Despite the post-Kirchner government’s many faults, one thing that it’s doing right is retaining the Argentinian-Chinese Strategic Partnership, which holds the best hope for Beijing to balance Trump’s “Fortress America” plans in the hemisphere. This week’s G20 Summit has drawn global attention to the host country of Argentina, a South American nation that’s recently experienced…
Today it’s clear that fascist-turned Brazil is out – so we are at RICS. There is not much to argue about. The world’s fifth largest economy, Brazil, has failed and betrayed the concept of the BRICS and the world at large. Whether you consider South Africa as a valid member of the BRICS is also…
The victory of Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil’s presidential election last week has won Israel a passionate new friend on the international stage. The world’s fifth-most populous nation will now be “coloured in blue and white”, an Israeli official said, referring to the colours of Israel’s flag. The Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu immediately called to…
Latin America’s “springtime of socialism” is at a close. After over a decade of progressive socialist presidents putting people ahead of cronyism, Latin America’s oligarchs, through the abuse of the courts, parliaments, and electoral systems, have put caudillos in office throughout the region. Unlike the past, when local generals, with a wink-and-a-nod from the local…
It’s darkness at the break of (tropical) high noon. Jean Baudrillard once defined Brazil as “the chlorophyll of our planet”. And yet a land vastly associated worldwide with the soft power of creative joie de vivre has elected a fascist for president. Brazil is a land torn apart. Former paratrooper Jair Bolsonaro was elected with 55.63 percent…
The victory of the far-right Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, Latin America’s most populous country and co-founder of the BRICS bloc, has understandably caused much fluttering in the dovecotes of leftists and liberals around the globe. But what the Bolsonaro victory shows is not so much the strength of far-right ideas as the weakness of the…
