FROM GEOPOLITICS TO GEOECONOMICS

In the military regime, General Golbery, almighty intellectual of the dictatorship, taught the generations of the time that geopolitics is the mother of all strategic thinking and the actions that Brazil must follow in its future. That is, through military actions we must not only protect geographical spaces but also ports, seas and airs, physical borders and have a significant regional influence. That's why our rivalry with Argentina was important, as was our energy alliance with Paraguay, that is, Itaipu, was fundamental.

Thirty-something years ago, a new theory appeared, whose main authors are the French Jacques Atalli and the American Lutwak, who said that it is not the doctrine of military conquest that will dominate, but that the rivalry between countries will be determined by rivalry in the economy, markets and technology. And the theory became a practice that culminated in the new government of the United States and its policy. In other words, nothing new, only we are late in understanding that the world has changed radically. A chip manufacturing company, Nividia, known only to experts a few years ago, is worth four trillion dollars and is the most valuable company in the world. But its great value does not lie in the financial, but in its products and services, which determine the development of artificial intelligence, the latest technological frontier.

In this scenario, where competition between the United States and China determines the course of the world economy, we must understand that the movements of either of the two rivals affect us much more than we want to perceive. See the example of the introduction of 5 G technology in Brazil, where we open the doors to the Chinese company Huawei, to the detriment of our security and technological alliances with Western companies. In the tariff war it is an illusion to think that the eventual understanding, competitive but of interest of the two countries, between China and the USA, Brazil comes out unharmed. In other words, US farmers will return to supply soybeans, meat and wheat to China, to the detriment of Brazilian suppliers. Or that the US will not pressure the EU so that the agreement with Mercosur, with the help of Argentina, goes slower, so that Brazil has fewer alternatives for its exports and technological alliances.

Brazil, on the other hand, is extraordinarily well positioned for an economy of the past, but only as a supplier of commodities and raw materials without a technological aggregate, and the reduction of the cost of the state and the miserable infrastructure, is approaching the Dutch phenomenon, that is, it became rich with raw materials, but spent money instead of investing in its more sustainable development. Brazil is in a future without a future.