Policy Circulation and South–South Cooperation in Brazil–Africa Relations: Rise, Fall and Change

Abstract

AbstractThis chapter focuses on Brazilian South–South Cooperation (SSC) as a vector for policy transfer and circulation between Brazil and Africa. It argues that during the first decades of the new century, Brazilian policies in the fields of agriculture, health and social protection have travelled to Africa through SSC, embedded in a broader circulation of development-related policy knowledge and technology from Brazil to the developing world. This resulted from strong state activism and the mobilisation of policy-winning coalitions. This circulation has been deeply connected to the attractiveness of Brazilian policy solutions to actors outside Brazil (international organisations and partner governments) and their eagerness to learn from Brazilian experiences. The circulation has also been shaped by Brazil’s authority and capacity to inspire and share. Engaging with questions of policy change and the time factor in policy travel, the chapter further argues that the simultaneous contraction in Brazilian state activism in SSC, since the mid-2010s, and the persistent efforts to consolidate SSC as a policy field in Brazil, have implications on the ways the policy travels through development cooperation and affects the politics of Brazilian policy diffusion in Africa. In particular, it posits the importance of a new set of dynamics, namely: (i) Brazilian flagship public actors and institutions resistant to policy sharing; (ii) ‘trilateralisation’ of the Brazilian SSC and policy circulation through United Nations agencies and (iii) the increased focus on hands-on technical SSC exchanges to pilot Brazilian policy solutions, instruments and programmes in Africa.