Brazilian foreign policy towards South America during the Lula administration: caught between South America and Mercosur

The aim of this article is to analyze Brazil's foreign policy towards the South American region during President Lula's administration. As such, the article intends to highlight two specific dimensions: the extent to which foreign policy during this period has differed from previous periods and the relative importance granted by Brazilian diplomacy to recent cooperation and integration efforts, more specifically the Unasur and Mercosur. The article argues that the Lula administration has behaved differently from its predecessors by prioritizing the building up of Brazilian leadership in South America on several different fronts, especially by strengthening multilateral institutions in the region

The new Africa and Brazil in the Lula era: the rebirth of Brazilian Atlantic Policy

In the post-Cold War world, Africa has been an important focus of Brazilian foreign policy. Having a significant historical weight in building our nation, African countries are also part of the moves adopted by Brazil's foreign policy. The main purpose of the present text is to show this relevant regional dimension regarding Brazil's international insertion during the Lula era. The work is divided in two parts: the first part approaches Africa's international insertion throughout recent years and the second analyses the dimension occupied by African affairs in Brazil during the Lula era. The main argument is that the new role played by Africa in the international scene coincides with a global Brazil

Brazilian foreign policy under President Lula (2003-2010): an overview

Foreign Minister of Brazil since 2003, Ambassador Celso Amorim outlines the main guidelines and accomplishments of Brazil's foreign policy under President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. The article provides a full-fledged, although not exhaustive, narrative of a number of diplomatic initiatives championed by Brazil over the last eight years: from the gathering of the group of developing countries in a World Trade Organization (WTO) meeting in Cancun to the negotiations that led to the Declaration of Tehran, as well as the challenges the country has been facing as its international weight grows.

Interests and Values in Obama's foreign Policy: Leading from Behind?

Abstract This study will exam the relative importance of values and interests in Obama's foreign policy, focusing on crucial cases: the military actions related to Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Non-Syria, Al-Qaeda and ISIL. We will argue that his "leading from behind" strategy is not very distant from the foreign and defense strategies of his post-Cold War predecessors, by which democracy is seen as an assurance to security. According to Obama's strategy, Americans will only provide support for the building of democracy in the target countries, while this task should be performed by the locals themselves. Americans will provide military training to the new governments as well so they can be responsible for their own security, including preventing regrouping of terrorists in their soil. If Obama opposes the imposing of democracy by the use of force, empirical data shows that his administration is "not prepared to accept" any option that threats US security or American liberal-democratic values, bringing in this way values and interests very close to each other.

Does corruption inhibit foreign direct investment?

Globalization creates new opportunities for firms to invest abroad and many economies are making active efforts to attract Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in order to promote economic growth. Decisions to invest abroad depend on a complex set of factors, but the least corrupt countries may attract more foreign direct investment because they provide a more favorable climate for investors. In this paper we investigate the impact of corruption on FDI inflows in 73 countries, over the period 1998-2008. Our results suggest that countries where corruption is lower, the FDI inflows are greater, and so controlling corruption may be an important strategy for increase FDI inflows.

Motivations to visit and image destination of Guimarães: differences between Portuguese and foreign tourists during 2012 Guimarães European Capital of Culture (ECOC)

Guimarães hosted the European Capital of Culture (ECOC) during the year of 2012. This study investigates the differences between Portuguese and foreign tourists regarding the main motivations to visit Guimarães and the retained perceived image of the destination. To achieve that purpose a survey was administered to 390 tourists that visited the city during the cultural event. The results show that tourists who visited Guimarães are relatively young, wealthy, employed and well educated. They are touring around the northern part of the country which includes an itinerary beginning in Porto, and extended to other important neighboring cities such as Braga or Viana do Castelo. The main motivations to visit the city, for both Portuguese and foreign tourists, are its historical heritage and the title of ECOC, the associated cultural events and celebrations that take place during 2012. However, these items were more valued by foreigners than Portuguese tourists. Using a factor analysis the tourists’ perceived attributes of Guimarães were described in four dimensions: “material heritage”, “intangible heritage”, “cultural performance”, and “sport and education”. Although foreigners and nationals perceived the tourism attributes of the city differently, the comparison of the mean scores of the four factors across Portuguese and foreigner tourists reveals that the most valued and least valued factors are common to both groups.

An optimal level of technology reliance on foreign partners in a global sourcing partnership: components procurement, technology management and market performance

Existing studies on global sourcing strategy have implicitly adopted a cJosed-systems perspective in which sourcing activities are managed within a multinational company across national boundaries. Produd and process innovations and components procurement that are jointly managed by a consortium of cooperating firms have not been examined. In this paper, we empiricallyexamine the issues concerning sourcing partnerships in an open-systems perspective. Findings suggest that even in a sourcing partnership arrangement with a foreign supplier, the principal firm's ability to procure and control the supply of major components has a positive bearing on its market performance.

Transaction costs: an empirical analysis of their relationship with investment and foreign direct investment

As stated by the New Institutional Economics theory, transaction costs play a relevant role in economics and, according to the extent of such costs, agents make investment decisions. Actually, transaction costs may represent a disincentive to entrepreneurship. This work aims to verify whether transaction costs are related to investment rate and foreign direct investment rate (FDI) in different business environments. The results suggest that foreign investors do not have precise information about other countries as domestic investors do; as it is observed, only the relation between transaction costs and investment rate is significant. Furthermore, there is evidence that the business environments of BRIC countries are less developed when compared to business environments of other countries in the study

INTERNATIONALIZATION OF STATE-OWNED ENTERPRISES THROUGH FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT

ABSTRACT State-owned enterprises (SOEs) are created to focus on domestic needs, and yet recent evidence points to increasing outward foreign direct investment by SOEs. Existing International Business (IB) theories focus on efficiency-based motives for internationalization; therefore, they do not fully capture SOEs' internalization dynamics, which are driven largely by political factors and social welfare considerations. We integrate public management and IB theories to develop propositions that combine these questions: why SOEs internationalize; what are their motivations; and what are the main managerial outcomes of SOEs' internationalization. Our findings suggest that SOEs display little hesitancy in entering international markets, and that SOE international expansion is not contradictory with the goals of state-ownership if the purpose is to adjust the company to changing institutional environments both in the domestic and international markets. Our propositions about SOE internationalization are based on an in-depth case study of the outward foreign direct investment conducted by Brazil's Petrobras over the past three decades.