On the heels of the Pacific Alliance's May 2013 summit meeting in California, Julia Sweig reflects on the significance of this new regional trade bloc and on the implications of Brazil's foreign trade and investment agenda.
The recent announcement of a BRICS development bank raised many questions. Isobel Coleman writes about the potential structure and purpose of the BRICS development bank and its implications for international development and the global economy.
Asked by Fagner Dantas, from Universidade Federal da Bahia
The Brazilian government faces a number of challenges and opportunities concerning its economic forecast in the coming years. After peaking at 7.5 percent growth in 2010, Brazil's recent economic slowdown has caused worry that the dream of a new high-growth economy had slipped out of reach.
Asked by Fagner Dantas, from Universidade Federal da Bahia
The global energy map is being redrawn at an accelerated pace. All signs point to the United States becoming part of an increasingly hemispheric energy trade, both for oil as well as for biofuels like ethanol. The Middle East will still loom large in U.S. energy policy given its crucial role in the world oil market, but U.S. energy officials and companies are forging deeper ties with their counterparts elsewhere in the Americas.
Since 1988, Brazilians have cleared more than 153,000 square miles of Amazonian rain forest, devastating the environment and driving global climate change forward ever faster. Recently, however, Brazil has changed its course, reducing the rate of deforestation by 83 percent since 2004. At the same time, it has become a test case for a controversial international climate-change prevention strategy that places a monetary value on the carbon stored in forests.
Julia E. Sweig assesses the recent shift in Mexico's narrative under the newly inaugurated president, Enrique Peña Nieto, and the implications of this shift for Brazil.
Over the past several years, the most talked-about trend in the global economy has been the so-called rise of the rest, which saw the economies of many developing countries swiftly converging with those of their more developed peers.
Bernarndo Wjuniski interviewed by Christopher Alessi
While a new round of U.S. quantitative easing will have a negative impact on emerging markets like Brazil, the country should not blame U.S. monetary policy for the structural flaws in its economy, says expert Bernardo Wjuniski.
Authors: Shannon K. O'Neil, Richard Lapper, Larry Rohter, Ronaldo Lemos, and Ruchir Sharma
Brazil's rise never depended on the sale of commodities, and thanks to recent reforms, the country will continue to prosper, write Shannon O'Neil, Richard Lapper, and Larry Rohter. Ronaldo Lemos, meanwhile, claims that those reforms have not gone far enough.
After emerging from the 2008 financial crisis relatively unscathed, Brazil's inevitable entrance into the club of major global powers is increasingly accepted. CFR's Stewart M. Patrick and Carlos Simonsen Leal of the Brazilian Getulio Vargas Foundation discuss Brazil's perspective on global finance and international security.
The Council on Foreign Relations' David Rockefeller Studies Program—CFR's "think tank"—is home to more than seventy full-time, adjunct, and visiting scholars and practitioners (called "fellows"). Their expertise covers the world's major regions as well as the critical issues shaping today's global agenda. Download the printable CFR Experts Guide.
Special operations play a critical role in how the United States confronts irregular threats, but to have long-term strategic impact, the author argues, numerous shortfalls must be addressed.
The author analyzes the potentially serious consequences, both at home and abroad, of a lightly overseen drone program and makes recommendations for improving its governance.
Two experts argue that despite myriad development strategies, only one can succeed in alleviating poverty in India: the overall growth of the country's economy. More