Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is paying a state visit to China from Saturday to Wednesday, during which he will attend the fourth ministerial meeting of the China-CELAC (Community of Latin American and Caribbean States) Forum in Beijing. At present, unilateralism and protectionism are clearly on the rise, and the international order is facing serious challenges. This situation requires further cooperation between China and Brazil, both influential developing nations. In a recent interview with Global Times (GT) reporter Xia Wenxin, Elias Khalil Jabbour (Jabbour), an associate professor at the School of Economics of Brazil's Rio de Janeiro State University, shared his views on topics including China-Brazil ties, China's economic development and BRICS cooperation amid US tariffs.
GT: What are your expectations for President Lula's visit? What do you think is the significance of China's deepening ties with Brazil and Latin America in the current global landscape?
Jabbour: My expectations are high, as there is a radical change in the international landscape that requires Brazil to make more assertive decisions. In fact, within the Lula government, the illusion that Brazil can "balance" between the poles centered around the US, Europe and China is fading, and it is becoming clear that Brazil's future is increasingly tied to the level of political and productive engagement between my country and China. This is the main point I can observe, especially with the acceleration of negotiations for industrial and infrastructure projects between the two countries.
Greater alignment with China is fundamental to Brazil's destiny. I have been saying in Brazil, and this also applies to Latin America, that our future as sovereign countries and as a sovereign region depends on what I call "total productive integration" with China. This means that Brazil and Latin America must see China not merely as an export market for commodities, but as a real opportunity for industrialization, reindustrialization and the consolidation of what I call our "second independence."
GT: Last year marked the 50th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Brazil. During his visit to Brazil in November, Chinese President Xi Jinping mentioned the need for the two countries to usher in the next "Golden 50 Years." What do you see as potential "golden areas" for further development of China-Brazil relations?
Jabbour: There are several areas. I believe we should focus on what is fundamental for Brazil, which includes heavy investments in infrastructure, reconstruction of our land connections, hundreds of kilometers of railways, highways, ports, airports and also partnerships to rebuild our industrial production base. Key sectors like artificial intelligence (AI), defense and green industries are also potential "golden areas." Brazil needs China to reindustrialize, and China needs Brazil as a base for exporting its productive capacity.
GT: We are seeing the abuse of tariff policies from Washington. Even though the 10 percent "reciprocal tariff" on Brazilian products is currently being halted for 90 days, Brazil has already become a victim of US tariffs, as steel, one of Brazil's key exports to the US, has been subject to a 25 percent tariff since March. What do you think of this series of tariffs from the US?
Jabbour: We must take a broader view, not focused only on the tariffs themselves, but on the response the US is trying to give to its own decline. I have argued that US leadership is no longer possible in a world based on rules, institutions and true democracy in international relations. Faced with this, systemic chaos becomes the only way to maintain its hegemony. It's not about Democrats versus Republicans - it's about how the US views its own decline.
On the other hand, the US tries to find external scapegoats for the fact that the richest country in the world has produced an increasingly morally bankrupt society, deindustrialized, with a growing homeless population, and many people using drugs openly in public. The US elite has been robbing its own people since the Reagan administration, and the tariffs are just another way to blame an external agent and continue punishing the American people.
GT: Against the backdrop of US abuse of tariffs, how do you see the overall development of China's economy this year? And what is your take on China's role amid all these challenges to global economic development?
Jabbour: Over the past 45 years, China has built a series of institutional, productive and financial mechanisms that provide the country with great resilience amid the storms of the international economy. Meanwhile, a key advantage of China is its socialist system and its ability to focus on large projects and major tasks, in addition to having public ownership of strategic means of production and a financial system under state control. China is not merely a copy of the East Asian developmental states.
China's economy, fully focused on building goods and services and integrating disruptive technological innovations such as 5G, AI and big data into its planning system, ensures the country has immense capacity to anticipate and resolve contradictions in its development process. China's dynamics is something we must study deeply - not only to understand its advantages, but also the potential and superiority of socialism over capitalism in our historical era.
As for its role, China, with its immense internal market, the political responsibility of its leadership toward the world and its investment capacity across the globe, has become the major source of stability and predictability in a world increasingly marked by chaos.
GT: The 17th BRICS Summit will be held on July 6 and 7 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. At the recent meeting of BRICS foreign ministers, the ministers reached a consensus on opposing the global "tariff war" and trade protectionism. What do you think of such a consensus? What role can the BRICS mechanism play in opposing trade protectionism?
Jabbour: The BRICS mechanism can play a fundamental role in accelerating productive, financial, trade and investment integration among its member countries and the Global South as a whole. One of the great trends of our time is the transformation of the Global South into a major regional market. We must seize and deepen two facts: The Global South already produces more wealth than the Global North, and its trade flow between member countries is also greater than the trade flow between the Global South and the Global North.
This article first appeared in the Global Times:
https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202505/1333872.shtml
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