In iPhone we trust?

"To do a great right, do a little wrong", William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice

The Apple vs FBI dispute over the San Bernardino iPhone is a case with far reaching long-term consequences for all. No easy solution here. The balance between privacy and security is obviously is where people are focusing their attention. But while an important discussion, I don’t think this is what makes the case an extraordinarily complex one. We have solved this tension in so many ways in history. While for example we admit the access of banking records, we protect the privacy of the patient/doctor relationship or the lawyer/client privilege even for the most diehard criminals and terrorists. No. The case brings other issues. It exposes the tensions between the global technology companies and their internet ecosystems that hover different jurisdictions (democratic or not) and our judgment over the moral legitimacy of those same jurisdictions. We would not be having this discussion if every court of the world would be like an US Court, would we? This tension between global technology companies and different nation states and national public interest is manifesting itself in other disputes like taxes, just to cite one. And this is no different. It also touches individual corporate freedom. Apple thought it had protected itself from the pre-Snowden government interference by basically not creating a backdoor for its new IOS system. Can it be forced to create one? By just the US Legal System? Why not another Legal System? Believe me that this case will be a headline in history books many years from now. And whoever ends up judging this case will need the same extraodinary legal finesse that Portia showed in  saving Antonio's pound of flesh while respecting Venice legal precedent. A tall order indeed. 

Band of Brothers

"Extremism is so easy. You've got your position, and that's it. It doesn't take much thought. And when you go far enough to the right you meet the same idiots coming around from the left". Clint Eastwood

What unites such disparate figures as Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders, Marine Le Pen and Jeremy Corbyn is in fact a total disrespect for the workings of modern democracies for the past six decades. The need to compromise, negotiate and find common ground. It is the same discourse against the establishment, of the pure outsider that will come to clean the rubbish of centrist sell-out politics. No matter that these pure white knights are anything but. It just requires a complete suspension of disbelief to associate political revolution to Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn that have been living out of politics for the past 40 years. Or that Marine Le Pen and Donald Trump can in any dimension represent the common working class voter.

On the left, the heritage of modern social democracy represented by the centrist policies of Blair and Bill Clinton is being ripped apart mercilessly. And on the right, pure parochial nativism reigns untrammeled. And on the left and right, social media and cable TV just allows everybody to live on their perfect bubble of ideological purity. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, once said that everybody has the right to its own opinion but not to his own facts. What he did not anticipate was that we would reach a time where facts would be a superfluous accessory to opinions. This is the brave new world of politics we seem to live in.

Have we reached Peak Civilization?

"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities", Voltaire

For all my life, and I think like many in my generation, there was a belief in the gradual progress of civilization around the globe. At different speeds, no doubt, but the direction was clear. That the better angels of our nature would slowly conquer and defeat our longstanding barbaric demons. After Paris, the belief is still there but the naiveté about its linear spread has been shattered. The dark corners of globalization are there to haunt us for a long time. And it is not only ISIS. Just look at the no man's land where the Mexican cartels rule. The common thread is there. Chaos, anarchy and the fanatical pursuit of identity amidst state rule failure. And every time we empty the bucket something nastier emerges. We defeat the Colombian cartels, we get the even more savage Mexican ones. Out goes Saddam, Assad and Khadafi and ISIS takes over. So a new normal awaits us in this valley of shadows. One that must live with terrorism without being terrorized by it.  One that defends resolutely our values of tolerance, respect for diversity and inclusiveness in the face of those that want to spread hate. The eagerness to reach quick solutions in the face of tragedies like Paris is natural, but the wrong course of action. This is the path that can easily lead us, for example, to profiling entire groups people in an act reminiscent of some nasty periods of our history. It is unfortunate that this will be a long-haul fight, but it is the reality. And reality cannot be wished away.

In a way we must be like the Spartans who refused to build walls around their cities because they feared it would weaken their resolve to fight. Myself, I will rather perish in any terrace, restaurant and street of our diverse and open societies than live in the closed and fearful countries that some people seem to advocate for us to transform into. It is the only way to prevail.

Many shades of risk

"The wise are instructed by reason, average minds by experience, the stupid by necessity and the brute by instinct -  Marcus Tullius Cicero"

Unlike the hound of the Baskervilles, dogs are barking everywhere when it comes to risk in this turbulent world. You have geopolitical risk that brews in the South China Sea, Middle East and Eastern Europe. The risk on the Euro from the whole Greek drama, the consequences to the world economy of the US initiating an upward interest rate cycle, the unstable situation in large emerging economies like Brazil, Russia and Turkey. And China's transition to a new economic paradigm .To all of this markets reaction seems to be relatively sanguine. Like in the cartoon above, is it because of a framing issue? Or we just simply think that dogs that bark don’t bite?

The chicken game

A totally reckless driver against one without a driving wheel....

When a vote is free and democratic but not really fair...

"For it is a habit of mankind to entrust to careless hope what they long for, and to use sovereign reason to thrust aside what they do not fancy", Thucydides

The finger

True or not, the now famous Varoufakis finger to the Germans mirrors the sorry state of European relations. Today another European summit ended in total disarray. With the absence of any trust between the parties, we are clearly walking in the direction of a Greek exit from the Euro. In 2010, this would have had significant economic consequences for the bloc. If today these apparently look more manageable, the political consequences are in turn far greater and unpredictable now. Faites vos jeux....

Expressive Varoufakis

 

 

 

Água quente, água fria

Existem dois tipos de investidores estrangeiros que olham para o Brasil. Os de água quente, entram na alta. Chegaram em 2010/2011, e hoje estão saindo do Brasil às catadupas feridos pelo câmbio e pelos planos de negócio jamais realizados. Estes só regressarão quando o Brasil voltar a estar na moda. Existem depois os de água fria. Que sabem que grande parte do segredo de prosperar no Brasil é escolher o momento de entrada. Esses estão colocando muito dinheiro no país neste momento. E irão sair quando a piscina virar jacuzzi de novo.

Vai demorar para o fusca ficar bonito de novo

Darkest hour (II)

People only accept change when they are faced with necessity, and only recognize necessity when a crisis is upon them.", Jean Monnet

In the last post, the discussion centered on Russia’s threat to the European Union’s future. However, the significance of that threat is amplified by the Union’s weakness. What was meant to be the corollary of Europe’s integration has become its most divisive issue and has shattered the political scene in many of the Union’s members.  I am talking about the Euro.

The tension between politics and European integration is not new. In fact, it was embedded in the EU’s DNA right from the beginning. The founding fathers of the Union, Jean Monnet and Adenauer among others had seen what the advent of mass politics through the introduction of universal suffrage had done to Europe in the first half of the 20^th century. Like the founding fathers of the US two centuries earlier, their concern was how to control the savage passions of the masses and, in the European case, avoid further conflict in Europe. Their response was to make the European integration a totally technocratic process. The technocrats would create function and need and the politics would suffer pressure to adapt and accommodate. Because in the beginning, we were talking about issues that touched peripherally on voters and furthermore the economies were growing, that process went on seamlessly. The first real test came with the introduction of the single market 1992 and Thatcher was the first to understand that the political sphere kept being presented with ”faits accomplis”. She was the first to rebel but not the last. Following Delors exit, the Heads of State placed the lackluster Santer in its place and in 1995, the powers of the European executive branch were greatly diminished through the treaty of Nice. The great powers wanted to gain firm control of the European process. Or, shall we say of the European bicycle. Because that was the comparison that was made. If you stop pedaling, you fell. The single market to work demanded free movement of people. And, for all to work, it was necessary the single currency. You have just to keep pedaling.

In 1991, I got an interview with the then Portuguese central bank governor. At that time, the issue of central bank independence was a hot topic in Portuguese politics, so I remembered asking him if he felt he had sufficient independence to conduct the monetary policy. He smiled and pointed at the fax machine. His autonomy lasted 15 minutes before he received the fax from Frankfurt with the German interest rate decision. So, we get back to that eternal European question: Germany. Too big for Europe, too small for the world. Here the technocrats joined hands with the politicians in finding the single currency the cure all medicine. For the former, it was the corollary of all efforts in the direction of the European integration. For the latter, it was the quid pro quo to accept the German reunification. It was a momentous decision, particularly because it was done without any voter legitimacy. And worst of all, the selling pitch was done differently to different audiences. In Germany, as a risk free endeavor and a final price to erase the country’s sins and be considered as good Europeans. In the South, as the end of a journey. A rich money in a poor’s people pocket and a painless nirvana. Now, the designers of the single currency were totally conscious of the tension between the existence of the Euro and the absence of any European governance mechanism. But, perversely, that was what the acceleration of the European integration through the Euro was meant to achieve. To force the political scene to adapt (if this sounds Marxist it is because it is based in the same reasoning. You have to create political facts). With the Euro, the pressure for a political integration would amplify. It would also put the anti-integrationist camp led by the UK on the sidelines. So all the tensions we see today are in part fruit of design. To oblige the politicians to renounce their sovereignty in order to save the Euro. Finally accepting the need for a political union. Everything is perfect except that in a democracy sidelining the voters cannot be done forever. Because the whole plan might unravel if the politicians are replaced by others bent in changing the status quo. That is what we are facing now.

 

Is this the vision Europe wants?

To understand, how perverse the politics of the Euro have become, you just have to look at the recent negotiations with Syriza’s Greece. Logically, any relaxation of the Greece’s conditions would favor the other southern countries that also underwent an adjustment program, namely Portugal and Spain so you would expect these countries to support it. A North against South battle. In fact, no. The biggest opposition to any relaxing of the Greece’s conditions come precisely from Portugal and Spain. Because any increased flexibility towards Greece would mean the discrediting of five long years of harsh medicine. If only they had stood up to the Germans as Syriza has done and the medicine would have been much more palatable. Of course, this is an illusion. Voters in France, Italy, Portugal, Spain and Greece are being sold the reverse hoax of the 90’s. In the 90’s, it was that once the Euro was introduced, prosperity was around the corner. And for 15 years, fuelled by debt at German risk levels this was true. Now is that the exit from the currency is a painless decision. Because, it is not that the defenders of the Euro have lost the battle of the present. The need for reforms in many of the countries named was evident. It is that they are losing the fight for the future. What the establishment parties are proposing to voters is just a very long slog of austerity. No wonder that parties like Podemos, FN and others are thriving in this environment.

To be fair the shattering of the European political center cannot be attributed solely to the Euro. Like the tea party in the US, it is anti-elite rebellion fuelled by the incapacity of western social democracy of keeping buying social peace, the social fragmentation brought by technology and globalization and the perceived corruption and disconnect of the political system. But like the gold standard in the 1920’s, what the Euro is doing in Continental Europe is aggravating all these trends by putting the political system in an economic policy straitjacket. We are paying in full the price of having embarked in a project that was poorly explained to voters in particularly in the only country that really surrendered sovereignty when the Euro was created. Germany. To save Europe, truth needs to be restored. No more hoaxes and illusions. And the battle of the future needs to be won because it cannot be abandoned to the distorted and dangerous vision of Marine Le Pen and others.    

Darkest hour (I)

"A political society does not live to conduct foreign policy; it would be more correct to say that it conducts foreign policy in order to live.", George F. Kennan

9th November 1989. Huge crowds finally put an end to the Berlin wall. A day to rejoice for all of us who love of freedom but also the founding stone of many of the current European travails. Like a pilgrim after successfully arriving to its destination, Europe just sat down not sure of what to do next. For the last 25 years it just sleepwalked through decisions and projects long designed before that momentous occasion, namely the Euro. Little care was given to legitimize far-reaching decisions of sovereignty pooling neither focus to think strategically on security, in particular on Europe’ southern and eastern borders merely assuming that the Kantian dream of eternal peace was at just within reach and that the rest of the world would just pause and look in awe to the never tried European utopia. It did not. And now we have a very complex set of challenges, each one daunting in its own right. Together they do represent the gravest threat to the European project: (i) a civilizational menace from the East led by Russia, (ii) the implosion of the Southern flank of the European Continent and the (iii) shattering of the political center that sustained the European integration in many member countries.

It has been a long road to get to this mess. During the 90’s, going to the voters to ratify the great leap forward of the European project (Maastricht treaty plus the Euro project) backfired every time until the politicians got tired of the whole process and just decided to push ahead regardless. The currency union was the price exacted from the Germans for the go ahead to the German reunification and no voters would stand in the away of the Lilliputian dream of binding Germany and limiting its power. Furthermore, the currency union was sold (without any vote) differently to different audiences. In the South, as painless voyage to a new stage in prosperity. A hard currency finally in people’s pockets. In the North as a risk free endeavor. Clearly, these two selling arguments were incompatible with one another.  To top it all, to make sure that the European Governments still had the illusion of not ceding the sovereignty that the important decision on the currency union implied, in 1995, the treaty of Nice was negotiated and signed and with that, a mortal blow was struck to the powers of the European Commission. No elected executive organ would emerge with legitimacy to speak on Europe’s behalf. Governments would do that but of course with their national interest in mind. So by 1995 we had a currency union not legitimized by voters and we had a killed any notion of a federal government to command it. The leap to the void was complete.

While the Europeans continued to absorb themselves in the management of this improbable arrangement, little thought was given to the challenges of the world post-Germany reunification besides the expansion in autopilot to the East of the European Union. The Balkan crisis should have been a wakeup call that no the rest of the world was just not going to stand still while Europeans discussed the details of what would then became the Maastricht treaty. On 29 June of 1991, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Luxembourg (I know but no pun intended) Jacques Poos claimed emphatically on the Balkans crisis “this is the hour for Europe”. It took eight long years and the desperate relinquishing of the clock to the Americans for the crisis to abate. It was clear that the security of the continent could not be taken for granted. Nevertheless, the great European introspection marched on regardless.

The sole European policy response, the expansion to the East, faced its own conceptual problems. Having the Berlin wall for so long had answered by default the long-standing question of where in the East Europe ended. With the wall gone, the easy reply to that query had also disappeared. So where did Europe end? In Riga? In Lvov? In Kiev? In Moscow or in the Urals? Nobody really knows. Contrary to the United States, Europe does not delimit itself from shining sea to shining sea. There is sea all right in the West but then just a fuzzy civilizational border in the East that has advanced and receded during the course of history. Could we then have a rationale to say no to the aspirations of countries like Ukraine or Georgia to be in the long-term part of the European Union? Of course not. We said yes to the Baltic countries so why no to Ukraine? But there is a problem in this rationale. And that problem is security. There cannot be a mismatch between NATO expansion and the European Union expansion. And that is what we are finding out at our own cost with the current Ukrainian crisis.

Before I enter this part of the argument let me be a hundred percent clear. There are no excuses for Russian behavior. There is no complot of the whole world bent on Russia’s humiliation. Putin has led the country to a neo-fascist corner supported by a receptive population whose sense of victimization has been masterfully exploited by a corrupt and dangerous regime. As yesterday’s murder of Boris Nemtsov shows, whoever possesses a civilized conscience in that country is killed, coerced and forced to flee.

That said, there were several errors done in this process by the Europeans themselves. The first is a serious misreading of the Russian regime. In the eyes of Moscow the threat is not so much of the expansion of NATO or the European Union per se and the fear that following that missiles will rain over Moscow. Therefore, no amount of assurances, words, and councils will ever satisfy Russia in this regard. It is the possibility that under these umbrellas, liberal and modern countries might emerge. Moreover, because Georgia and Ukraine are sufficiently similar to Russia, they might make the Russian people think, “if that worked over there why don’t we have it here”. It is a regime change threat that endangers all the ruling kleptocratic elite. Now this cannot be a reason not to give Ukraine, for example, a deeper connection with the European Union via the trade agreement that initiated the Euromaidan revolt, which deposed Yanukovych last February. Like in 2008, when Russia invaded Georgia as a preemptive move against any further western bias from that country, unfortunately a Russian reaction was distinct possibility. What was absent once again was a strategy to dissuade Russia from destabilizing the country.

 

             Munich revisited?         

 

In 2003, at the height of the US diplomatic confrontation with certain European countries over Iraq, Robert Kagan, an American scholar, published a book called “Of Paradise and Power, America and Europe in the New World Order”. The basic argument was that European countries were very reluctant to resort to armed force. They were from Venus while the Hobbesian Americans were from Mars. The argument is not entirely fair, as the recent interventions in Mali and Libya show, but the truth is that Europe as a whole has forgotten about the value of deterrence in the great power game. The intervention capacity of most European countries is pitiful. With the exception of France, no country spends more than 2% of its GDP in defense (a long-standing NATO target). Furthermore, the US commitment to European security is weaker today than in the past.  During the cold war, the stationing of 300.000 US soldiers in Europe had the objective of generating enough American victims and hostages in case of Soviet invasion so that a nuclear retaliation could be credible escalation. No such deployment protects the Baltic countries today for example. Will the US and Europe risk war with Russia over these countries? I have my doubts and I believe Putin does too making it more probable that this scenario is played out. Lack of deterrence makes the world more dangerous not less as very few European leaders seem to understand. Lack of punishment makes the world more dangerous not less. The road to Munich and the summit itself made World War II more likely. Not less. In that, sense the recent Minsk agreement was a huge and very dangerous victory for Putin. It made the Crimea annexation a fait accompli. Therefore, crime pays. It made a mockery of Ukrainian sovereignty of the rest of its territory. Moreover, its subsequent disrespect by the Russian backed rebels did not even elicit a full fledge economic support to Ukraine nor further sanctions against Russia. So no punishment.

Because Putin sees the liberal democracy model supported by the twin pillars of the European Union and NATO as its most dangerous threat, its long-term goal is to undermine both of them. A successful destabilization of the Baltic countries will ensure that Article V (mutual defense clause) of the NATO charter is debased and thus the entire building of the alliance.  Its support for the ascending far left and far right parties (assisted by the Euro’s suicidal politics – more on that later) all over Europe will make the European Union even more unmanageable and put the transatlantic alliance in peril as well as the European Union itself. How a Europe with Podemos, UKIP, Front Nationale and Syriza in power will behave in terms of continental security is anybody’s guess. Not even in the Soviet wildest dreams at the time of the Pershing II crisis with all the Soviet support to the peacenik movements all over Europe did such a political scenario seemed possible.

So yes, the Ukrainian crisis and Russia’s policy do represent a geopolitical threat with potentially enormous consequences for the future of Europe. All the gains of post-World War II in Europe cannot be taken for granted. They will have to be defended. It is a not matter of arms or war. It is a matter of ideas and values. Ukraine right to freely choose its future has to be upheld. This means at this stage not so much arming the Ukrainians with guns (that moment for armed deterrence has long passed unfortunately) but making sure that their economic plight is secured. This is the only long-term game Russia cannot win. Armed deterrence, however, can still save the Baltic countries. It is where Putin will strike next.

Forbes most powerful 2014....#1 Putin speaks

I am not a man. I am Cantona

Ámen.

Obama and the Middle East

Hangover....

 "Em Minas Gerais, a política é como um crochê: não se pode dar ponto errado, sob pena de começar tudo de novo".
 Ex-Presidente Itamar Franco

 Muita discussão mas pouco se olhou para o futuro 

Agora que as eleições aqui no Brasil terminaram, está na hora de colocar no papel algumas reflexões sobre o apaixonante processo a que assisti neste imenso e contraditório país que me acolhe há 6 anos. A primeira nota é que falhei na minha previsão de vitória da oposição. Quem me conhece sabe que desde há mais de um ano sempre pensei que seria uma eleição marcada pela mudança. Mas errei. Foi apertada, decidida nos detalhes e por isso é interessante refletir sobre o porquê do resultado. A segunda nota é que este ano foi muito parecido com 2002 quando comecei a trabalhar com o Brasil. Naquela altura advoguei para muitos brasileiros incrédulos, que a vitória do Lula era fundamental para a consolidação do regime democrático no Brasil. Neste ano, embora achasse igualmente importante a alternância no poder, o país não vai terminar numa Venezuela qualquer como aqui se teme em muitos quadrantes. A semelhança de 2002 e 2014 tem a ver com os cenários apocalípticos projetados por parte da sociedade brasileira, nomeadamente a de São Paulo. O país vai viver uma situação complexa mas não trágica. E para quem gosta de política como eu, extremamente interessante de ser seguida. Feita a introdução, aqui vão as notas sem uma ordem particular:

1. Vitalidade da democracia brasileira: Tendo em conta o resultado apertado, a disputa acirrada durante a eleição e todo o ambiente polarizado que o Brasil viveu nos últimos meses, os brasileiros devem ficar orgulhosos da maneira pacífica e madura como os resultados foram aceites. É um sinal da solidez da democracia e que a distancia de vizinhos e de países até mais desenvolvidos (quem não se lembra da Flórida). Aécio perdeu por uma margem mínima e não se ouviram reclamações de recontagem dos votos, contestação ao resultado, etc. Isto é maturidade democrática. Parabéns Brasil.

2. Esquerda e direita: As reportagens de quase todos os órgãos de notícias internacionais focavam no confronto da esquerda defensora dos direitos sociais representada por Dilma e da direita liberal representada por Aécio. Ao fim da enésima peça retratando esta dicotomia em vez de irritação passei a ter pena da ignorância. É que o Brasil não tem direita. É tudo de esquerda, sendo que uns são menos à esquerda que outros. O programa social das duas chapas era quase idêntico. A disputa entre o Aécio e a Dilma no espectro político europeu seria entre o Partido Trabalhista inglês (Aécio) e o Partido Socialista francês (Dilma). Também o Aécio não representava o partido dos empresários. Representava sim uma política mais favorável às empresas. Parece uma nuance mas tem diferenças. É que infelizmente quem tem uma política mais dos empresários é sempre a esquerda mais à esquerda e aqui no Brasil não é exceção onde o PT tem um conjunto de empresários que beneficiaram do seu governo. O PSDB seria mais neutral deste ponto de vista (benéfica para os empresários como um todo mas menos propensa a afilhados) e por isso a vitória do PT foi comemorada com vigor em alguns quadrantes econômicos do país.

3. O Ohio brasileiro: Nos Estados Unidos ninguém consegue ser Presidente sem ganhar no Ohio. No Brasil esse papel é desempenhado por Minas Gerais. Este estado, um dos maiores do Brasil, é um mini Brasil, dividido entre uma parte sul desenvolvida e um norte nordestino. A divisão de Minas espelha o país e não é por acaso que a diferença entre os dois candidatos foi quase idêntica ao score nacional. Embora Aécio Neves se despeça desta eleição achando que poderia ter conduzido melhor a campanha em Minas Gerais (o que é verdade) as dificuldades que o seu discurso teve no Nordeste se reproduziram em Minas e deram a vitória ao PT neste estado e no país. E este é o cerne do problema do PSDB se quer de novo governar o país. Como última nota, a governação de Minas por Aécio Neves também tinha as suas fragilidades como fica claro no score obtido na próspera região do triângulo mineiro.

4. O PSDB: Sempre achei que como condição do PSDB ser governo outra vez teria de assumir a herança dos governos de Fernando Henrique Cardoso sem complexos de forma assertiva. Aécio teve perfeito neste papel facilitado pelo corte geracional que ele representa e pela sua ausência de responsabilidades de governo na altura. Esteve por isso à vontade para defender o que de bom estes governos trouxeram ao país. Foi por isso que já em 2010, achei que Aécio teria sido o melhor candidato do PSDB à presidência. Faltou contudo a segunda condição à qual não prestei tanta atenção durante a campanha talvez por viver na "bolha" de São Paulo. Sair do casulo de um discurso para os convertidos e saber falar para aqueles que tendo beneficiado dos governos PT não se reviam particularmente na Dilma. Falar suave e bater forte em vez do inverso que foi o que aconteceu durante a campanha. O falar suave seria fundamental para dividir os 8 anos do Lula que a maior parte dos brasileiros acha que foi um bom período do país dos 4 anos de Dilma onde muitos brasileiros têm dúvidas sobre a capacidade política e de gestão desta última. Ao ter optado por um discurso contra o PT e não contra a Dilma, Aécio acabou por unir o adversário, acordar Lula para a campanha com efeitos particularmente nefastos no Nordeste e tornar a eleição numa campanha pela intensidade dos fieis de cada um muito semelhante à última eleição de Obama (onde também beneficiou quem estava no poder). Estudos demográficos ainda davam uma vantagem, embora muito pequena, ao PT neste ciclo eleitoral (taxa de urbanização, peso Norte-Sul, classes sociais, etc..) e o fato da campanha se ter centrado na mobilização das demografias de cada um dos candidatos acabou por ser benéfica ao partido no poder. Neste particular, e paradoxalmente, o escândalo da Petrobrás, acabou por ser prejudicial dado que toldou ainda mais a visão do PSDB e o centrou num discurso anticorrupção (leia-se contra o PT) muito popular em São Paulo mas com pouca penetração no resto do país. Este discurso é fácil de conduzir pelas "vestais" que chegam à política mas muito mais difícil de ser erigido como principal bandeira por quem é poder também, já que é fácil para o adversário encontrar telhados de vidro e deixar o eleitor com a impressão de que no fundo "são todos iguais". E essa foi precisamente a linha de defesa do PT. Por último, o dia seguinte às eleições nas redes sociais demonstra que a necessidade de adaptação do discurso ainda é uma lição não totalmente compreendida pelo PSDB, nomeadamente em São Paulo. A noção que o Nordeste vota na ignorância, simplesmente comprados por programas sociais como o Bolsa Família é verdadeira só em parte. O Nordeste sempre votou no poder instalado fosse ele os coronéis ou Brasília. Isto é verdade, mas se o PSDB quer ser governo terá de aumentar o seu score na região e há vias para o fazer. Não é de certeza chamando a toda a região a Cuba do Sul e constituída por um bando de ignorantes como muita gente postou na rede. O PT usou com habilidade na região o estereótipo que São Paulo olha de cima para o resto do país e nomeadamente para o Nordeste colando a candidatura de Aécio a tal retrato. Para ganhar no futuro esta é uma armadilha onde o PSDB não se pode deixar cair.

5. O marketing político: Debater o papel dos marqueteiros políticos num resultado eleitoral é uma discussão velha e inconclusiva. Existem sempre argumentos a favor e contra da sua importância verdadeira. Contudo parece-me irrefutável que a campanha do PT e sobretudo o seu líder, João Santana, merecem um lugar nos vencedores. Eles tinham pela frente uma eleição extremamente difícil, uma candidata que está longe de ser fácil de ser trabalhada e conseguiram uma vitória tirada a ferros. Conseguiram ainda que a discussão eleitoral não se centrasse sobre os seus 4 anos de governação, mas nos 12 do PT (terreno muito mais favorável) e sobretudo na governação de Minas Gerais por Aécio Neves no segundo turno e no programa de governo de Marina Silva no primeiro. Do ponto de vista de posicionamento estratégico foi brilhante já que atacaram aquilo que eram as "fortalezas" do adversário e os colocaram na defensiva. No caso de Aécio, uma governação de Minas que era vista como sem mácula e grande porta estandarte da sua capacidade de gestão e no caso de Marina, o único candidato que durante a eleição apresentou um verdadeiro programa de governo. É óbvio que a estratégia contou com os erros dos adversários, mas qual a estratégia bem sucedida que não beneficia disso?

6. Terceira via: É irresistível em qualquer regime político polarizado, existir o sonho de uma terceira via que se possa afirmar como projeto de poder. A candidatura de Marina junta-se ao largo rol de protagonistas que em vários países pensaram que tinham reais possibilidades de poder romper o equilíbrio existente com sucesso. Foi assim nos Estados Unidos, Inglaterra, Alemanha entre tantos outros. É um cemitério com muitas campas e outras tantas ilusões.

7. Vencedor: O PMDB. Maior partido brasileiro é incontornável para quem quer governar o país. Incapaz de ter um candidato próprio é ele sempre que garante a governabilidade do país. Meu palpite: terá importância acrescida no próximo governo da Dilma.

E para o futuro? Curiosamente a grande vantagem do governo é que as expectativas foram colocadas tão em baixo sobre a sua capacidade de governar que surpreender pela positiva não será difícil. Por outro lado, o PT também sabe que se quer ganhar em 2018 não poderá voltar a perder em São Paulo por 7 milhões de votos. Assim, teremos uma volta a uma política econômica mais ortodoxa e um nome para a Fazenda que seja bem visto pelo maior estado do país. E em 2018, teremos inevitavelmente o "play it again Sam".

 

 

Tragic futility

Tragic Futility

 

 

 

When a war has no workable political objective it is futile. And because it is a war, with the sheer human costs it imposes on all parties, it becames tragic. That is the war in Gaza. Repeating itself for the umpteenth time. Instead of taking sides, passing moral judgements it is far better (although equally despairing) just to look at the unfortunate stupidity of it all. No, the history clock cannot be rewinded so Israel cannot be uncreated. And no, short of killing each and every Palestinian, submission to the Israeli state will not happen.

 

In the background of Gaza,  what we are witnessing in the Middle East is the shattering of the post-imperial order, dissolving the region into a war of clans and tribes. Not only Jew against Palestinian. But Sunni against Shia. The Christian heritage disappearing. Diversity being dissolved in a sea of slaughter. Be it in Iraq or Syria. Or in Gaza.

 

As for Israel, and as democracy, it should (and is) be judged on a higher standard. Unfortunately for its people, its soul is slowly being corrupted in the morass of its policy towards the Palestinians. From victory, to victory until the final defeat, that is how the last five leaders of the Shin Bet (Israeli Military Intelligence Service) described  Israeli policy in the great documentary "The Gatekeepers". Not, that it doesn't have its reasons and grievances but because it is being led to a dead end and in that process it will lose itself and all that it holds dear. I could write about the killing of innocent civilians, of women and children, of which the region provides plenty of images. But I choose not. I prefer to use the words of Willy Peter Reese as they could be written by a young IDF soldier.  Willy died at the age of 23. He was a German soldier in the Eastern Front involved in another war of annihilation with no end in sight except for the total elimination of one of its contenders.

 

 

"The armour of apathy with which  I covered myself against terror, horror, fear, and madness, which saved me from suffering and screaming, crushed any tender stirring within me, snapped off the green shoots of hope, faith, and love of my fellow men, and turned my heart to stone.

...At the same time, I bore in mind that I was fighting men I didn't hate, who were never enemies to me, who in their destiny were more like brothers; and that I was only trying to perform an imposed duty.

...We served the imperative of history as specks of dust in the whirlwind and were priviliged to participate in the end of our world.."

 

Willy Peter Reese, A Stranger to Myself: The inhumanity of War: Russia, 1941-1944

 

 

 



From Russia with love

From Russia with love

"When evil men plot, good men must plan", Martin Luther King Jr.

Unfortunately it is much more than just macho antics...

 

 

The downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 over the skies of Eastern Ukraine last week can be blamed, at least indirectly, on the shoulders of Vladimir Putin and the revanchist policy he implemented in Russia. The almost three hundred men, women and children aboard the flight are just the latest victims of a misguided policy that unfortunately seems will go on unchecked. Like the fascists in Germany after the first world war, Putin managed to make the Russian people embark on an alternative reality voyage where Russia was humiliated and stabbed in the back by treacherous Western nations (which finds fertile ground on the Russian pervasive sense of victimisation) and the redemption of its prestige can only be found in the resurrection of something alike to the old Soviet Empire. The free choices of the people of Ukraine, Georgia or other ex-Soviet Republics are irrelevant because in his mind the fact that they might look at his Russian paradise with fear rather than awe is inconceivable. Do not fool yourselves in thinking this is a one off. Starting with the scorched earth tactics in the Caucasus, his invasion of Georgia and now his endeavours to transform Ukraine into a rumpus state, it will not be three hundred bystanders that will stop him. Neither whatever civilized conscience still exists in Russia which lies dormant among the regime's propaganda. I once thought that Europe might encompass Moscow. Today I am sure that it has no place in any civilized concert of Nations.     

 

When myths get shattered....

When myths get shattered....

“Football's not a matter of life and death ... it's more important than that”, Bill Shankly

If there is a founding myth about Brazil, it is football. The national identity of the country, the pride of its people revolves around this sport. That's why the reverberations of yesterday's trashing against Germany go far beyond the realm of football. It is the coup de grace  in the narrative of  a  nationalism that emerged in the second half of last decade, that was fuelled by Lula's second mandate and that has carried PT in power ever since. The Brazilian exceptionalism. So well. The new Brazil has not emerged. It has improved in some aspects but still faces the same old, old problems. The economy sputters failing to fulfill its potential. Instead of finding best practices around the globe, opening the country to the outside and to competition, fomenting talent and meritocracy, the last few years have a been a sucession of depressing choices founded on a parochial view of world affairs and of how wealth is generated. Not so uncommon in this Continent full of misconceptions and with a disturbing tendency to repeat the same mistakes time after time, but particularly poignant for a country that, more than any other in the region, has all the ingredients to be a truly successfull one. The last fragile thread that sustained the illusion of Brazilian exceptionalism as concocted by its leaders and hungrily accepted by a majority of its people was washed away in Belo Horizonte last night. There is no Barbosa to blame like in 1950. There was no lack of passion in the shouting of the national anthem. There was no lack of sweat in the yellow shirts. There was, sadly of all, no lack of talent in the pitch. No. It was just a colective failure so in tandem to what happens elsewhere in the country. That acts of pure will can replace measured and founded reason. Brazil didn't lack attacking spirit last night. It just had a total misconceived perception of its true value in the pitch and when reality bit it really went deep in the flesh.         

 

I am waiting for a new The Economist cover...

 

 

For many months, contrary to the opinion of many, I have thought that this year was going to be a watershed year in Brazil, namely with a political change coming in the next election. Today I am sure of it. But more than just changing its political leaders, Brazil needs a hard look unto itself. Of adjusting expectations to reality and realizing that without fundamental changes in the country, success will be always  outside its reach. No matter the will, the sweat and the talent.

 



 

Politics at its best...on both sides of the Atlantic

In the UK....

...and in the US



Hubris

Hubris

 

“I am sufficiently proud of my knowing something to be modest about my not knowing all.”, Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita

 

 

London, 31st March 1990. A large peaceful protest against the implementation of the Community Charge (commonly known as the Poll Tax) ended up in looting and rampaging amidst large confrontations with the police. Eight months later the most sucessfull British Prime - Minister of the post-war era, winner of three elections and with the Labour Party still finding its voice, was thrown out of office after a sucessfull putsch led by Conservative Party grandees. Curiously enough, the British electorate didn't reject the Conservative Party. Two years later, John Major won another term for the party and Tony Blair saw himself as an heir to the Iron Lady and still won three elections. The same thing happened in another corner of Europe in 1994, when the Portuguese Prime Minister, also winner of three elections and visibly unbeateable in the ballot box, was confronted by huge protests folowing an apparently minor decision of raising the toll price of the major Lisbon bridge. 

These events came to my mind this year, first in Turkey and now in Brazil where I live. The same mix is present. Apparently successfull leaders. Years of prosperity. Political opposition struggling to find its place. A minor decision. Protests. Initial violent reaction of the police. Spreading out of the protests. So, what is going on? 

 

 

 

It gets to the BRICS as well...

 

 

What many people forget is that growth and prosperity are as socially dislocating as recessions. What Turkey and Brazil are finding is that there is a flipside to success. Starting with Turkey, it's a complete nonsense to say that Erdogan is transforming the country into a proto-Islamic Republic and that the alcohol restrictions are just a step away from Islamist theocracy. Using that standard, the United States and its Calvinistic view of alcohol consumption and purchase (just buy spirits in many of the American states and try carry them in the street in other than non-transparent brown bags) would be a Christian one. What AKP did in terms of the presence of religion in Turkey was re-balance the social engineering of Kemal Ataturk which was clearly unsustainable in the long-run given the country's cultural and religious moorings. And that was fine with most of the Turkish society. That in part was why he successfully won three elections in a row and managed to beat the army into submission. But three more things happened. First, the total collapse of the Kemalist opposition preventing that any dissenting voices make themselves heard inside the political system. Secondly, the social dislocation, seen clearly with rise of the Anatolian elite as opposed to the traditional Istanbul based one, following many years of growth and the emergence of a much more pluralistic society. And lastly, that ancient sin of hubris which tends to infect successful political leaders. Margaret Thatcher thought she could break the poll tax protests the same way she broke the back of the coal workers and unions one decade before. She overlook the fact that those that were protesting in 1990 were not a dying minority fighting for its privileges but the new Britain that emerged from her reforms. Erdogan is following the same path by forgetting that the people in Taksim square are not the Kemalist officers he brushed from power by precisely mobilizing the street. It is one side of that same street he commanded in the past that today sits comfortably with the balance found in Turkish society and that demands inclusion in the decision making process. 

The events in Brazil have many similarities with the Turkish ones. Once more, we have ten years of growth and prosperity and consequently of social change. And then major social protests born out of apparently minor decisions. To understand the social change dimension I normally use the example of the shift in the political base of the governing party, the PT. While in the 90's, the PT was the party of the industrial belt of São Paulo. It is today the Party of the emerging middle class of Brazil located many miles outside São Paulo, in perennial poor regions of the country like the Northeast. If the political base of one of the major parties in the political system changes that much it is because the underlying social fabric of the country has also suffered a major upheaval. 

Everytime I talked about the economic crisis in Europe, and in particularly in my country, I was always met by a mixture of surprise and incomprehension by the average Brazilian. "You have security, education, a health system that works and public transportation, so why do you feel so depressed?" was the typical question I received here. And freed from the survival trap following ten years of prosperity that is precisely what they are demanding from their political system. Lula was always too conscious that he was running a successful software that he inherited from the government of Fernando Henrique Cardoso and while he intelligently adapted it to his agenda of inclusion, he never questioned that the main objective was to keep the "pie growing". Except for the last year in government where he finally succumbed to a more ideological agenda (true, hubris again) he always maintained his own radicals at bay and outside economic policy. President Dilma is not made of the same cloth. She truly believes  in a leftist nationalistic and state centric development agenda forgetting that after a decade of growth what Brazilians were going to demand was a true reform of the state and specially the delivery of essential services. Had she maintained a high tempo of growth probably this day of reckoning could have been delayed, like the Chinese have been doing for decades. But the incapacity of producing results combined with a very centralizing and autocratic way of exercising power merely accelerated the demands of the new Brazilian middle class.

Should a further slowdown in China make this country the next on the list?

 

A propósito do Luís

Se a Malásia é uma fusão de mundos na Ásia, conjugando as raízes malaias (semelhantes às da Indonésia) com fortes minorias chinesas e indianas, a ilha de Pulau Pinang (ou Penang), no norte da península, é o epicentro desta mistura de culturas e um dos principais polos industriais do país. Navegar nas ruas da capital, Georgetown, é mergulhar numa enorme mistura de sabores, cheiros e religiões desses três mundos e ao mesmo tempo vislumbrar os vestígios de um passado colonial em suave decadência debaixo do calor tropical. A noite é dominada pelo espírito boêmio da comunidade chinesa que comemora tudo, desde o novo ano chinês, passando pelo Natal em que a passagem do dia 24 para o dia 25 de Dezembro é vivida ao ritmo de uma contagem decrescente estilo ano novo com direito a fogo de artifício à meia noite e tudo. E chegamos ao Paradise Food Court, bem no centro de Georgetown, que é algo a meio caminho entre uma feira popular e um daqueles bailes dos bombeiros na província, pleno de pequenas bancas de comida e com show de cantores chineses que se revezam toda a noite (e com direito a show de travestis em alguns dias da semana). Dois brancos se destacam neste pequeno mundo que, se Emir Kusturica fosse chinês, já tinha sido passado a filme de cinema. O Anthony Bourdain que sorri nas fotos expostas em boa parte da bancas e que é usado à exaustão como atestado de qualidade das iguarias em face do esgar desconfiado do turista, e o Luís. Com a sua banca vendendo bifanas, pregos e outras iguarias lusitanas, o Luís, chegado há quatro meses ao país, é um exemplo vivo da nossa capacidade como povo em chegar a sítios improváveis, integrar-nos localmente e tentar a nossa sorte. Passada a surpresa de ver o casal de “brancos” atrás do fogão, “então ver a minha mulher a trabalhar foi um choque” diz o Luís que se ri quando conta como havia chineses que iam à banca apenas para os observar a cozinhar, o respeito dos concorrentes do Food Court foi hoje ganho e com as devidas adaptações ao gosto local, “tudo tem de ter um pouco de doce e de picante”, a venda vai de vento em popa, tanto que o Luís já se sente confiante em abrir um restaurante propriamente dito ao mesmo tempo que aprende Mandarim.

 

Not lost in translation...

Mas a história do Luís dá que pensar. Que como numa Europa em crise, pouco se fala da necessidade de melhorar a mobilidade das pessoas no espaço europeu e de terminar a construção do mercado único com uma verdadeira liberalização do setor dos serviços (e não a diretiva “meia-dose” aprovada em 2006), algo que seria um importante estímulo a países como Portugal. Infelizmente um dos fatores que mais contribui para o deficiente funcionamento da União Monetária não é só a inexistência de uma política orçamental comum, mas a falta de mobilidade intra-europeia do fator trabalho por razões legais, mas também culturais (ir de Portugal para a Alemanha não é a mesma coisa que deixar o Alabama e chegar à Califórnia) e econômicas, onde a elevada percentagem de posse de casa própria se destaca como fator restritivo. Mas o exemplo do Luís mostra também que na decisão de emigração ou de internacionalização das empresas, a redução das opções aos mercados e países da mesma herança cultural limita sem necessidade as possibilidades de sucesso. Vezes sem fim na minha carreira, falando com empresas portuguesas (e devo dizer também brasileiras) sempre vi expostas as mesmas prioridades e o mesmo racional. Não que ir para Angola, Moçambique ou Brasil seja em si mesmo necessariamente uma má opção. Mas pode apenas não ser a melhor. Temos um caso singular, aliás, no mundo empresarial português onde uma internacionalização fora dos mercados tradicionalmente priorizados tem conhecido grande sucesso como é o caso da Jerónimo Martins e a sua experiência polaca, sendo que agora a empresa escolheu a Colômbia em detrimento do Brasil como novo mercado para a empresa. Aliás, e apenas como curiosidade, o mercado que quase levou a empresa à falência no final dos anos 90 foi precisamente o brasileiro.

A outra questão tem também a ver com o modo como a internacionalização é feita. Para ser bem sucedida, entre outros fatores, ela normalmente requer um envolvimento profundo da direção da empresa, um processo dividido em fases de forma a reduzir o consumo de recursos financeiros e para melhor adequar os produtos ou serviços aos requisitos e preferências locais e a escolha dos gestores certos para liderar a empresa localmente.  Na minha experiência, foi, aliás, este último fator que mais vezes vi como responsável do insucesso de um processo de internacionalização. Desde aquele capítulo de alguns manuais de RH das empresas intitulado “quando não sabes o que fazer com o quadro envia-o para longe”, que normalmente traz maus resultados porque o profissional que não tem sucesso no mercado doméstico também não o terá no estrangeiro. Novos mercados requerem os melhores quadros à frente do negócio. Mas para enviar os melhores gestores para o estrangeiro, não é só necessário providenciar as necessárias condições econômicas durante a sua estadia (o que é óbvio), mas a forma como a organização integra essa experiência no plano de carreira. Ou seja, quais as condições de regresso do quadro (o que já não é de todo óbvio). Muitos profissionais de grande valor e ambição hesitam em ser mandados para o exterior, pois temem o período em que ficam fora do centro de poder da empresa e logo de decisões de promoção e de avanço na carreira. Isto sem falar nos profissionais contratados localmente desligados de qualquer ligação à cultura de empresa. O caso mais notável de sucesso que vi na gestão desta problemática, e com tanto mais valor dado tratar-se de uma empresa familiar, é o Grupo Odebrecht que com sucesso se tem expandido no mundo mantendo intacta a sua cultura empresarial.

Regressando ao Luís, apenas um desejo. Forte sucesso em Penang.

 

Publicado no Jornal Público de 20/01/13