Brazil and R2P

Global Responsibility to Protect 4 (2012) 532

brill.nl/gr2p

Brazil and R2P: Does Taking Responsibility Mean Using Force?Kai Michael Kenkel*Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro [email protected]

Abstract This article traces the reaction of the Brazilian government to the emergence of the R2P norm. After an initial period of rejection, followed by a period of absence from UN debates, Brazil has recently engaged cautiously with R2P. The article gives a detailed analysis of the origins of the Latin American system of legal protections that resulted in an interpretation in the region that reduces sovereignty almost exclusively to the inviolability of borders. This interpretation is at the heart of Brazils rejection of R2Ps tenets regarding the use of force. It does not stand in the way, however, of its contributing decisively to the other two pillars identified in the Secretary Generals Implementation Report. The paper identifies two main factors that motivated the gradual opening of the Brazilian foreign policy establishment to R2P, one external and one internal. Externally, the strong endorsement of R2P in the World Summit Outcome Document did much to facilitate Brazils rapprochement with the concept. Concomitantly, Brazils rise as an emerging power has increasingly created tensions between regional traditions and still-dominant Northern views of the responsibilities that accompany Brazils global aspirations. Brazil is in the process of developing an approach to peace operations and intervention that defines responsibility separately from the use of force, obviating the effects of this perceived tension. As a result, Brazil has become an important peacekeeping troop contributor and is no longer a vocal detractor of R2P. It has begun adapting the non-military elements of the principle to its policy goals and looks set to be an active and important participant in the concepts further implementation. Keywords responsibility to protect; Brazil; Latin America; emerging powers; use of force; United Nations

Sitting on the fence, thats a dangerous course; You could even catch a bullet from your peacekeeping force. Dire Straits, Once Upon a Time in the West*The author acknowledges the indispensable support for the research underlying this text provided by a grant from the Institute for Applied Economic Research (IPEA) of the Presidency of the Federative Republic of Brazil. Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2012 DOI 10.1163/187598412X619649

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K.M. Kenkel / Global Responsibility to Protect 4 (2012) 532

Once one of the more hostile detractors of the responsibility to protect (R2P), Brazil has recently shown guarded engagement with the concept and has sought to integrate it with its own broader foreign policy goals. This article seeks to explain that transition, and in doing so focuses on two processes relevant to the countrys attitudes towards intervention. First, as the country has risen as an emerging power, its strategic horizons have shifted; incentives at the global level increasingly outweigh the cost of diminishing adherence to longstanding regional traditions. Second, Brazil is a strong, though occasionally instrumentalist, adherent to the multilateral form; therefore, the increasing endorsement and operationalization of R2P by the United Nations raises the spectre of isolation and a loss of participation and influence given its sceptical instincts towards the concept. The paper first presents the main contours of the dominant Latin American interpretation of sovereignty and intervention, and the clear basis of Brazils first reactions to R2P in it. A recounting of the institutionalization and honing of the concept follows, which sets the stage for a demonstration of significant changes in the Brazilian reception of R2P from 2008 onward. The paper closes with an analysis of the implications of that shift for the broader implementation of R2P and considerations of future modes of approach to sceptical emerging states such as Brazil. The Latin American Context: Sovereignty as Shield and the Non-Use of Force As they relate to the responsibility to protect, the key tenets of the Brazilian foreign policy tradition are firmly grounded in the Latin American historical context. These are: an absolutist interpretation of state sovereignty as the inviolability of borders; strong dedication to the multilateralist principle and its manifestation in international organizations as a means of advancing foreign policy goals; and a diplomatic approach based, at the international level, on a strong preference for negotiation and an equally firm repudiation of the use of force. These factors are the touchstone of Brazilshistorical international conduct and look to remain so for the foreseeable future. However, the countrys rise as an emerging international power and the ensuing widening of its policy horizon to a permanently worldwide scope have forced it to engage with norms of conduct that increasingly clash with these continentally-bound precepts. These tensions are nowhere more acute than at the nexus of questions that make up the debate surrounding R2P. The equation of sovereignty with inviolability of borders is a direct result of the history of intervention in the domestic politics of the Western


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Hemisphere by the United States1. This has established non-intervention as the defining characteristic of the inter-American ambit and entrenched it there as arguably the most strongly-held organizing principle in any regional political culture2. In locating the origins of this interpretation, it is instructive to rely in part on contemporary analysts; as one prominent American jurist was able to claim four decades ago,the idea of a regional system of public order has its source in President Monroes historic pronouncement of 1823. The American international law expounded by Alvarez, Drago, and the disciples of Calvo developed as a response to the interventionist claims of European creditor states in the latter part of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth centuries, and subsequently as a reaction to the United States own version of American public law.3

The Monroe Doctrine stated that the United States would not tolerate incursions by European powers in the Western Hemisphere; tellingly it did not, however, establish the same limits on Washington itself.4 Subsequently, as southward incursions by the United States grew in number and scope, and respect for the equality of jurisdictions (and, therewith, de facto, sovereignty) began to fade, the Argentine jurist Carlos Calvo developed the eponymous Doctrine, which imposed the jurisdiction of local courts and outlawed the use of force by states to underscore commercial claims.5 The Calvo Doctrine is seen as the cornerstone of attempts to codify an American legal system binding the United States to equal treatment of its Southern neighbours. Where Calvo had sought to prohibit diplomatic action prior to the exhaustion of local resources, further US sabre-rattling led to the promulgation of the Drago Doctrine, which outlawed the (increasingly likely) use ofA.J. Thomas, Jr., Non-Intervention and Public Order in the Americas, Proceedings of the Annual Meeting (American Society of International Law), 53: 72-80 (1959), p. 73; Jos A. Cabranes, Human Rights and Non-Intervention in the Inter-American System, Michigan Law Review, 65/6: 1147-1182 (1967), pp. 1148-1150. 2 The depth of this entrenchment is ably illustrated in the early analysis of the OAS Charter by Thomas, Non-Intervention and Public Order in the Americas, p. 75. 3 Cabranes, Human Rights and Non-Intervention in the Inter-American System, p. 1148. For the original text of the Monroe Doctrine, delivered in a State of the Union address, see http://www.law.ou.edu/ushistory/monrodoc.shtml. 4 In their analysis of the Latin American area in Regions and Powers: The Structure of International Security, Barry Buzan and Ole Wver dub the ritual reference to the Monroe Doctrine misleading, arguing thateven more tellingly for the magnitude of its later effect on norms of interventionthe nature of the US claim evolved later out of repeated practices of interference (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), p. 307. 5 Carlos Calvo, Le Droit International Thorique et Pratique, 4th ed. (Paris: Guillaumin, 1887-88).1

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force by any state not just the European powers to back up claims in commercial disputes.6 Shortly thereafter, the 1904 Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine laid out an interventionist policy that would lastingly shape Latin American perceptions of US intentions:Any country whose people conduct themselves well can count upon our hearty friendship. If a nation shows that it knows how to act with reasonable efficiency and decency in social and political matters, if it keeps order and pays its obligations, it need fear no interference from the United States. Chronic wrongdoing, or an impotence which results in a general loosening of the ties of civilized society, may in America, as elsewhere, ultimately require intervention by some civilized nation, and force the United States, however reluctantly to the exercise of an international police power.7

Given its astounding outward parallels to some elements of the R2P doctrine, the Corollarys role in shaping Latin American responses to R2P, particularly as related to the notions of primary state capacity and the rightfularbiter criterion, cannot be overestimated despite the passage of time. In response, scholars and practitioners in the region began to codify an approach intended to safeguard against such interference, based on the fundamental elements of juridical equality of states, the prohibition of war as a political instrument, the peaceful settlement of controversies, arbitration and non-intervention.8 This radical form of non-intervention, however, led to a difficulty whose solution would serve as the foundation for another hallmark of Latin American and particularly Brazilian foreign policy9:It is true that non-intervention protects those values intertwined in the concept of sovereignty or independence of states, but such a restrictive doctrine leaves little room for the protection of other values. While, under general international law, measures to uphold the law as a reaction against a state guilty of a breach of the law are permitted, under the Charter of Bogota that right has been completely abrogated without qualification: no state has the right to intervene for any reason whatever. Thus, a most vital change worked by the prohibition against unilateral intervention is that it removes a methodOn Calvo and Drago see Julio A. Lacarte, The Latin American System, Proceedings of the Annual Meeting (American Society of International Law), 53: 62-68 (1959), pp. 64-65. Cabranes, Human Rights and Non-Intervention in the Inter-American System (footnote 12, p. 1153) is also excellent on the modern implications of the Drago Doctrine. 7 United States of America, Presidency, Theodore Roosevelts Annual Message to Congress for 1904, House Records HR 58A-K2. 8 Lacarte, The Latin American System, pp. 64-65. 9 See also Cabranes, Human Rights and Non-Intervention in the Inter-American System, p. 1155.6


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of enforcing general international law. If nothing was substituted therefor, it would have the effect on many occasions of permitting a delinquent state to benefit by its breach of general international law. The American states have for this reason sought to substitute therefor collective action, but this collective action or collective intervention is by no means a complete replacement of the individual action permitted by general international law as a sanction to uphold the law.10

Accordingly, a collective and later multilateralist inclination is in the genetic makeup of most diplomatic traditions in the region; indeed South American states, Brazil included, have been some of the most active members of the United Nations since its inception. It is important to note that the role of collective institutions as protective mechanisms against larger powers has therefore cast these bodies, in the foreign policies of the regions states, primarily as tools for the attainment of national objectives rather than an end unto themselves or a public good. Several authors point to gaps between rhetoric and voting behaviour as a result of this putatively instrumentalist stance, particularly with respect to human rights.11 The double foundation of strict non-intervention and the total abnegation of the use of force is codified most prominently in Articles 19-22 of the Charter of the Organization of American States.12 Article 6 of the InterAmerican Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance, endorsed in annex to the Bogot Charter, adds to this enshrinement of the basic principles the aforementioned possibility of collective action in their defence.13 Despite the attendant possibility of multilateral intervention, early analysts underscore the primacy of absolute sovereignty (often over, in particular, human rights), highlighting that any discussion involving the contention that security and peace based on moral order and justice overrides the non-intervention principle is extremely arguable. The non-intervention principle governing the O.A.S. andThomas, Non-Intervention and Public Order in the Americas, pp. 73-74. See, representatively, Sean Burges and Jean Daudelin, Brazil: How Realists Defend Democracy, in Thomas Legler, Dexter Boniface and Sharon F. Lean (eds), Promoting Democracy in the Americas (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2007), 107-132; Jean Daudelin, Le Brsil Comme Puissance, Problmes dAmrique Latine, 77: 27-45 (2010); Daniel Flemes, Brazilian Foreign Policy in the Changing World Order, South African Journal of International Affairs, 16/2 (2009), 161-182. 12 Organization of American States, Charter of the Organization of American States, 1948, http://www.oas.org/dil/treaties_A-41_Charter_of_the_Organization_of_American_States .htm#ch2, accessed 28 February 2011. 13 Organization of American States, Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance, 1948, http://www.oas.org/juridico/english/treaties/b-29.html, accessed 28 February 2011.10 11

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K.M. Kenkel / Global Responsibility to Protect 4 (2012) 532 the American states is exceedingly broad, prohibiting intervention in the internal or externalaffairs of a state, directly or indirectly for any reason whatever. As to the overriding goal of an order of human dignity, the American doctrine of non-intervention effectively impedes implementation and protection by a system of public order.14

According to Jorge Cabranes,It is apparent from its constituent instruments that, in its early years, the postwar inter-American system was primarily concerned with the maintenance by each state of absolute and exclusive authority over its own territory, free of extracontinental or intra-continental intervention. It also seems clear that those who signed the OAS Charter in 1948 did not imagine that the OAS would be empowered to undertake multilateral intervention or collective security action against a member state of the Organization.15 The constituent instruments of the inter-American system reveal the unwillingness of the Latin American states to qualify the principle of non-intervention any more than is absolutely required by a collective defense system16 Without unduly stretching the limits of credibility, one might consider the possibility that the doctrine of absolute non-intervention was simply intended to prevent the hemispheres dominant power, or a group of states allied to that power, from deciding what these basic goal values are and then compelling conformity from the other states in the inter-American system.17

Multilateralism in the region thus has two primary purposes, which differ significantly from the Northern perspective: to provide the legal guarantees obviated by the absolute definition of sovereignty, and to protect against interference from larger powers with the legalist approach to borders typically playing off of a Ratzelian vision of the organic state.18 As succinctly put by Ramesh Thakur, typically of the global South the emphasis is on justice among rather than within nations.19 In other words, interpreting sovereignty in this way leads to a view that places individual (human) rights outside the purview of the concept of sovereignty and of the appropriate sphere of state action.Thomas, Non-Intervention and Public Order in the Americas, p. 76. Cabranes, Human Rights and Non-Intervention in the Inter-American System, p. 1158. 16 Ibid., pp. 1158-59. 17 Ibid., p. 1160. 18 A compelling analysis of the correlations between internal political form and economic development, and the propensity to adopt sovereignty as shield is given in Martin B. Travis, Jr., The Political and Social Bases for the Latin American Doctrine of NonIntervention, Proceedings of the Annual Meeting (American Society of International Law), 53: 62-65 (1959). 19 Ramesh Thakur, The Responsibility to Protect: Norms, Laws and the Use of Force in International Politics (New York: Routledge, 2011), p. 144.14 15


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Cabranes convincingly outlines an argument that serves as an earlier parallel to the Brazilian response to R2P outlined below. His claim is that for more than a decade after its founding, the Organization of American States (OAS) exhibited no particular inclination to undertake a program to provide international protection for fundamental freedoms within member states20 and that [u]nlike the UN Charter, the OAS Charter makes only the most cursory mention of human rights. Moreover, the scant references that do appear do not arise in any context which might conceivably be regarded as qualifying the doctrine of non-intervention.21 Cabranes nevertheless sheds light on the presence of human rights concerns in OAS practice from 1959 onward22. Indeed, as many rights in the Latin American independence process were gained in collective form, individual rights continue in a somewhat secondary role, though this situation saw significant change when the human rights violations of the military regimes that ended in the 1980s came to light. Tellingly, the degree of substantive commitment to human rights in both domestic dialogue and especially foreign policy tends to correlate to the severity of the abuses perpetrated under the various military regimes; thus Chile and Argentina have taken strong stances, shown inter alia through endorsement of R2P and human security, while Brazil has not.23 It is important to note that domestically numerous South American states have experienced military regimes that engaged in widespread human rights violations, and despite relative international calm the region suffers from high rates of internal violence, particularly gun-related homicides. However, from the standpoint of preventing major interstate conflict, the Latin American system has been quite successful.24 It has become aCabranes, Human Rights and Non-Intervention in the Inter-American System, p. 1147. Ibid., p. 1148. 22 Ibid., p. 1168. 23 This is a strong example of the example set out by Wayne Sandholtz that normative advancement comes as a result of concrete historical experience: Dynamics of International Norm Change: Rules against Wartime Plunder, European Journal of International Relations, 14/1: 101-131 (2008). See Daudelin, Le Brsil Comme Puissance, as well as Burges and Daudelin, Brazil: How Realists Defend Democracy, on the countrys voting record on human rights. 24 Analysts of civil-military relations have contended that the early fixing of borders in fact dislocated political contestation to within states, reducing the number of major interstate conflicts, but leading to increased intervention by underoccupied militaries in domestic politics. A similar argument has been made to explain high levels of societal violence. In fact, Buzan and Wver, Regions and Powers (pp. 305-307) point out that while there may not have been many20 21

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commonplace to point out that the continent has seen only one meaningful international conflict the Triple Alliance War and 160 years of international peace since then. There have been no mass atrocities on the South American continent to rival the Shoah and the Rwandan genocide, and thus to imprint upon the regions governments the urgency felt by the ICISS in seeking to respond to the horror of inaction.25 It is precisely the success of the absolutist conception of sovereignty, and the very strong prohibition on the use of force, that has isolated the region from the 20th-century cruelties that shaped European consciousness and stimulated the genesis of R2P at the international level, while indicatively for attitudes towards R2P relegating other forms of violence to a domestic plane isolated from the same form of scrutiny. The Precepts of Brazilian Foreign Policy and Initial Reaction to R2P In accordance with its continental origins, the primary hallmark of Brazils foreign policy profile is often described as Grotian26, based on nonintervention, pacifism, legal normativism27, and a marked abstention from the use of military force coupled with a proclivity towards the multilateral form (including its instrumental use).28 The legal framework for the conduct of foreign policy clearly enshrines the key elements of themajor conflagrations, the region has seen its share of minor border disputes over the last two centuries. This may, however, ultimately underscore the efficacy of multilateral conflict resolution mechanisms. 25 International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, Responsibility to Protect: Report of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, http:// www.iciss.ca/report2-en.asp, accessed 28 February 2001, paragraph 1.1. This is an even stronger point in favour of the argument set out by Sandholtz, Dynamics of International Norm Change. 26 See Gustavo Snchal de Goffredo Jr., Entre Poder e Direito: A Tradio Grotiana na Poltica Externa Brasileira (Braslia: Instituto Rio Branco/FUNAG, 2005). 27 Indeed the legal-normativist tradition has been described succinctly by Chilean analyst Jorge Heine as one of the main difficulties concerning what would come to be known as compliance pull that R2P faces in a South American context, pointing out the enormous difficulties in a region where treaties and formal protocols provide the basis for international obligations, and the Napoleonic code constitutes the anchor for domestic law, in The Responsibility to Protect: Humanitarian Intervention and the Principle of Non-Intervention in the Americas, in Ramesh Thakur, Andrew F. Cooper and John English (eds.), International Commissions and the Power of Ideas (Tokyo: United Nations University Press, 2005), pp. 221245; here, p. 233. 28 See, inter alia, Letcia Pinheiro, Trados pelo Desejo: Um Ensaio sobre a Teoria e a Prtica da Poltica Externa Brasileira Contempornea, Contexto Internacional, 22/2, pp. 305-335 (2000), p. 323, http://publique.rdc.puc-rio.br/contextointernacional/media/


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paradigm outlined above, while concomitantly laying down the foundations for tensions with norms of international (particularly Northern) origin.29 The Brazilian Constitution itself, in fact, is not free of its own fundamental tension between guiding principles. In fact, [i]nasmuch as the intervention debate can be described as a competition between the norms of non-intervention and of respect for human rights, that very battleground is located within one of the defining paragraphs of the Constitution.30 Article 4 of the 1988 Constitution establishes that:[t]he international relations of the Federative Republic of Brazil are governed by the following principles: I - national independence; II - prevalence of human rights; III - self-determination of the peoples; IV - non-intervention; V - equality among the States; VI - defence of peace; VII - peaceful settlement of conflicts; VIII - repudiation of terrorism and racism; IX - cooperation among peoples for the progress of mankind; X - granting of political asylum.31

The fundamental difficulty with this paragraph as a basis for consistent policy is that it places on equal footing principles (non-intervention and human rights) that the dominant interpretation of sovereignty in the region places in opposition. In practice, this tension has been resolved according to the historical continental preference for non-intervention, giving primacy to the horizontal component of sovereignty. The 199632 and 2005Pinheiro_vol22n2.pdf, accessed 15 February 2011; Gelson Fonseca Jnior, A Legitimidade e Outras Questes InternacionaisPoder e tica entre as Naes (So Paulo: Paz e Terra, 1998), p. 359. 29 For an excellent analysis of the relationship between regional normative subcultures on sovereignty and those that claim universal applicability, see Amitav Acharya, Norm Subsidiarity and Regional Orders: Sovereignty, Regionalism and Rule-Making in the Third World, International Studies Quarterly, 55/1, pp. 95-123 (2011). 30 Kai Michael Kenkel, Global Player, or Watching from the Sidelines? The Responsibility to Protect: definition and implications for Brazil, Revista da Escola de Guerra Naval, 12, pp. 6-59 (2008); p.26. Available in Portuguese at http://www.egn.mar.mil.br/arquivos/ revistaEgn/dezembro2008/Global Player ou Espectador nas Margens.pdf. Accessed 28 February 2011. 31 Constitution of Brazil. 1988. Available from http://www.v-brazil.com/government/laws/ titleI.html. Accessed 28 February 2011, Article 4. 32 Brazil, Ministry of Defence. National Defence Policy (Braslia: Ministry of Defence, 1996), http://merln.ndu.edu/whitepapers.html, Accessed 28 February 2011, paragraph 2.3.

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National Defence Policies (PDN)33, again enshrine the principles of nonintervention34 and pacific resolution (non-use of force) very clearly. As another example, the principle of non-intervention appears already in the third sentence of the most recent iteration of security policy, the National Defence Strategy published in 2008.35 As a corollary to its predilection for peaceful means and the multilateral form and the attendant emphasis on diplomacy, the Brazilian foreign service has a reputation for a very high level of competence. One of its hallmarks is a constant aversion to ultimata and to the reduction of differences to a Manichean viewpoint, prioritizing the search for a negotiated via media.36 A further offshoot is the countrys history of continuous yet, until recently, token contribution to United Nations peace operations (PKOs). Until 2004, in a pattern typical of South American states,37 Brazils participation in PKOs and other interventions had been restricted38, particularly with regard to ruling out any acceptance of Security Council action under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter. The non-use of force has been a firm constant throughout the countrys engagement with the issue of blue33 Brazil, Ministry of Defence, National Defence Policy (Braslia: Ministry of Defence, 2005), http://merln.ndu.edu/whitepapers.html, accessed 28 February 2011, paragraphs 2.3, 4.12. 34 In an area of the world marked by structural inequalities between states, non-intervention is broadly defined as refraining from attempts to influence the outcome of the political process in, or the conduct of, other sovereign states, whether by military or other means of direct or indirect coercion. 35 Brazil, Ministry of Defence, Estratgia Nacional de Defesa (Braslia: Ministry of Defence, 2008), http://www.mar.mil.br/diversos/estrategia_defesa_nacional_portugues.pdf, p.8. On how historical experiences have conditioned security policy in Latin America, particularly as it relates to intervention, see Monica Herz, Concepts of Security in South America, International Peacekeeping, 17/5, pp. 598-612 (2010). 36 Indeed many policy problems viewed elsewhere as a choice between mutually exclusive normative options (such as alignment with the West or with blocs such as the BRICs, or simultaneous advances towards the United States and Venezuela) are not constructed as contradictory in Brazilian diplomatic practice. In fact, this space is seen as providing Brazil with important qualities as an international mediator and contributor to conflict resolution. 37 See the contributions in International Peacekeeping 17/5 (2010). 38 For a pre-MINUSTAH analysis, see Paulo Roberto Campos Tarrisse da Fontoura, O Brasil e as Operaes de Manuteno da Paz das Naes Unidas (Braslia: FUNAG, 1999) and Afonso Jos Sena Cardoso, O Brasil nas Operaes de Paz das Naes Unidas (Braslia: FUNAG, 1998). More recently, see Srgio Luiz Aguiar (ed.), Brasil em Misses de Paz (So Paulo: Usina do Livro, 2005) and, on the relationship between economic and military power, Joo Paulo Soares Alsina Junior, Poltica externa e poder militar no Brasil (Rio de Janeiro: FGV, 2009).


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helmets. Historically, the exception Chapter VII establishes to Article 2(7) is taken as constituting a violation of the sacrosanct principle, despite Security Council implementation thereof. As a result, prior to its prominent participation in UN efforts in Haiti beginning in 2004, Brazil had steadfastly rejected taking part in any Chapter VII mission. In addition, in its capacity as a non-permanent Council member in 1994, the country refused to support anything more than a minor Chapter VI mission in Rwanda, and abstained from a series of resolutions related to the multinational force sent to Haiti that year39. With the exception of battalion-sized contingents sent to the Suez (UNEF I, 1956-1967) and Angola (UNAVEM III, 1995-1997), as well as a large police contingent to UNTAET (1999-2002), Brazils pre-MINUSTAH contributions to UN PKOs consisted of a steady trickle of military observers and staff/liaison officers. The rhetorical position on intervention did not differ significantly from the practical one. The initial Brazilian government response to the emerging R2P norm clearly reflected the countrys grounding in South American practice, oscillating between calculated vagueness and reflexive rejection, separated by prolonged absences of any pronouncement at all. The first response was one of forceful repudiation, a stance espoused by then-Foreign Minister Celso Amorim,40 who initially dismissed R2P as nothing more than the droit dingrence in new clothes.41 Offering a more detailed criticism of the new concept that still bore the clear mark of reaction to the legacy of the Roosevelt Corollary, Amorim objects to what he implicitly sees as the permissiveness of the right authority criterion in the ICISS report:The most questionable section of the Report is that which refers to the question of who decides whether or not there should be an intervention. While the authority of the United Nations Security Council is not questioned, different more or less heterodox courses of action are examined for those cases in which that body may be paralyzed by the threat of a veto by a permanent member. The door is thus left open for certain countries to arrogate to themselves the39 See the detailed analysis in Eugnio Diniz, Brazil: Peacekeeping and the Evolution of Foreign Policy, in John T. Fishel and Andrs Saenz (eds), Capacity Building for Peacekeeping: The Case of Haiti, (Washington, DC: National Defense University Press, 2007). 40 Amorim became the countrys Defence Minister in August 2011. 41 Celso Amorim, Conceitos de Segurana e Defesaimplicaes para a ao interna e externa do governo. In J. R. de Almeida Pinto, A.J. Ramalaho da Rocha and R. Doring Pinho da Silva (eds.), Reflexes Sobre Defesa e Segurana: uma Estratgia para o Brasil (Braslia: Ministry of Defence, 2004), pp. 135-157, here, p. 140.

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K.M. Kenkel / Global Responsibility to Protect 4 (2012) 532 right to intervene, without the express authorization of the Council or monitoring by a truly multilateral body.42

The initial critique is illustrated succinctly in another statement by the then-head of Itamaraty43, which is indicative of the very first reactions in that it reduces R2P to questions of the use of force, the most entrenched of principles in Brazil and the region:We have been called upon to deal with new concepts such as human security and the responsibility to protect. We agree that they merit an adequate place in our system. But it is an illusion to believe that we can combat the dysfunctional politics at the root of grave human rights violations through military means alone, or even economic sanctions, to the detriment of diplomacy and persuasion.44

Such a reduction of the concept is somewhat ironic in that it neglects to address those constitutive elements of R2P prevention and particularly reconstruction which have the potential to advance Brazilian foreign policy priorities; admittedly these were advanced by the concepts developers only well after the above statement. As the concept became more developed in UN practice, these issues would gain prominence, opening the door for potential Brazilian rapprochement with R2P. In the meantime, during the run-up to the 2005 World Summit, Brazilian officials began to familiarize themselves more with the concept and to adopt a studiously noncommittal public stance before the global meeting:In our view, the General Assembly could examine in detail the new concept of a collective responsibility to protect Brazil has a historic and sound commitment to human rights, democracy and the rule of law. We are parties to all main human rights treaties and we have significantly cooperated with and benefited from the international human rights machinery. It is in this context that we welcome the proposals contained in the report of the SG towards the strengthening of the system. We believe that the debate on this

Amorim, p. 141. Unless otherwise noted, all translations in the text are by the author. The metonymic moniker for the Brazilian Ministry of External Relations, after the name of the Palace in which it is housed. 44 Brazil, Ministry of External Relations. Statement by H. E. Ambassador Celso Amorim, Minister of External Relations of the Federative Republic of Brazil, at the Opening of the General Debate of the 60th Session of the United Nations General Assembly, 17 September 2005, www .un.org/webcast/ga/60/statements/bra050917eng.pdf, accessed 28 February 2011. See also Celso Amorim, Discurso da abertura do Seminrio de Alto Nvel sobre Operaes de Manuteno da Paz, Braslia, 5 February 2007, in Brazil, Ministry of External Relations (ed.), Resenha de Poltica Exterior do Brasil,100, pp. 63-66 (2007).42 43


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issue is also necessary and positive and we intend to actively participate in the exercise.45

With an eye to the tensions within its own multilateralist traditions that rejection of a concept endorsed by the world body might potentially occasion, some rhetorical statements cautiously opened the door, tentatively couching the countrys goals in language associated with the concept:It is within this context that Brazils aspirations for an enlarged Security Council with new members, permanent and non-permanent, with developedand developing countries in both categories, should be seen. Brazil has already indicated its willingness to assume immediately its responsibilities as a permanent member, alongside other countries that are equally capable of acting on the global level and contributing to international peace and security.46

This statement is particularly interesting in that it represents a fundamental element of the Brazilian engagement with R2P: the idea that assuming global responsibility with or without an eye to a seat on the Security Council can be done without increased resort to the use of force. This question, intimately related to the debates on R2P, the role of emerging powers and Security Council reform, will be revisited in the conclusions. While the above statements are typical of the initial period of Brazilian reaction to the R2P concept, a series of events would lead to modifications in the reception of the idea, particularly as its contours began to be defined beyond the use of force. President Lula da Silvas quest to heighten Brazils international profile most visibly through a push for permanent membership in the Security Council increasingly brought to the fore tensions between the countrys continental roots and the Northern interpretation of the duties inherent in its global aspirations, particularly in the area of the intervention debate and its increasing presence on the UN agenda. Indeed it would require strong incentives to abandon a political consensus that had made Latin America the most peaceful region on the planet (in inter-state terms) for over a century and a half.45 Brazil, Permanent Mission to the United Nations, Cluster III: Freedom to Live in Dignity. Statement by Ambassador Ronaldo Sardenberg, Permanent Representative of Brazil to the UN, 19/20 April 2005, http://www.reformtheun.org/index.php?module=uploads&func =download&fileId=307, accessed 28 February 2011. 46 Celso Amorim, Poltica Externa do Governo Lula: os dois primeiros anos, Anlise de Conjuntura OPSA, 4, p. 12 (2005), http://observatorio.iuperj.br/pdfs/5_analises_Artigo %20Celso%20Amorim.pdf, accessed 28 February 2011.

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The Door Opens a Crack: Adaptations in the Response to R2P Brazilian officials began to engage in earnest with R2P during the negotiation process for the World Summit Outcome Document in 2005. This increased engagement was the result of two concomitant and synergetic processes that occurred beginning at the middle of the decade one internal to the making of Brazilian policy, the other outside it. First, the process of institutionalisation of R2P at the United Nations, and the increasing definition of its contours that resulted, presented a scenario of potential isolation that went a long way towards inciting a multilateralist state such as Brazil to engage in the debate. Second, Brazils status as an emerging power, and President Lulas stated desire to transform its new economic clout into international political influence particularly in the form of a vetoendowed permanent seat on a reformed Security Council created tensions between the continentally anchored foreign policy traditions outlined above and the responsibilities and worldviews associated by major powers (that is, those who would be involved in reforming the Security Council) with global player status47. In mapping these two processes this section will identify specific critiques of R2P that have a basis in Brazils foreign policy traditions, and identify how specific steps within the implementation process at the UN (and conceptual moves by the lead R2P authors), as well as external pressures characteristic of emerging power status, led to a gradual move from rejection to a cautious opening towards certain aspects of the concept by the continental giant. Though the Organizations process of engagement had begun in earnest with the 2004 Report of the High-Level Panel and the Secretary Generals preparatory report In Larger Freedom48, Brazilian officials first substantive public statements emerged surrounding the adoption of the Outcome Document. At the time the document was endorsed by the worlds heads of state, three main points of contention permeated Itamaraty pronouncements, based primarily on Latin American traditions: the issue of the states own primacy in fulfilling its sovereign duties (last resort); a perceived permissiveness regarding the possibility of great power appropriation of the concept for self-interested unilateral action (right intention); and the47 The italics denote the fact that this raises once again the question of who defines international responsibility, and whether it must necessarily involve the propensity to use force. This point is taken up in the conclusions. 48 High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change, A More Secure World: Our Shared Responsibility, paragraph 203; Kofi Annan, In Larger Freedom: Towards Development, Security and Human Rights for All, A/59/2005, paragraph 135.


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related issue of the final arbiter49 (right authority50) of international action. In addressing the latter two directly, the Outcome Document seeks to make progress towards assuaging these concerns:138. Each individual State has the responsibility to protect its populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. This responsibility entails the prevention of such crimes, including their incitement, through appropriate and necessary means. We accept that responsibility and will act in accordance with it. The international community should, as appropriate, encourage and help States to exercise this responsibility and support the United Nations in establishing an early warning capability. 139. The international community, through the United Nations, also has the responsibility to use appropriate diplomatic, humanitarian and other peaceful means, in accordance with Chapters VI and VIII of the Charter, to help protect populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. In this context, we are prepared to take collective action, in a timely and decisive manner, through the Security Council, in accordance with the Charter, including Chapter VII, on a case-by-case basis and in cooperation with relevant regional organizations as appropriate, should peaceful means be inadequate and national authorities manifestly fail to protect their populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. We stress the need for the General Assembly to continue consideration of the responsibility to protect populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity and its implications, bearing in mind the principles of the Charter and international law. We also intend to commit ourselves, as necessary and appropriate, to helping States build capacity to protect their populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity and to assisting those which are under stress before crises and conflicts break out.51

Brazils diplomats were not convinced, and sought to keep discussions of R2P out of the Northern-dominated Security Council and centred on the General Assembly, where the concepts predominantly Southern detractors would have greater sway.52 It was to be the Secretary-Generals49 Cabranes highlights eloquently why this particular point is of greater importance to Latin American states, given repeated instances of the arrogation to itself of this right by the United States and the subsequent unequal treatment of local government authority; p. 1180. 50 The clear origins of the ICISS criteria for intervention under R2P in the Catholic just war tradition do not seem to have played a role in the receptivity of the heavily Catholic states of Latin America to the concept. 51 2005 World Summit Outcome, UNGA Res. 60/1, 16 September 2005, paragraphs 138-139. 52 See Alex J. Bellamy, Global Politics and the Responsibility to Protect: From Words to Deeds (New York: Routledge, 2011), p. 28, Jennifer M. Welsh, Implementing the Responsibility to Protect: Where Expectations Meet Reality, Ethics & International Affairs, 24/4, 415-430 (2010), p. 425.

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Implementation Report that would sow the seeds of true engagement with R2P. The most important contribution was the narrow but deep approach, specifically the division of the concept into three pillars allowing for disaggregation of issues surrounding the use of force from other aspects more inherently compatible with Brazils foreign policy framework. The narrow limitation of R2Ps application to the four crimes of genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity assuaged concerns with regard to possible unilateral abuses. The deepening across three pillars, created room for participation in a debate broader than that on only the use of force, opening the door for several previous detractors.53 The first pillar (strengthening state capacity) in particular resonated with many Southern states, including Brazil and its Latin American neighbours. Having long insisted on the primacy of the state in carrying out its obligations towards its own citizens as a corollary to non-intervention, they were receptive to the reiteration of this aspect of R2P, which had been geared specifically to them. This was underscored by the efforts of several proponents of R2P such as Edward Luck, who underscored the notion that in seeking the cause of a putative failure on the part of a given state, the cause should be sought in the shortcomings of state capacity, not will. ICISS Research Director Thomas Weiss succinctly presented R2P precisely as an alternative to what these states feared:For those who chart changes in international discourse, the evolution toward reinforcing state capacity is key. This is not nostalgia for the repressive national security state of the past, but recognition, even among committed advocates of human rights and robust intervention, that state authority is elementary to enduring peace and reconciliation. The remedy thus is not to rely on international trusteeships and transnational NGOs, but rather to fortify, reconstitute, or build viable states from failed, collapsed, or weak ones.54

Secretary General Ban Ki-moon was even more explicitly political on this point, giving in a speech held prior to publication of the Implementation Report the underpinnings of its characterization of R2P as an ally of sovereignty:[R2P] is built on a more positive and affirmative concept of sovereignty as responsibility. Some contend that RtoP is a Western or Northern invention,53 United Nations, Secretary General [UNSG], Implementing the Responsibility to Protect, UNGA Res. 63/677, 12 January 2009, paragraphs 10b, 11. 54 Thomas G. Weiss, The Sunset of Humanitarian Intervention? The Responsibility to Protect in a Unipolar Era, Security Dialogue, 35/2: 135-53 (2004), p. 138.


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being imposed on the global South. Nothing could be further from the truth. Equally incorrect is the assumption that the responsibility to protect is in contradiction to sovereignty. Properly understood, RtoP is an ally of sovereignty, not an adversary. Strong States protect their people, while weak ones are either unwilling or unable to do so. Protection was one of the core purposes of the formation of States and the Westphalian system. By helping States meet one of their core responsibilities, R2P seeks to strengthen sovereignty, not weaken it.55

Such language is intended to resonate with the states of the Southern Hemisphere, whose receptiveness to ICISS premeditated linguistic shift to a language of responsibility from that of a droit dingrence is dampened by their experience of having precisely such language used as a justification for intervention upon them by the United States and other powers in the past.56 Alongside this direct attempt to engage the more reactionary-protective view of sovereignty common in the global South and in Brazil, another element that clearly increases R2Ps palatability in Brazil is the international assistance and capacity-building pillar. A developmental orientation has long been another defining facet of Brazilian domestic and foreign policy, and this aspect of R2P plays to Brazilian strengths particularly in the context of peace operations, as will be shown below. Alongside its contribution to rendering the concept implementable, the very fact of the endorsement of the document, and its support for R2P, by the worlds heads of state was a fact of no little portent for a state with Brazils Grotian proclivities. Emerging Power Growing Pains Brazils ensuing policy towards intervention and R2P can be framed in terms of a dilemma typical of an emerging power: the clash between regional norms that have until recently been adequate to the countrys previous focus, and the attitudes inherent to a position of greater influence at the international level. The succinct expression of this tension is that it relates to a shift in self-identification from a weak peripheral power (in need of the protection of sovereignty as shield) to a global stakeholder55 United Nations, Department of Public Information. Secretary-General defends, clarifies Responsibility to Protect at Berlin Event on Responsible Sovereignty: International Cooperation for a Changed World. UN Document SG/SM/11701. Available from http://www .un.org/News/Press/docs/2008/sgsm11701.doc.htm. Accessed 15 May 2009. 56 Cabranes, Human Rights and Non-Intervention in the Inter-American System, p. 1163.

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prepared to take responsibility for the international system and (particularly in the case of potential Security Council members) for those in it who cannot fend for themselves. This shift is that from reflexively viewing oneself as the potential target of an R2P intervention to weighing the merits of ones own participation. Key elements of Brazils foreign conduct in this period fit the emerging power label quite well. These are essentially states that have recently grown into middle power status. According to the behavioural approach to the study of traditional middle powers, as a result of their position in the international system these states tend to pursue foreign policies based on negotiation and compromise; strong support for international order, in the form of multilateral institutions, and good international citizenship.57 Emerging powers are known to have a more ambiguous, instrumental relationship to international institutions; Jennifer Welsh has pithily termed this a lovehate relationship.58 Both types of middle powers are conflict-averse and tend to favour normative approaches over power politics. These states further tend to pursue what in the Canadian context has been termed the functionalist principle: the pursuit of diplomatic niches, specialised areas in which this category of states can punch above its weight. Typically, emerging powers will both participate in strengthening the mechanisms of multilateral governance when it is advantageous while simultaneously seeking their reform. This creates a strong emphasis on being on the inside of the deliberative process. They are, often as regional powerhouses, simultaneously central leaders and peripheral followers in the international system59, though clearly set on attaining the former function exclusively. This brief summary reveals several aspects in which Brazils stance towards R2P, as an example of a norm advancing through a multilateral institution, is typical of an emerging power, and how pressures typical ofThis analysis is based on Andrew F. Cooper, Niche Diplomacy: A Conceptual Overview, in Andrew F. Cooper, Richard A. Higgott and Kim Richard Nossal (eds.), Relocating Middle Powers: Australia and Canada in a Changing World Order (Vancouver: UBC Press: 1993) and Robert W. Cox, Middlepowermanship, Japan, and Future World Order, International Journal, 44/4, pp. 823-862 (1989). On the behavioural approach see Adam Chapnick, The Middle Power, Canadian Foreign Policy, 7/2, pp. 73-82 (1999), esp. p. 76. 58 Welsh, Implementing the Responsibility to Protect, p. 428. 59 Stefan A. Schirm, Leaders in Need of Followers: Emerging Powers in Global Governance, European Journal of International Relations, 16/2: 197221 (2010).57


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that status influenced Brazilian stances on R2P. The pressure is primarily external: the advance of R2P within the UN, and its increasing endorsement both by other emerging powers60, Southern states, and Brazils regional neighbours61, placed considerable incentive on the country to joint the debate in order not to preclude a normative leadership role. This is particularly true due to the normative nature of the R2P debate: as one Brazilian scholar has pointed out, Brazil wants to make, as well as follow, international norms.62 There was a strong desire to avoid the appearance of followership in the debates over intervention. Further, this debate is a clear example of a situation in which Brazil originally had intended not to engage with a normative debate it later joined in order to avail itself of the possibility to shape the outcome through participation. In part as a result, alongside its engagement with R2P, Brazils representatives began to increase their public endorsement of the principle of non-indifference, which links Southern (in this case, African) origins with a concern for human rights without necessary recourse to the use of force. 63 Furthermore, with respect to the countrys relationship to intervention norms and international institutions, during Lulas second term

With the notable exception of India. Argentina, Chile, Mexico, Panama and Peru all showed support for the concept during the 2009 debates in the General Assembly, while Brazil remained uncommitted. The shift toward South American states acceptance of the concept appears to have played a particularly significantrole, due to the possibility of a loss of regional leadership. On the beginnings of this shift, see Mnica Serrano, Latin America: the Dilemmas of Intervention, in Albrecht Schnabel and Ramesh Thakur (eds.), Kosovo and the Challenge of Humanitarian Intervention: Selective Indignation, Collective Action, and International Citizenship (New York: United Nations University Press, 2000), pp. 223-244. 62 The Economist. Brazil and Peacekeeping: Policy, Not Altruism, 23 September 2010, http://www.economist.com/node/17095626. 63 One of the major proponents of this concept is Ricardo Seitenfus, who until his removal in December 2010 as a response to his strong criticism of MINUSTAH was the OAS Representative in Haiti. See, for example, Seitenfus, Ricardo Antnio da Silva, Cristine Koehler Zanella and Pmela Marconatto Marques. O Direito Internacional repensado em tempos de ausncias e emergncias: a busca de uma traduo para o princpio da noindiferena [Rethinking International Law in times of absences and emergencies: in search of a translation for the principle of non-indifference]. Revista Brasileira de Poltica Internacional, 50/2 (1997) Available from http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0034 -73292007000200002 Accessed 28 February 2011. On the African origins of the concept, see Paul D. Williams, From Non-Intervention to Non-Indiffernece: The Origins and Development of the African Unions Security Culture, African Affairs, 106/423: 251-279 (2007).60 61

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(2007-2010), the country began seeking to parlay its perceived strengths onto the global stage. In doing so, it became clear that for the Lula government, the rewards of greater global clout outweighed the cost of a certain distancing from historical, regional traditions. This was made explicit in three separate instances which represent a break with Itamaratys previous normative acquis, or at least with its accepted implementation: Brazils involvement in the Honduran constitutional crisis of 2009; its attempts to avoid, through the mediation of a separate accord, the ramping-up of sanctions against the Iranian nuclear programme; and its decisive participation in MINUSTAH, the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti. While in practice, a nascent policy shift with regard to intervention particularly a broadening of horizon to the global level and a contemplation of the implications of assuming global responsibility was underway, in what appeared to have all the signs of a pause for internal reflection, after the release of the Implementation Report Brazil refrained markedly from any pronouncements on R2P for a period of several years. Rapprochement: Everything But the Pointy End of the Stick After this brief hiatus, official Brazilian statements, without ceding an inch with regard to the use of force, began to show signs of an increased willingness to engage in the R2P debate. Itamaraty diplomats began haltingly to adopt certain of R2Ps premises. For example, one indicator of decreased resistance to the concept has been the reflection in government statements of the idea that R2P is in fact not a refashioning of sovereignty, but rather a political call to hold states to obligations already inherent in the principle itself. Indeed, by 2010 the overlap between this realization and Brazils priorities as a reformist emerging power were made clear:As my delegation highlighted last year, the responsibility to protect is not a new principle, much less a novel legal prescription. Rather, it is a powerful political call for all States to abide by legal obligations already set forth in the Charter, in relevant human rights conventions and international humanitarian law and other instruments. As envisaged in 2005, it is a means to address, in a coordinated fashion, the four crimes, namely genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. The Organization has already at its disposal tools that can be used to pursue the goals and purposes of the United Nations. The core issue is that some of those tools may need further improvement, including an outdated structure which does not conform to the current state of world affairs. In that sense, a


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thorough reform should be implemented in order for the Organization to realize its objectives.64

The first step of recognizing R2P emphasis on state capacity was followed by a marked given previous concerns opening towards the idea of sovereignty as responsibility. During the July 2009 General Assembly Debate on R2P, the statement of Brazils Permanent Representative, Maria Luiza Ribeiro Viotti, highlighted the notions compatibility with the Latin American concern that primary responsibility for carrying out that responsibility rest with individual states:recognizing that the States responsibility to protect does not qualify State sovereignty. Paragraph 138 is clear in that such responsibility is taken up by States individually. On the other hand, the attribute of sovereignty does not exempt the State from its obligation to protect its population. On the contrary, it is from this very attribute that derives such obligation.65

Viotti avails herself of the conceptual breathing room given in the Implementation Report specifically the division of R2P into pillars in order to chart avenues for R2P as a mechanism adequate for Brazilian orientations. Viotti clearly situates Brazil as supportive of the development-oriented aspects of R2P, while predictably shying away from approximation to elements related to the use of force:The third pillar is subsidiary to the first one and a truly exceptional course of action, or a measure of last resort. With regard to the second pillar, it is complementary to the first one, that is a means to assist the efforts of the State to fulfill an obligation that is primarily its own. Among the two pillars directly related to the international community, the one regarding assistance and capacity-building must certainly concentrate our attention and energy. Brazil attaches particular importance to the aspect of prevention, as we have already stated in several other fora, such as the Security Council and the Peacebuilding Commission.66

Brazil, Permanent Mission to the United Nations, Early warning, assessment and the responsibility to protect, Statement by H.E. Ambassador Regina Maria Cordeiro Dunlop, Deputy Permanent Representative of Brazil to the United Nations, 9 August 2010, http://www.un.int/ brazil/speech/10d-rcd-plenary-r2p-0908.html, accessed 28 February 2011. 65 Brazil, Permanent Mission to the United Nations, Remarks by H.E. Ambassador Maria Luiza Ribeiro Viotti,Permanent Representative of Brazil to the United Nations to the Plenary meeting of the General Assemblyon the responsibility to protect, 23 July 2009, http://www .un.int/brazil/speech/10d-mlrv-informal-interactive-dialogue-on-the-responsability-to -protect.html, accessed 28 February 2011, pp. 2-3. 66 Ibid., pp. 3-4.64

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Underscoring this point, Brazils chief UN diplomat highlights both her countrys extant priorities, and R2Ps compatibility with them, reminding the Assembly thatBrazil advocates the concept of non-indifference as a way of emphasizing the responsibility of the international community when faced with humanitarian disasters and crises, including those resulting from hunger, poverty and epidemics. These are humanitarian catastrophes that can be prevented or mitigated through political will and short, medium and long-term cooperation. This requires that developed States fulfill their development-related obligations, as agreed in Monterrey and in the Doha review conferences. Non-indifference also calls for enhanced South-South cooperation and innovative financing mechanisms, which complement traditional sources of financing for development. Brazil seeks to implement this approach in its South-South activities.67

Viotti underscores this vision a year later, in a statement revealing shades of alignment with the R2P concepts own subordination of military options to preventive and developmental ones:On the other hand, a mission that protects civilians under imminent threat, but makes no progress in helping address the underlying causes of the conflict or in peacebuilding tasks will not lead to a sustainable peace. Helping States onto the path of peace, stability and development is, ultimately, the best way for the United Nations to contribute to the long-term protection of civilians.68

Brazilian diplomats have begun to reveal their habitual sophistication in dealing with R2P. Former UN Permanent Representative Gelson Fonseca, in a 2010 introductory chapter on the principle, takes pains to outline the concepts contours (importantly also pointing out what it is not), gives its normative and legal bases, and outlines the Brazilian position. In doing so, he uses specific examples of both the concepts application and of Brazilian priorities in the countrys engagement with it. The article goes a long way towards responding to primal fears of R2P and capacitating readers to engage fully with the notion.69 In essence, Fonseca denies R2P status as aIbid., 23 July 2009, pp. 4-5. Brazil. Permanent Mission to the United Nations. Statement by H.E. Ambassador Maria Luiza Ribeiro Viotti, Permanent Representative of Brazil to the United Nations, at the Open debate of the Security Council on "Protection of civilians in armed conflict, 7 July 2010, http:// www.responsibilitytoprotect.org/Brazil%2520-%2520Ninth%2520Open%2520Debate %2520on%2520the%2520Protection%2520of%2520Civilains%2520in%2520Armed %2520Conflict.pdf, accessed 28 February 2011, p. 3. 69 Gelson Fonseca Jnior, Dever de proteger ou nova forma de intervencionismo?, in Nelson A. Jobim, Srgio W. Etchegoyen and Joo Paulo Alsina (eds.), Segurana Internacional: Perspectivas Brasileiras (Rio de Janeiro: FGV, 2010).67 68


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norm, interpreting it rather as a tool for the orientation of political decisions concerning intervention:In this sense R2P can be understood as an instrument to assist in complying with the norms fixed in the treaties that define its basic points of reference It becomes a political reality in that it becomes an argument to which recourse is possible in specific situations that resemble what it describes. It reinforces the position of those who wish to combat the violation of human rights in extreme situations, such as genocide, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. A standard of behavior is a part of the world of values, a path to be followed. If and when R2P will effectively be used is an open question and depends on political choices. Thus, one of the essential questions will be whether the advances in defining the conceptual contours of R2P will eliminate, attenuate or, on the contrary reinforce the possibility that it could transform itself into o cover for interventionist actions with non-humanitarian objectives.70

Fonseca raises several points fundamental to grasping the reaction to R2P inside the Brazilian diplomatic establishment. As stated in official positions above, it is viewed not as a rule in itself, but as a political benchmark, and its ability to restrict unilateral interventions is questioned. However, in a crucial move that seems directly addressed towards a misunderstanding of the concept common in Brazil, Fonseca hails R2Ps acceptance as a strengthening the multilateral form while underscoring a key point the primacy of original state responsibility over international response:One of the advantages of the concepts consecration by the General Assembly is that more objective references come into being, concerning both the limits of what are, as well as how to resolve humanitarian tragedies. The manner of interpreting the text of the Declaration renders clear that initial responsibility for combatting crimes lies with states, that the first function of the international community is to use instruments of assistance, and that the use of Chapter VII is only justified in the last instance, when unilateral solutions lose legitimacy. There is insistence that the parameter of legitimacy not impede unilateral acts, but [R2P] permits that they become the object of a more clear political judgement. The multilateral acceptance of the concept diminishes the force of those who seeks to interpret it unilaterally. They lose legitimacy and it is easier to criticize them.71

In describing the Brazilian position on R2P during the 2009 debate, Fonseca importantly takes up the often overlooked elements of R2Ps relationship to sovereignty and its basis in extant legal provisions:70 71

Ibid., p. 177. Ibid., p. 187.

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K.M. Kenkel / Global Responsibility to Protect 4 (2012) 532 In various ways, Brazils attitude is close to what I previously termed cautious. The idea of R2P is accepted, and interpreted not as a norm, but as a political appeal for the respect of human rights. Another preoccupation is to situate R2P, which is not a qualification of sovereignty and, at the same time, should not oppose in Manichean form those who are sympathetic to human rights and those who are not. R2P is one more element in the fight for human rights. It ratifies tendencies and is not properly a novelty. To condemn those responsible for the genocide in Rwanda, it is not necessary to use R2P. Finally, the Brazilian position insists on the idea of non-indifference and the importance of preventive measures which attack the deeper causes of [conflict] while underscoring that the recourse to force must only occur in the last instance. The Brazilian position emphasizes, then, what the Secretary-General has termed the first and second pillars of R2P: primary state responsibility and the development of cooperation measures to help in prevention, which should not be diminished in relation to the third pillar (action by the international community, including force). It also insists that the concept not be enlarged.72

The latest Brazilian prise de position on R2P continues in this vein, haltingly endorsing the concept (or perhaps admitting the inevitability of its remaining a part of UN parlance) while decisively standing against the use of force in its implementation. Released on 9 November 2011 and centred on an elegant turn of phrase in Portuguese wrought by President Dilma Rousseff before the General Assembly, the concept note Responsibility while protecting73 acknowledges the necessity of protecting civilians in armed conflicts, as well as other elements of the R2P agenda, but focuses primarily on the need for the utmost restraint in the use of force in doing so. Clearly influenced by Brazilian discontent at the form taken by the operationalization of R2P by NATO in Libya, the papers main points centre on the implementation of the concept rather that its basic tenets. The paper reiterates basic limits on the implementation of R2P present since 2001 such as the exhaustion of diplomatic means and Security Council authorization and admonishes the international community to a strict reading of these and to greater reluctance in using force to pursue the protection of civilians. At its core, the paper illustrates the tensions in Brazils position, accepting the widely endorsed conceptual premises of R2P while beset by fundamental distrust regarding their potential abuse when implemented by Western powers. While the depth and breadth of itsIbid., p. 191. Brazil, Permanent Mission to the United Nations, Responsibility while protecting: elements for the development and promotion of a concept, 9 November 2011, accessed 24 November 2011, http://vascopresscom.blogspot.com/2011/11/brazilian-ambassador-to -un-addresses.html.72 73


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echo remains to be seen, the note, whose authors tellingly hail from a younger generation within Itamaraty, is a crucial step forward in Brazils increasing engagement in the normative conversation about R2P as well as the burgeoning debate surrounding its implementation. Acta, Non Verba: Intervention and the Use of Force in MINUSTAH The post-2005 rhetorical rapprochement was, as is not infrequently the case in Brazil, preceded by practice. Whereas the use of force has consistently been rejected rhetorically by Brazilian representatives in New York, in Haiti the situation was rather different. As mentioned, prior to MINUSTAHs inauguration in 2004 Brazils participation in peacekeeping had been strictly subordinated to the limitations of Chapter VI. Contributions, with a few exceptions, were small but constant. MINUSTAH would change this. The initial contingent consisted of approximately 1,200 troops; this was nearly doubled with the sending of a second, purely humanitarian, armed battalion immediately following the devastating January 2011 earthquake. In addition, unlike other UN PKOs where nationalities vary, the military Force Commander has always been a Brazilian general, who exercises command over troops whose majority are from Latin American countries. The character of MINUSTAHs mandate is clearly that of peace enforcement, and it is authorized under Chapter VII.74 Prominent participation in such a mission is a clear rupture with previous peacekeeping policy, though aligned with the countrys quest for global profile. Despite efforts to avoid the appearance of such a break by the Foreign Ministry75, there is no doubt about its robust nature among those familiar with the actual implementation of the mandate on the ground.76 Indeed, without qualifying Haiti unduly as an R2P case, there is a growing recognition that empirically it is the type of intervention called for by the responsibility to react and the second pillar of the narrow but deep approach. In keeping with the normative tension inherent to emerging power status, this level of use of force has been taken in stride by those who support

S/RES/1542. See Diniz, Brazil, pp. 945. 76 See, for example, Carlos Chagas Vianna Braga, MINUSTAH and the Security Environment in Haiti: Brazil and South American Cooperation in the Field, International Peacekeeping, 17/5, pp. 711-722 (2010).74 75

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Brazils claim to greater international influence. According to Brazilian analyst Monica Herz, Brazils elite thinks peacekeeping is part of the price you have to pay to be among the nations who make the rules.77 In part, acceptance of using higher levels of force is eased by the fact that it is integrated into a much broader, comprehensive effort in Haiti that is aligned with Brazils larger goals of regional leadership, South-South cooperation and a development-oriented approach to peacebuilding.78 Not only is it clear from the countrys statements on R2P at the UN that there is strong overlap between the non-coercive elements of R2P and Brazilian foreign policy, but in the Haitian context, the South American hegemon is already engaged in activities very similar in nature to R2P. Conclusions: Brazils Role in the R2P Conversation In terms of its relevance to Brazilian interests, the countrys opening to R2P, however cautious, is an indicator that it has begun to set long-term goals clearly situated at the global rather than the regional level. Were the continental giant to retain its previous policy objectives, the relevance of R2P to its objectives would be academic at best (currently there are no foreseeable R2P cases in South America under the narrow but deep approach), meriting not even the hostility with which it was greeted initially. However, Brazil has embarked upon a self-conscious and enthusiastic quest for more influence at the global level in particular, a permanent seat on the UN Security Council and has chosen peace operations as a primary locus of that striving. This is due in part to a realization that with the added power the country craves comes a commensurately larger share of global responsibility. Brazil has shown signs that it is willing to take on that responsibility, to the extent dictated by its capacities as a developing country. But it is precisely as a Southern, postcolonial state that it will do so. As a result, its increasing presence among the major international political actors raises the question of how to define international responsibility (for Brazil, the emphasis will be on responsibility as a criterion for Security Council membership). The R2P debate is one of the primary loci in which this is done, and Brazil is in the process of becoming a crucial contributor to that conversation. Brazil will exercise responsibility, but it will do so in a form thatEconomist, Brazil and Peacekeeping. See Kai Michael Kenkel, South Americas Emerging Power: Brazil as Peacekeeper, International Peacekeeping, 17/5: 644-661 (2010).77 78


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differs in key ways from what Northern powers have come to identify with the term79. To begin with, as the countrys stance on R2P has shown, it does not share the interpretation that the use of force need be one of the primary components of international responsibility. Instead it has chosen to echo in its engagement with R2P its overarching predilection for negotiation and economic development, as well as a reliance on areas where it has been successful. These include domestic policies that address the root causes of structural violence, such as poverty reduction and agricultural innovation. As the global balance of power shifts increasingly in favour of the global South, the development focus will need to be taken up if R2P is to make headway80. Brazil has the opportunity to become a crucial articulator of a new form of conflict resolution and international responsibility. It has already had considerable success with a model for participation in peace operations in the limited context of the UNs ongoing Haitian intervention. In this sense, Brazilian policymakers have an incentive to believe that their drive for more influence will not suffer from the refusal to use more force; responsibility simply will increasingly be measured in other ways. For example, the countrys abstention in the Security Council vote authorizing the no-fly zone over Libya belies the fact that contrary to many Northern powers the country does not view the use of force as an inalienable element of the responsibility to assist in conflict resolution, believing instead that it can be exercised using pacific means81. In terms of R2P, this means that as Southern powers come on board the R2P debate (and grant the concept increased representative legitimacy), the contours of that debate will necessarily change; in keeping with the emerging division of labour in international interventions foreshadowed in the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations New Horizon Report, this may mean that while the robust use of force remains the preserve of Western powers, peacebuilding, developmental root causes and

79 For an indicative example of the Northern view, see Stewart Patrick, Irresponsible Stakeholders? The Difficulty of Integrating Rising Powers, Foreign Affairs, 89/6: 44-53 (2010). 80 See Bellamy, Global Politics and the Responsibility to Protect, pp. 93-121. 81 Brazils reluctance to endorse S/RES/1973 stemmed from qualms about the openness of the Resolutions language, which was seen as insufficiently limiting the world bodys endorsement of the use of force by coalition forces. Alongside a lack of conviction that diplomatic means had been exhausted, there was a perception that military force alone, and in the form proposed, would not lead to meaningful progress in resolving the human rights situation on the ground.

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preventive aspects might be taken on by an increasing number of Southern contributors to the process. Given Brazils increasing leadership role among states of the global South, and its explicit support for a normative component to that role, now that it has engaged with R2P the country should be included as a key partner in the concepts further development and propagation. Brazil can make decisive contributions both to shaping the concept into a precept attractive to Southern states, and consequently to its formal acceptance by these states in UN fora. Its diplomats possess the skill and will to bring to the concepts future crafting elements that promise to attenuate what some see as the waft of neo-colonialism. The countrys position as a voice for Latin America, emerging powers and the global South make it a powerful ally in taking such a new concept to informed discussion. The key to engaging Brazil on R2P is offering space in the debate for addressing its main concerns. It has neither the means nor the inclination to implement R2P through the use of armed force, and this is not the appropriate area for its contribution. Its foci are those of the global South: the strengthening of state capacity as the ineluctable first step in R2P action; safeguarding its substantive participation in operationalization, particularly with regard to its own strengths in the prevention and especially the rebuilding pillar; and dealing effectively with the threat of misappropriation of R2Ps normative pull by false friends arming for unilateral interventions. If this is done, both Brazil and R2Ps advocates will benefit from the inclusion of a rising power with the sophistication to shape decisively this important concept for the better, and the credibility and clout to add significantly to its proponents.

Brazil and R2P

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