United States. This argument also applies to Hélio Jaguaribe.

The construction of the centrality of independent foreign policy in the vision of the 1920s is explicit in the way Rodrigues (1966, 66-67) begins his presentation of the country's own independent foreign policy:

World War II awakened the idea of ​​underdevelopment in the national consciousness. However, foreign policy, despite suffering secondary treatment, persisted in following American policy, despite the total parallelism initiated by Lauro Müller and reaffirmed by Nilo Peçanha.  

It remains to be seen what Brazilian PEB was like in the 1920s, an engagement that, curiously, neither of the two authors makes.

THE MOST IMPORTANT EVENTS IN FOREIGN POLICY IN THE 1920S

The period between Rio Branco's death and the Vargas administration—comprising the administrations of Wenceslau Braz (1914-1918), Epitácio Pessoa (1918-1922), Arthur Bernardes (1922-1926), and Washington Luís (1926-1930)—coincides with the period in which international politics was marked by the First World War and its aftermath (Barreto 2001). Europe is central to Brazil's foreign agenda during this period, if for no other reason than because it is the locus on which Brazilian diplomacy focuses its attention (with participation in the war, the Council of the League of Nations, and the negotiations surrounding the Briand-Kellogg Pact).

Brazilian participation in the First World War 

The beginning of the conflicts in Europe occurred in 1914, but Brazil maintained its neutrality until 1917. Only with the sinking of four ships, as a result of the unrestricted war at sea declared by the Berlin government (Barreto 2001), did the country have reason to engage in the conflict.

The declaration of war, during Nilo Peçanha's chancellorship, was preceded by intense correspondence with the Washington government, as noted by Fernando Barreto (2001, 49). However, while still in the chancellorship of Lauro Müller, who preceded him, the Itamaraty report on the recognition of Alexander Kerensky's provisional government in Russia after the fall of the czar gives evidence of a pragmatic motivation for participation in the war:

Recently, a popular revolution took place in Russia, resulting in the abdication of the Tsar and the fall of the Romanov dynasty (...). This government, having been immediately recognized by the Entente powers—Great Britain, France, and Italy—and, soon after, by Japan, the United States of America, and China, the Brazilian government had no hesitation in also recognizing it; which occurred on April 9 ​​(Barreto 2001, 44—respecting the spelling used by the author).

The Itamaraty's official justification explained the move as a result of the government's popular support. However, there was also a prestige diplomacy dimension: inclusion in the ranks of the great powers through recognition of the new Russian government. Similarly, if the United States' entry into the conflict represents the last major power in the world to enter a conflict that was initially European, this change directly impacts the inertia of Brazilian diplomacy—especially considering the existence of Brazilian interests that would be negotiated at the peace conference: Brazil's credit in German banks and Reich ships seized in Brazilian ports.

The Paris Peace Conference, 1919

The sinking of Brazilian ships due to disobedience to the naval blockade established by Berlin, and not recognized by Rio de Janeiro, would result in Brazil's involvement in the First World War in 1917 [2]. The country's participation in the war effort was the largest in Latin America and involved sending air officers who served with the Royal Air Force, sending a field hospital to Paris, and sending a contingent of soldiers (although they did not engage in combat, given the Spanish flu infection that killed a large number of the soldiers sent) (Garcia 2006). This effort enabled Brazil to be represented at the Paris Peace Conference of 1919.

The initial issue that caught the attention of the Brazilian Foreign Ministry was securing a large delegation (three delegates) to demonstrate the country's prestige. Brazil's representation ended up being equivalent to that of Serbia, where the conflict began, and Belgium, another important theater of war. This representation was due to the pragmatic use of the relationship with the United States, specifically the insistence of Woodrow Wilson (Garcia 2000; 2006). It is worth noting that the delegation was chaired by Epitácio Pessoa, who would be elected president of the country during the conference, and included the participation of Pandiá Calógeras, who would assume the Ministry of War during Pessoa's administration, and Raul Fernandes, who was invited to participate in the establishment of the Permanent Court of International Justice [3].

This delegation achieved two substantial victories during the conference. In Eugênio Garcia's (2006) view, the alliance with Washington was essential to these successes. The recognition of the debt arising from coffee purchased from São Paulo by the German government at the beginning of the conflict is the first victory. The cargo was stored in European ports, but payment had been embargoed by the Reich government. Recognition of this amount as an effective right, not a war debt, defined it as a German obligation regardless of the outcome of the peace agreement negotiations.

The second substantial Brazilian demand in the negotiations concerned the destination of German ships seized in ports of countries that opposed the Triple Alliance. France and the United Kingdom were the countries that lost the largest tonnage of ships to German Navy sinkings and demanded that the ships seized by the Allies be distributed to compensate for these losses. The US and Brazil, on the other hand, had seized a much larger number of ships than had been lost to German actions [4]. The Brazilian position was even more difficult because some of the seized ships were already leased to France. The victory of the US and Brazil argument regarding the ships resulted in an approximately 50% increase in the volume of cargo capable of being transported by the Brazilian Merchant Marine. In addition to Washington's support, the Brazilian delegation adopted a rigid stance, threatening not to sign the treaty if the resolution of the issue was unfavorable to Brazil—a stance that contradicts Jaguaribe's interpretation of the period's decline.

In his analysis of Brazilian identity, Frederico Merke argues that the construction of Brazil's Americanist identity began with the publication of the 1870 Republican Manifesto, a document that emphasized the importance of a Republic to consolidate the country's belonging to the continent. The manifesto asserted that "we are Americans," with the idea that, to assert this identity, we would have to change the form of government (Merke 2008).  

Interestingly, there is a certain ambiguity regarding this Americanism at the beginning of the Republic. Despite the importance attributed to American republicanism, it is impossible to affirm that there was a substantive change in the Brazilian political elite with the change of regime (Alonso 2002; Carvalho 1987 ). Thus, the idea of ​​an ideological rupture in the direction of foreign policy has little basis in the material conditions for implementing the Brazilian Foreign Policy. The best representation of this elite are those whom Angela Alonso (2002) calls the "generation of 1870": eminent figures from the beginning of the Republic who were the offspring of the imperial elite. 

Merke (2009) revisits Euclides da Cunha, interpreting how Brazil dealt with Canudos and Contestados to represent how the Brazilian elite dealt with the otherness of contexts that did not fit into the standards of life identified as modern and civilized by Europe. The importance of the European vision of modernity and civility was also represented in the urban context, with the reform carried out in Rio de Janeiro and the resulting tensions with marginalized populations ( Cheibub 1984; Carvalho 2019 ). 

The tensions in civil and urban conflicts do not constitute foreign policy, but they offer a context for where the parameters and references desired by the national elite of the time resided – Europeanism highlighted as an important aspect of our civilizing identity, as an ideal of civilization, which permeated the imperial period in contrast to the surrounding republics, always seen as unstable and politically immature.

The 1920s represented a period in which the PEB was no longer a proponent of international or domestic agendas, as it was under Rio Branco and would be under Vargas. Its foreign policy had to navigate a context imposed on the country. And in this context, it achieved victories, as in the Paris Conference, but also suffered setbacks, as in the bid for a permanent seat on the League Council.

The Claim for a Permanent Seat on the League Council

It is interesting to note how the consolidation of pragmatism in foreign policy unfolded as the major moments of the 1920s unfolded. Thus, while upon entering the war, Brazil used its identity-based ties with the United States and a hemispheric alliance as justification, at the Paris Conference, it successfully articulated these relationships to achieve tangible material gains. This crescendo led Brazilian diplomacy in the 1920s to embrace the quest for a permanent seat on the League Council, which represented a long-term political achievement of the war effort, an agenda that entailed reaffirming ties with the European powers. This was not a secondary theme in Brazilian diplomatic debate. The League of Nations was a means of perpetuating the old European policy, in which Brazil sought to participate, despite being an American country.

From the moment Brazil participated in the Paris negotiations, it was already known that the country would participate in the League, as provided for in Wilson's 14 Points; what was not anticipated was the campaign for a permanent seat.

The idea that Brazil should conquer this space was strengthened during Artur Bernardes's term (Garcia 2006). The president believed that Brazil was the natural representative of the Americas on this Council, since the United States would not participate. Thus, the president coined the campaign motto: "To win or not to lose." The idea was that Brazil did not need the League, which used it as a way to gain greater prestige among Europeans, so it did not risk any objectives with this project.

In fact, this strategy proved misguided. The attempt to represent the American countries found no echo among its neighbors, just as it found no support among Europeans. In the end, Brazil found itself isolated from its main partners and failed in the prestige policy designed to legitimize the government of Artur Bernardes, who had governed a country under siege for much of his term (Garcia 2000).

The strained relationship with Latin America's neighbors wasn't just a result of Brazil's bid for permanent membership on the Council. It was part of a broader spectrum that involved Brazil's desire to establish itself as hegemonic among its neighbors. The classic argument of territorial size and population, which was used to legitimize this bid, was compounded by the consequences of the 1923 Pan-American Conference on Disarmament in Santiago (Garcia 2003), at which Brazil rejected a disarmament process, a stance that resonated negatively in the region.

Add to these factors Brazil's penultimate argument in its bid for a permanent seat in the League: an alliance with Spain. The two countries would represent Latin America: Brazil, due to its Lusitanian culture, and Spain, representing its former colonies (Garcia 2000). This 1923 proposal also did not resonate well in Latin America and confirmed a distancing from the other countries in the region.

The quest for a seat continued in Brazilian rhetoric, this time with an attempt to restructure the alliance with Spain. The new terms proposed by Brazil in 1924 were: Brazil would temporarily represent the United States, and Spain would fulfill the same role for Germany. This way, the rightful holders of the seats would be respected, the Council would not be overrepresented (a fear of the British), and, as soon as representation in the organization was normalized, Brazil and Spain would leave the Council.

This argument didn't even convince Spain, which refused to endorse Brazil's proposal. They didn't believe it was acceptable for the country to assume interim participation in the body.

The inclusion of Germany in the Council in 1926, after the Treaty of Locarno [5], and this country's demand that no other countries be added to the body – a proposal supported by France and England – generated repudiation in Spain and Brazil. Spain withdrew from the League, and Brazil first vetoed Germany's entry [6], and then withdrew from the organization, opening the way for the European country's incorporation.

Brazil thus assumed the burden of risky action in pursuit of its objectives. In doing so, it had already managed to isolate itself both from the countries surrounding it and from those that represented the idea of ​​civilization it mimicked. Brazil's last major diplomatic gamble was its refusal to join the Briand-Kellogg Pact of 1928.

The Briand-Kellogg Pact

The Brazilian stance towards the Briand-Kellogg Pact summarizes the argument, developed based on the reading of Eugênio Vargas Garcia (2004, 2006), that the alliance built with the USA throughout the 1920s was pragmatically conducted in order to favor the project of Brazilian insertion in the European context of international politics.

The Brazilian government, already under Washington Luís's presidency and Otávio Mangabeira's foreign ministry, learned that the United States and France had negotiated a treaty condemning war and was surprised not to have been invited to participate in its drafting and become a full member. The US response explained that the country had not been invited because it was a peace and friendship agreement between the two countries. The US government expanded its scope by including countries that had signed the Locarno Treaty, as they had a special interest in the matter and because of the project's predominantly European scope. 

For Brazil's prestige, despite the justifications, it was unacceptable that the country was not an original signatory to this treaty, while Czechoslovakia and Poland were (Garcia 2006). Therefore, in August 1928, when the General Treaty of Renunciation of War was signed, the US ambassador to Brazil invited Brazil to sign, but the government declined. Officially, the refusal was based on the Constitution, which already provided for the refusal to use violent means to resolve conflicts. The real reason, however, was the country's perception that its prestige had been damaged:

Mangabeira would remain firm in his position (refusing to sign the treaty). In the words of the Brazilian foreign minister, 'we have given unequivocal testimony that, although loyal friends of the United States, we maintain complete autonomy in foreign policy.' (…) Brazil's support, with its 'efficient solidarity,' came at a price: the establishment of a two-way dialogue, as two friendly countries consulting each other on matters of common interest. Otherwise, there would be no partnership, but mere alignment (Garcia 2006, 472).

By the end of the 1920s, therefore, Brazil, with its search for prestige and external resistance to its proposals, had achieved isolation in all diplomatic circles that interested us: Latin America and Europe, as a result of its strategies to become an effective member of the Council of the League, and the USA, given its stance regarding the Briand-Kellogg Pact.

The 1930 Revolution and the emergence of new political projects would be the conditions that enabled the development of new agendas in Brazilian foreign policy. However, I argue that the change is less in terms of content and stance toward the great powers than is presented in the Brazilian Foreign Policy literature.

NEW VIEWS ON FOREIGN POLICY IN THE 1920S

Jaguaribe and Rodrigues's comparison with the events of the Brazilian Foreign Policy Movement (PEB) of the 1920s demonstrates that foreign policy studies have a distinct chronology, as they collide the historical timeframe under analysis with that in which the analyses are conducted. While the 1950s and 1960s produced seminal texts that structured the discipline of International Relations in the 1970s, their authors prioritized the successes of the PEB rather than the initiatives themselves. This created a history of automatic alignment between Brazil and the US, which served to promote a policy of autonomy from the Western bloc at a time when the political regime was becoming intransigent with the possibility of communist influence. Consequently, the 1920s have remained largely unanalyzed. It is Eugênio Vargas Garcia's efforts to systematize the events of this period that shed new light on the period and demonstrate its wealth of initiatives.

Vargas Garcia identifies the BEP of the 1920s as one of uncertainty regarding alignment with the United States or Europe, and organizes the interests identified as predominant in each of the strands based on the European and American imaginaries. Regarding the first, the following stand out: "concrete interests, the Westphalia system, aspirations for national greatness, entry into the club of great powers" (Garcia 2003, 582). Regarding the second list, it is worth mentioning "principledness, the rule of law, the peaceful resolution of international conflicts, the legal equality of states" (Garcia 2003, 582). This tension can be interpreted as revealing the moment of transition and instability that the interwar period represented for the international system. Thus, Eugênio Vargas Garcia's (2006) proposal to understand Brazil as divided between two distinct poles is a way of trying to rationalize diplomatic events along two continuums, as if it were possible to have "concrete interests" without any basis in any dimension of "principledness ." In other words, even Vargas Garcia assumes a dichotomy between two ways of engaging with diplomacy in the 1920s. The point is that he sees the complexities of the period and the negotiations typical of a political space.

One could even extrapolate the argument and conclude that the impertinent pursuit of a seat on the Council of the League of Nations would be a rupture with the concept of legal equality, as it would grant Brazil greater representation and decision-making power than other countries—thus manifesting the antagonism between academic achievement and politics in the conduct of the Brazilian Economic and Social Movement (PEB). In this sense, it is worth highlighting that legal equality has its origins attributed to Brazilian diplomacy itself, through Rui Barbosa's participation in the Hague Conference of 1907 (Bueno 2003). The aim is not to assert that, in the 1920s, Brazil became more radical than in the first decade of the century. The aim is simply to show that, in both cases, the Brazilian stance respected what was interpreted as the country's interests, despite any alliances that may have been established with the United States.

From this perspective, I take from Jaguaribe's book (1966, 226-227) a paragraph that summarizes his perspective on the period:

The second phase of our foreign policy covers the period between World Wars I and II. Having consolidated the country's territorial integrity and its position among the states of South America, Brazil, during the Old Republic, sought, on the international stage, to enhance its civilization in the eyes of Europe. From the last decades of the Empire and the first decades of the Republic, the country had a stable economic position, supplying coffee and other raw materials to European markets and importing finished products from them. Once border disputes and the balance of power between Brazil and Argentina had been settled in South America, the country had no serious or urgent interests to defend internationally. Brazil's semi-colonial structure, at that time, did not yet provide the conditions for significant industrial development, with the country's economic growth being driven primarily by the expansion of coffee cultivation. Under these conditions, Brazilian diplomacy was led to an essentially ornamental and aristocratic stance, which simultaneously tended to provide the ruling elites with a share in the lifestyles of the European upper classes and to present the country in a favorable light, valuing its standards of civilization. This ornamental stance, contrasting with the pragmatic sense and dynamism of our foreign policy in the preceding period, although partially justified by the country's conditions, marked the beginning of our diplomatic decline, establishing habits in Itamaraty that sterilized it in the routine practice of precedents and distorted the mindset of our representatives abroad, who were more concerned with individually winning the sympathy and support of foreign ruling classes than with assuming the Brazilian position and defending national interests. This very gratuitousness of our foreign policy would disconnect it from the domestic economic and social process, distancing public opinion from international considerations, at least as an area of ​​interference for the country, which had become accustomed to the idea of ​​being a passive participant in the international power struggle.

This type of passage is what Garcia points to as analyses that seem to have a derogatory intent, as they offer too much value judgment without proper factual analysis. The ornamental characterization of the foreign policy emerging in a country stigmatized by the oligarchic government, at a time of transition following the death of the patron of diplomacy, is almost a proposal for a counterfactual analysis.

At one point, Jaguaribe's analysis finds support: the idea that the foreign policy of the period was conducted on an aristocratic basis. In this regard, both Eugênio Garcia and Zairo Cheibub devote considerable attention to the perception that it is the relational paradigms of Brazilian elites that guide this dynamic of state representation. Garcia (2006) argues that this is a characteristic of oligarchic logic.

Cheibub, for his part, does not identify a rupture with the proclamation of the Republic. The tenure of the Viscount of Cabo Frio, who held the position that preceded the current General Secretariat (Director-General) from 1864 until his death in 1907, is symptomatic of this continuity. His analysis identifies many attributes of permanence in the Itamaraty, even within the families whose members held important positions in the imperial bureaucracy and who, as early as the 1980s, were active in the Ministry. This analysis is largely intended to reaffirm the Weberian perspective of homogeneity in elite formation, which finds in José Murilo de Carvalho (2007) a landmark in applying this model to the Brazilian reality.

In any case, it is worth noting that this prospect of interaction between Brazilian and foreign elites was not problematic. On the contrary, the notoriety of Ruy Barbosa and Domício da Gama and the close relationship between Brazilian and US representatives were extremely helpful in ensuring that Brazilian diplomatic demands were met at the 1919 Paris Conference. It was not the actions of the "Eagle of The Hague" that made these victories possible, but rather the Brazilian representatives' exploitation of these ties, as recalled by the US president himself, a friend of Domício da Gama, who directly addressed the Brazilian delegation inquiring about Ruy Barbosa's absence from its membership (Garcia 2006).

CONCLUSION

The Brazilian Foreign Policy (PEB) is not a republican invention. Both Jaguaribe (1958) and Rodrigues (1966) examine 19th-century foreign policy in detail before discussing the republican period. This is an important element to mention, as it corroborates Cheibub's (1984) interpretation of the continuities in Brazilian foreign policy. In this sense, the role of Baron of Rio Branco, as a founding figure of modern Brazilian diplomacy, can be relativized, and his acclaim as a founding figure of the Brazilian Foreign Policy (Barreto, 2001), understood in the context of his role in defining national borders.

Likewise, regarding Vargas' role, it is worth returning to Garcia (2006, 20):

In Brazilian history, 1930 is often considered the starting point of contemporary Brazil, as opposed to the period of the Old Republic. It can be argued that the internal rupture that occurred in 1930 obliterated the perception among Brazilian scholars and historians that the features of the modern world began to be defined during the 1914-1918 conflict. Consequently, the 1920s have traditionally been treated merely as the antechamber of the Revolution, dominated by the terminal crisis of the oligarchic state. 

Other aspects that contributed to the obliteration of the 1920s' PEB were the enthusiasm of the 1950s and 1960s for the then PEB and the interpretation that these years generated of the 1920s. The lack of successes comparable to those of Barão and Vargas in this interregnum contributed to an unfair silence about a period of adjustment of the PEB.

This PEB chronology, which blends the historical period in which the analysis is conducted with the historical period being analyzed, seems to have lost sight of the uncertainties that characterized the 1920s—a period of cultural turmoil, but also of uncertainty about the direction of the international system. In this uncertain scenario, the way Brazil leveraged its proximity to the US to gain advantages in the European arena reveals a foreign policy that sought to exploit its strengths to gain prominent positions in the new power structures. In this sense, it is a pragmatic vision that distinguishes itself from Barão and Vargas more by its lack of success than by the strategy adopted.

Like Brazilian artistic modernism, the Brazilian Popular Movement of the 1920s sought to be modern, and, as in the arts, Brazil was bold in diplomacy. However, unlike in the arts, in diplomacy, the country failed to establish a legacy based on its actions during these turbulent years.

Notes

[1] Letícia Pinheiro, in “Brazilian Foreign Policy,” establishes what would be two main lines in the conduct of the republican PEB. If, on the one hand there was the Americanism initiated by Baron of Rio Branco and nuanced in various ways by the conduct of Brazilian foreign policy, on the other there was the globalism that would begin with the independent foreign policy of President Jânio Quadros, but which was already foreshadowed in the government of Juscelino Kubitschek (Pinheiro 2004; Cervo & Bueno 2008).

[2] Mello Barreto links the sinking of the steamship Paraná, carrying a cargo of coffee, and the resulting deaths of three Brazilians to the breakdown of diplomatic relations. The sinking of the ships Tijuca and Lapa led to the seizure of German merchant ships in Brazilian ports, and the sinking of the ship Macau was the final reason for the Brazilian declaration of war (Barreto 2001).

[3]  Raul Fernandes contributed to what became known as the Raul Fernandes Clause in the ICJ statute, which provides that a state has the option of accepting the Court's jurisdiction to hear a case only if the other state also does so. This clause resolved the difficulty surrounding the Court's acceptance of countries' accession, either definitively or on a case-by-case basis. Lawyer Raul Fernandes plays an important role in criticizing the concept of bachelorism, which, in both Jaguaribe and Rodrigues, is seen as antagonistic to a political vision of foreign policy. Fernandes served as Brazil's foreign minister twice (December 1946 to January 1951 and August 1954 to November 1955), and the section in Rodrigues' book immediately preceding the PEI ends with a footnote on the repercussions of his criticisms of Fernandes's policy, strengthening the perception that the focus of the interpretation of the 1920s is more on the 1950s/1960s than on the events of the foreign policy being interpreted.

[4]  Brazil lost 25,000 tons of shipping; the US lost 389,000 tons of shipping; France, 950,000; and the British Empire, 7,740,000 tons. On the other hand, Brazil had captured 216,000 tons; the US, 628,000; France, 45,000; and the British Empire, 400,000 (Garcia 2006, 69).

[5]  The Treaty of Locarno of 1926 marked the reintegration of Germany into the international arena. Signed between Germany and the powers that formed the Entente, with the exception of the USSR, it reaffirmed some of the commitments established by the Paris Conference of 1919, particularly on border issues. The powers committed not to reoccupy the country, while the German government committed not to militarize the Rhineland.

[6] The inclusion of new members required that they be unanimously accepted by the Council, in which Brazil was represented on a temporary basis.

References 

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Received: February 5, 2025

Accepted for publication: March 19 , 2025

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