Lula’s multilateralist speech at COP27 should make the ‘anti-globalist’ right wing sick

Lula’s foreign policy is back – and with it, multilateralism in all its splendor, to the despair of the extreme right’s anti-globalist crowd.

In his speech at COP-27, president-elect Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) even defended a structure of “global governance” to deal with climate change, a multilateral forum whose power overlaps with countries.

“The world is in need of global governance, especially in the climate issue,” said Lula.

“That’s because the decisions [que a ONU e outros órgãos tomam], national states normally do not agree with them, businessmen do not accept them, deputies and senators do not vote and do not approve, so what we approve here becomes a pile of paper. We need a multilateral forum with decision-making power.”

It is an idea that should provoke horror in President Jair Bolsonaro (PL), who stated, in his first speech at the UN General Assembly, in 2019, that it was a “fallacy to say that the Amazon is a heritage of humanity”.

“We are not here to erase nationalities and sovereignties in the name of an abstract ‘global interest’. This is not the Global Interest Organization! It is the United Nations. So it must remain!”, Bolsonaro said.

In fact, all the ideas presented in Lula’s speech go against the Bolsonarist foreign policy of the last four years. Ernesto Araújo, Bolsonaro’s former chancellor, said that a “globalist project” was being carried out through “climate alarmism”.

In his speech, the president-elect revived themes dear to Itamaraty during the Lula-Celso Amorim administration: reform of the UN and the Security Council, cooperation with countries in Africa, greater integration of the country in Latin America, a world alliance against hunger .

Lula once again presented Brazil in a leadership position in the global South, representing poor countries in their demands with the rich.

He emphasized the need for the rich countries, which have contributed the most to pollutant emissions throughout history, to make the contributions promised to the poorest countries, the most impacted by climate change.

Lula also stressed the need for UN reform to reflect the rise of developing countries. “There is no explanation for the fact that only the winners of the Second World War are the ones who rule,” he said, referring to the veto power of the permanent members of the UN Security Council.

In Bolsonarist foreign policy, Brazil wanted to align itself with western white Christian countries, such as Hungary and Poland, and with the US in the Trump administration. The only multilateral institution that the government cultivated was the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development), which works as a kind of seal of quality in attracting investments.

Lula also asked for an ACTO (Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization) summit and a COP to be held in a state in the Brazilian Amazon, in 2025, in addition to requesting priority for climate change at the next G20 summit.

“We are back to help build a peaceful world order, based on dialogue, multilateralism and multipolarity”, said the president-elect.

Bolsonaro vetoed Brazil’s climate change conference four years ago, threatened to pull the country out of the UN Human Rights Council and was often uncomfortable and isolated at multilateral events.

Evidently, Lula emphasized Brazil’s sovereignty over the Amazon, as did Bolsonaro. “We are open to international climate cooperation, through investments and research, but always with Brazil’s leadership, without renouncing sovereignty,” said the president-elect.

But, unlike Bolsonaro, who blamed NGOs and riverside communities for the fires and deforestation and said there was an international conspiracy to steal riches from the Amazon, Lula has a more realistic view of the urgency and gravity of the problem.

Now all that remains is to show that practice will follow speech, and fulfill his promise that “the fight against climate change will have the highest profile in the structure of the next government”.