The Brazilian Institute of Applied Economic Research (IPEA) is calling for article submissions for the 31st issue of its Tempo do Mundo Magazine, to be released in April 2023. Submissions should be made under the overarching theme of “South-South Cooperation for Post-Pandemic Development: Challenges and Opportunities for Brazil and the World,” between 1 December 2022 and 31 January 2023.
Background
Due to the multidimensional crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, which aggravated the concentration of income on a global scale and brought new challenges to different international actors, the 2019-2020 biennium can be considered a turning point in international cooperation. Such changes are inevitably reflected in the operationalization of South-South development cooperation . In Brazil, for example, the COBRADI 2019-2020 Report produced by IPEA recorded a 43% drop in Brazilian spending on this activity.
South-South development cooperation has a rich history in post-World War II International Relations. Initially guided by a vision of development based on inequality in relations between countries of the North and South, cooperation practices soon experienced profound changes from the rapprochement between countries that had just acquired their independence and those that contested the current international order.
During the bipolar order, the political mobilization of the so-called “Third World” led to what today corresponds to the “Global South”. Although initiatives such as the Colombo Plan (1950) have historical precedence, the Bandung Conference (1955) established the pillars for building differentiated political relations between countries of the South. After the formalization of the Non-Aligned Movement as an international political bloc in 1961, the countries of the Global South proposed a differentiated vision of the international financial and commercial system, leading to the creation of the Group of 77 (G77) in 1964 and the accession of China . Subsequently, a vision of the New International Economic Order was adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1974 (A/RES/S-6/3201).
With economic difficulties and setbacks in the development agenda in most countries of the Global South, the second phase of the South-South development cooperation in the 1980s was marked by a slower process of advancement in the political and economic agenda. The eighth round of negotiations within the scope of the World Trade Organization (Uruguay Round) was one of the most expressive events of the period. The beginning of the 1990s was marked by the adoption of the concept of sustainable development and the holding of the Earth Summit, also known as the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, or Rio 92. However, in the same way, the 1990s The 1990s did not contribute in a substantive way to the advancement of most issues in CSSD, with the exception of the strong tendency towards the creation and consolidation of regional political-economic blocs,
The turn of the millennium and the restructuring of the United Nations System, however, brought considerable innovations to the global development agenda, marking the beginning of the third phase of the CSSD. If the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) helped to partially guide global efforts to finance and manage development projects, the favorable global economic context for the economies of developing countries allowed the CSSD to receive attention and energy once again. redoubled.
In its third phase, the CSSD was coupled by the countries of the South to a broader strategy of contesting the global economic-political order, promoting structures of representation in global forums traditionally dominated by countries of the North (eg G7), own financing structures of common projects (eg BRICS), in addition to various multilateral (eg IBSA) and regional (UNASUR) policy coordination forums and dialogue channels between regions of the Global South (eg Summit of South American countries and Arab countries , and South American countries and African countries).
International Cooperation for the Development of Brazil is traditionally one of the instruments of the country’s foreign policy, with the bilateral/trilateral South-South development cooperation being one of its aspects. Although always demonstrating central participation in South-South development cooperation initiatives and agendas, Brazil was one of the countries that actively invested in partnerships with countries of the global South as a strategy for international insertion and a way to influence international rules and norms. However, and even though the three dimensions of the CSSD experienced considerable progress during its third phase, Brazilian Technical Cooperation for Development (CTPD) with countries from the South showed considerable expansion, as captured in the reports concerning Brazilian Cooperation for International Development (COBRADI) prepared regularly by IPEA since 2010.policy network ) made up of public, private and civil society actors in Brazil.
In view of the advent of a new and ambitious global initiative embodied in the 2030 Agenda and materialized in the seventeen Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), expanding the previous agenda by including more emphatically themes such as science, technology and ocean protection, we discuss whether the CSSD would be entering a fourth phase. The post-2015 political context, however, is radically different from the beginning of the millennium, being marked by the rise of conservative governments in several developed and developing countries, as well as important reforms in the institutional architecture of cooperation, which can be attributed, largely extent, to China’s growing role in the international development agenda. Foreign policy orientation often collides with multilateral rules and practices in favor of short-term national interests and agendas, rekindling historical conflicts in stable regions (eg: War in Ukraine) and causing economic and financial crises that put dignified lives at risk of the peoples of the planet, on all continents. Add to this context the challenge of the pandemic caused by the SARS-CoV2 virus. The Pandemic represented both the greatest collective challenge faced by peoples since the Second World War and one of the greatest failures at the contemporary international political coordination level to guarantee justice and equity in access to medicines. War in Ukraine) and causing economic and financial crises that put at risk the dignified life of the peoples of the planet, on all continents. Add to this context the challenge of the pandemic caused by the SARS-CoV2 virus. The Pandemic represented both the greatest collective challenge faced by peoples since the Second World War and one of the greatest failures at the contemporary international political coordination level to guarantee justice and equity in access to medicines. War in Ukraine) and causing economic and financial crises that put at risk the dignified life of the peoples of the planet, on all continents. Add to this context the challenge of the pandemic caused by the SARS-CoV2 virus. The Pandemic represented both the greatest collective challenge faced by peoples since the Second World War and one of the greatest failures at the contemporary international political coordination level to guarantee justice and equity in access to medicines.
In this sense, the following questions are proposed:
- What is the role of South-South Development Cooperation in the face of the current challenges of the international political agenda?
- What are the main advances and setbacks?
- How could the institutional structures created in the third phase of the South-South Development Cooperation support the current political and economic coordination between countries of the South?
- How to create common metrics to quantify and evaluate the effects of Brazilian Technical Cooperation for Development among Southern countries?
- What is Brazil’s role in the current South-South Development Cooperation agenda?
- Which actors have been leading the South-South cooperation agenda?
- What reforms of architecture, agency, processes, etc. would be a priority for the interdisciplinary debate?
This issue of the Tempo do Mundo Magazine will be coordinated by professors Rafael T. Schleicher (IPEA and Fiocruz), Ana Flávia Barros-Platiau (UnB) and Iara Leite (UFSC). Articles submitted for the volume will be received from 1 December 1, 2022 to 31 January, 2023. The magazine’s edition is expected to be released in April 2023.
Originally posted by the Tempo do Mundo Magazine. To read the original article in Portuguese, please click here.