‘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

Jacob Mardell

Published: 3:30am, 4 Nov 2022

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Brazil’s Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has clinched victory over right-wing incumbent Jair Bolsonaro after an incredibly tense and divisive election. In his acceptance speech, which the presidential-elect delivered from a hotel in Sao Paulo surrounded by teary-eyed supporters, Lula struck a conciliatory tone, promising to unify the country and fight for the poorest Brazilians.

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.

After four years of destructive environmental policies and hostile diplomacy under Bolsonaro, the international community will be celebrating the return of the man former US president Barack Obama once called the “most popular politician on Earth”.

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.

Then Chinese president Hu Jintao (left) speaks with Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, then serving in his first term as Brazil’s president, during a meeting at Planalto Palace in Brasilia on November 12, 2004. Hu was in Brazil for a five-day state visit. Photo: Reuters

In the run-up to the election, Chinese media was quiet on the question of which candidate might better suit Chinese interests. Now that the votes are counted, the preference in Beijing is clear. Chinese commentators are hopeful Lula’s pro-Beijing record signals a new era in Brazil-China relations and a new ally in the fight against US hegemony.

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.

In 2004, the United States was focused on the Middle East while China was seen as an economic partner rather than a “strategic competitor”. Back then, Lula had no problem maintaining good relations with the US while designating China an ally in the fight to reform the international order.

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.

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In the 2000s, the term BRICS reflected global enthusiasm about promising emerging markets. Now, Moscow and Beijing are expanding the group and positioning it as a counterweight to the West.

Saudi Arabia is pursuing BRICS membership at the same time as it challenges the US and upgrades its relationship with China. The grouping has taken on a decidedly geopolitical flavour, and there will be hand-wringing in Brasilia at the thought of being seen as a leader of an anti-Western club.

Leaders of the BRICS nations, Russia, India, China, South Africa and Brazil, meet in a video conference on September 9, 2021. Both China and Russia have voiced support for expanding the group. Photo: India’s Press Information Bureau via AP

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.

Neither is it just a question of yielding to US pressure. Lula focused on China in the 2000s because he hoped it would help lessen Brazilian dependence on the US. Back then he considered China and Brazil on a more or less equal footing, but now it’s clear that Brazil and China are in different leagues. With China emerging as a superpower, Lula has just as much reason to be wary of dependence on China.

On the campaign trail, Lula even repeated the China threat rhetoric from Bolsonaro’s 2018 campaign about China “buying” Brazil. Lula was in campaign mode at an industry confederation and thus was playing to the crowd, but his speech was a sign that the tone of the debate has changed since he was first in office.

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With Lula’s victory, there will be talk about how Latin America’s political map now resembles that of the early 2000s. There will be concerns in the West that this second “pink tide” will allow China to make gains in the region at the expense of the US.

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.

It is possible that Lula could flirt more with China to win concessions from the US – a path some middle powers have taken. More likely, he will attempt to balance the two relationships while pursuing regional integration, realising that Latin America’s best hope against being buffeted by geopolitical winds is to band together.

Jacob Mardell is an analyst at the Mercator Institute for China Studies