Diplomacia à prova de choque: as relações com países exportadores de petróleo e a busca pela segurança energética na política externa brasileira durante os governos Geisel e Figueiredo (1974-1985)

Abstract

In the 1970s, two international shocks arising from geopolitical conflicts in the Middle East triggered a large raise in oil prices. Several countries, and particularly those who imported oil, had to adjust their foreign policies in order to deal with these shocks. In this situation was Brazil, who had a high demand for oil because of the ongoing accelerated economic growth process. In this dissertation, our aim is to identify the reactions in Brazilian foreign policy before these international shocks, through a comparative analysis of the relations between Brazil and the oil-exporting countries during the Ernesto Geisel (1974-1979) and João Figueiredo (1979-1985) administrations. Our hypothesis is that while the guarantee of energy security was still a main goal during the period, the two administrations played out different approaches regarding the subject, most importantly in the individual level of analysis. The process tracing methodology was used in this research, along with the inquiry of primary sources within ministers Azeredo da Silveira and Saraiva Guerreiro’s archives at the Centro de Documentação e Pesquisa de História Contemporânea do Brasil, located at Fundação Getúlio Vargas (CPDOC/FGV). Our analysis indicates that both governments addressed the energy crises differently. While Geisel undertook an initiative of rapprochment in direction of the traditional Brazilian partners in oil trade such as the Arab countries, in the Figueiredo years we can verify a trend towards diversification of oil suppliers, in which Brazil turned its attention to other regions such as Latin America. For that matter, we can identify a strategy change (or program change) in Brazilian foreign policy regarding the question, which was triggered by external shocks and a domestic reestructuring process, as put forward by Hermann (1990).