Abstract
This article analyzes Brazilian civil–military relations using a framework that directs attention to the institutions of not only democratic civilian control, but also of military effectiveness and efficiency. The article argues that democratic civilian control over the armed forces in Brazil is exercised by a wide variety of mechanisms, many of which are not specifically designed for this purpose, but are instead part of a vast array of institutions that exercise control and oversight over public bureaucracies in general. Military prerogatives that were once high are now moderate or low, and there is currently no question of civilian control of the armed forces. However, several questions remain regarding the effectiveness of the armed forces. The article also emphasizes the importance of civilian staff assuming responsibilities in defense, as they have in virtually all other areas of government policy.
Introduction
The literature on civil–military relations is rich, especially as it relates to the important case of Brazil. This article 1 seeks to contribute to that literature by reassessing the level of civilian control of the military in Brazil. However, focusing solely on control is inadequate. As David Pion-Berlin stated, “If democracy is to survive and flourish in today's world, it must strike a balance between controlling the armed forces and ensuring their effectiveness” (Pion-Berlin 2006: ix).
The views expressed in this article are the authors’ alone and do not necessarily represent those of the Department of Navy or the Department of Defense.
Therefore, we also analyze Brazil's civil-military relations utilizing a conceptual framework that we believe captures not only the status of the armed forces within the democratic regime, but also the capabilities of the armed forces; that is, their effectiveness. Finally, we examine efficiency, which we define as the presence of institutions that a state can employ to monitor and control expenditures of public resources. We believe that our analysis will allow researchers to better understand the current reality of Brazilian civil–military relations.
Our analysis finds its origins in Max Weber's work on the relationship between political power and bureaucracy. 2 We use a modern version of that theory, New Institutionalism. The question is not whether institutions matter, but how they matter and in what circumstances. For the purposes of this article, we will use the following definition of institutions: “formal or informal procedures, routines, norms, and conventions embedded in the organizational structure of the polity or political economy” (Hall and Taylor 1996: 936).
We elaborate on this point in Bruneau and Tollefson 2006: 5–8.
Our assumption is that as dynamics change within a polity, so do institutions. It is important to examine the relationship between institutions in order to understand political power – which is, after all, a relational concept. In the case of Brazil, much has changed since the military gave up power in 1985 and moved from being the government to an institution. What has changed? What institutions have emerged in the power relationship between civilians and the military, and how have they affected our understanding of control, effectiveness, and efficiency?
The Need for Analysis
The available literature in English on the topic of civil–military relations in Brazil is somewhat polemical. Some authors, including Jorge Zaverucha and Flávio Da Cunha Rezende (2009), emphasize continuity with the non-democratic past, 1964 until 1985, when the military was the government. Other authors, such as Wendy Hunter (1997), highlight the break of the military from the past in the context of democratic politics. 3 Additionally, while there is much recent literature in English on national aspirations, defense policy, and the like, with an emphasis on Brazil ultimately overcoming the legacy of “the land of the future, and always will be,” this literature fails to deal with the institutions – the structures and processes of national defense – through which the State could implement the published strategies and fulfill its stated aspirations. 4
For the former perspective, see also Martins Filho and Zirker (1996 and 2008). For the latter perspective, see also Castro and D'Araujo 2001: Introdução. New and high-quality analysis in Portuguese and Spanish includes D'Araujo, Fuccille, and Saint Pierre.
For example, the work of Joám Evans Pim, entitled Brazilian Defence Policies: Current Trends and Regional Implications, is informative. However, it provides minimal information on what instruments Brazil has available to implement a military or defense strategy. More recently, Daniel Flemes and Alcides Costa Vaz (2011) published Security Policies of India, Brazil and South Africa – Regional Security Contexts as Constraints for a Common Agenda, which neglects information on Brazilian military capabilities.
It is commonplace to state, as President Lula did in 2003, that Brazil is ready to “assume its greatness” (Brands 2010: 6). A huge outpouring of reports and documents has presented Brazil as a regional, if not global, actor; one of the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, and China) countries; an important interlocutor with the United States; and more. For example, on 21 November 2010, the then-US Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates, and the Brazilian Minister of Defense, Nelson Jobim, signed a Security of Military Information Agreement. Recent significant US government documents have highlighted Brazil's importance. As President Barack Obama's National Security Strategy stated, “We welcome Brazil's leadership and seek to move beyond dated North-South divisions to pursue progress on bilateral, hemispheric, and global issues” (2010: 44). In their most recent twenty-year prospective, the US National Intelligence Council stated, “Brazil will play an outsized role on the region's future. Its resources and scale could offer benefits and insulation others lack” (National Intelligence Council 2012: 82). In addition to the Congressional Research Service, which issues periodic reports on Brazil, many important US and European think tanks and non-governmental organizations have published reports heralding Brazil's emergence into greatness as a country with the fifth largest landmass and population and the sixth largest economy in the world (see, for example, the works of Meyer 2013; Einaudi 2011; Flemes and Costa Vaz 2011).
Until the mid-1990s, the Brazilian government made few official statements on national defense. According to President Fernando Henrique Cardoso, “in 1996, for the first time in Brazilian history, the basics of National Defense Policy were defined” (Cardoso 2002: 333). Since then, the Brazilian Government has published three documents dealing with civil–military relations and national defense. The first was the Estratégia Nacional de Defesa (END), or National Defense Strategy, a decree law drafted by Minister of Defense Nelson Jobim and Minister of Strategic Affairs Roberto Mangabeira Unger and signed by President Lula in December 2008, and updated in 2012. This was followed by the Política Nacional de Defesa, or National Defense Policy, drafted by Minister of Defense Celso Amorim. Most recently, Minister Amorim drafted the Livro Branco de Defesa Nacional, or White Book of National Defense. These three documents were presented by President Dilma Rousseff to the Brazilian Congress in early 2012. The documents, one following after another, are a major change since the political transition in 1985.
There is indeed much going on in Brazil pertaining to the general areas of national defense. The Brazilian Navy is currently building a nuclear-powered submarine and there is a new law pertaining to the defense industry with potentially large implications for domestic firms. Brazil's hosting of two of the most important global events, the FIFA World Cup in 2014 and the Olympics in 2016, has obvious implications for the use of national defense institutions, technology, and deployed military personnel during these events. The armed forces have been playing a role in pacifying the favelas in Rio de Janeiro in anticipation of these events. Brazil was the leading promoter and principal founder of both the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) and the South American Defense Council, with the latter created in Salvador, Bahia, on 16 December 2008.
In the context of democratic Brazil, it is very significant that there has been a major increase in scholarly and popular interest in issues of national defense. The evidence includes the Frente Parlamentar de Defesa, which had 120 members in the 2014 legislature. The Pro-Defesa program of the Ministério da Educação e Cultura (MEC), the Ministry of Education and Culture, and the Ministry of Defense (MOD), encourages and provides funding for joint projects between military and civilian educational institutions. In addition, there has been a great increase in the number of military officers obtaining advanced degrees (masters and doctorates), and civilian professors and students engaged in topics of national defense. An epistemic community is emerging in Brazil that is focused on issues of security and defense, both domestically and regionally. The Associação Brasileira de Estudos de Defesa (ABED; Brazilian Association of Defense Studies), which was founded in October 2005, has held annual conferences in São Carlos (2007), Niterói (2008), Londrina (2009), Brasília (2010), Fortaleza (2011), São Paulo (2012), and Belém (August 2013). The 2012 conference, held in São Paulo, had over 700 attendees. Recently, ABED began publishing a journal, the Revista Brasileira de Estudos de Defesa.
There are currently two centers, in Niterói and Porto Alegre, that are formally recognized by Coordenação de Aperfeicoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES), (Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel), in the MEC, specializing in themes of national defense. There are several other similar programs that have not yet been formally recognized. In addition, there are at least half a dozen non-governmental blogs that deal with national defense. The Revista Eletrônica de Estratégia Brasileira de Segurança e Defesa (The Electronic Journal of Brazilian Security and Defense Strategy) is one of the many publications that discusses issues of defense and security. Today, there is unprecedented interest in the executive and legislative level, among Brazilian society and academia, and among observers abroad on issues concerning national defense; all of this is taking place in the context of a democracy. As far as we can ascertain, however, even with this recent attention and activity, the analysis of civil – military relations in Brazil does not extend beyond a narrow focus on control.
Democratic Consolidation in Brazil
Despite early negative prognoses by prominent scholars regarding the (poor) potential for democratic consolidation in Brazil, there is no doubt that Brazil today is a consolidated democracy. Examples of pessimism include Juan J. Linz and Alfred Stepan, who bluntly stated that “Brazil is a case of unconsolidated democracy” (1996: 187). Also, Terry Karl and Philippe Schmitter stated, “In the former four cases [Brazil, Ecuador, Paraguay and Turkey], the transition has been drawn out, real limits have been placed on the extent of democratization, and consolidation seems very difficult to reach” (1991: 280).
The current democratic consolidation can be documented in any number of different ways. Since the establishment of the Constituent Assembly, which resulted in the Constitution of 1988, virtually all of the amendments have been in the direction of further democratic consolidation. 5 Bruneau is happy that in his writing in the late 1980s he did not rule out the positive democratization that would later take place. Bruneau stated, “it seems likely that Brazilian democracy will continue on its haphazard and complex journey with much attention and energy devoted to political activities” (Bruneau 1991: 279). Indeed, it has.
For extensive details on this expanding process of democratization, see the chapter by Sadek and Cavalcanti (2003).
There have been free and fair elections since the 1988 Constitution for all levels of government in this federative republic. Presidential elections were held in 1989, 1994, 1998, 2002, 2006, and 2010, with further elections also scheduled for late 2014. Congressional elections were held in 1990, 1994, 1998, 2002, 2006, and 2010, and are also scheduled for 2014. The National Congress is bi-cameral. The 513 members of the Chamber of Deputies (Câmara dos Deputados) are elected for four-year terms. The 81 Senators from the Federal Senate (Senado Federal) are elected for eight-year terms, with one-third of the Senate seats determined in a Congressional election, followed by two-thirds in the subsequent election. Elections at the gubernatorial, state, and municipal level were held in 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004, 2008, and 2012, and gubernatorial elections are scheduled for 2014.
The rigor and transparency of Brazil's electoral system is the envy of many older democracies. Power at the presidential level has been transferred from an upper-class moderate Social Democrat, Fernando Henrique Cardoso, to a lower-class member of the Workers’ Party (Partido dos Trabalhadores, PT), Luiz Inácio “Lula” da Silva, and then to a former insurgent against the military regime, Dilma Rousseff, also from the PT. Voter participation in the presidential and congressional elections has been uniformly high since 1990, hovering around the 80 percent mark. In the 2010 elections, the voter turnout was 78.50 percent for the Presidency, and 81.88 percent for Congress (International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance). However, it should be noted that voting is compulsory in Brazil.
On 25 October 2011, Brazil's Senate passed the Freedom of Information Law. According to Freedom House, this was a:
landmark step towards improving press freedom in Brazil. The bill would secure citizens the right to information on public agencies, including budgets, salaries, staffing, and internal reports, as well as protections to whistleblowers (Freedom House 2011).
Under President Rousseff, Brazil created a Truth Commission to investigate alleged human rights abuses (torture, forced disappearances, murders, and other violations) between 1964 and 1985. The seven-member panel was given two years to look into cases of torture and tasked with issuing a report. The Commission has been given complete access to government documents, has broad subpoena powers, and can name those who violated human rights. However, the Commission lacks prosecutorial power, and is limited by the 1979 Amnesty Law (Freedom House 2012).
Freedom House ranks Brazil “free” in terms of political rights and civil liberties (Freedom House 2013). In short, there is currently no doubt that Brazil is a consolidated democracy, and, that democracy is deepening. Civil–military relations have evolved in the context of this broad democratic deepening.
A central element of the democratic deepening is the diminishment of the military prerogatives, so usefully formulated for comparative purposes by Alfred Stepan in his influential book entitled Rethinking Military Politics: Brazil and the Southern Cone (1988). It seems obvious, at least in retrospect, that politicians have several incentives to diminish the prerogatives of the military, thereby increasing their own power, as elected representatives, and those of the civilian institutions they have created and in which they operate. In our view, Wendy Hunter had it right: Elected civilian politicians have incentives to whittle down military prerogatives, which they did (Hunter 1997).
Stepan ranked military prerogatives in Brazil as “high”; indeed, higher than the other countries he analyzed, which included Argentina, Spain, and Uruguay (Stepan 1988: 122). 6 Today, more than 25 years later, if we look at his eleven prerogatives we find a very different situation, in which most of the military prerogatives are actually low. In all cases, we see a tremendous emphasis on legal instruments – the 1988 Constitution and subsequent laws, as Brazilians seek to overcome the arbitrary and, at the most generous, formally legal workings of the military regime. 7 The following section briefly examines the eleven military prerogatives.
It should be noted that Zaverucha (2000: 37) reviews 15 prerogatives and updates Stepan's analysis without finding much difference from 1988.
It is noteworthy that the organizational chart of the Ministry of Defense lists at the top of the page the legal bases for the ministry. See Ministério da Defesa (2014).
Selected Prerogatives of Military as Institution in a Democratic Regime, Brazil from 1946 to 2014
Source: Adapted from Stepan 1988: 93–114, especially table 7.1 and page 103. “Close to high” for 1969–1972 is interpreted as “high”. For 1985–1987, variables 8 and 10 “were reduced” (page 103) according to Stepan, and are placed here in the moderate category. Authors’ update based on documents and interviews in Brazil with civilians and military officers in 2012 and 2013, and by e-mail in 2014.
Prerogative #1: Constitutionally sanctioned independent role of the military in political system. According to Stepan, this prerogative is low when “Military actions to bolster internal security are only undertaken when ordered by the appropriate executive official within a framework established by legal system and the legislature” (Stepan 1988: 94). Today, Brazil's rating in this category is low. Many of the changes in military prerogatives result from the founding of a civilian-led Ministry of Defense (MOD) by President Fernando Henrique Cardoso by Complementary Law 97 of 9 June 1999. The armed services no longer enjoy cabinet rank and are now under the MOD. The fact that the MOD was created by a complementary law is very important since this type of law requires that both the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies pass the law by absolute majorities which is 50 percent plus one vote (which meant 257 out of 513 in the Chamber, 42 out of 81 in the Senate), and then signed by the president. More recently, the MOD's powers were expanded and further specified in Complementary Law 136 of 25 August 2010.
Prerogative #2: Military relationship to the chief executive. Stepan wrote that this prerogative is low when “Chief executive (president, prime minister, or constitutional monarch) is de jure and de facto commander-in-chief” (Stepan 1988: 94). This prerogative is also currently low in Brazil. Since 1985, all of Brazil's presidents have been civilians. Since 1989, the presidents have been elected by the population in national elections every four years. The MOD, headed by a civilian, channels demands from the armed services.
Prerogative #3: Coordination of defense sector. To Stepan, this prerogative is low when that coordination is done:
De jure and de facto […] by Cabinet-level official (normally a civilian appointed by chief executive) who controls a staff with extensive participation by professional civil servants or civilian political appointees (Stepan 1988: 94).
The military maintains “moderate” prerogatives in this area in Brazil due to the paucity of civilian expertise in the MOD. Insofar as the coordination of the defense sector is defined by the central documents on national defense, it is the civilians who take the lead. This responsibility is made very clear in Complementary Law 136 of 25 August 2010, and it should be noted that the Strategic Defense Strategy (END) was the responsibility of two civilians: Minister of Defense Nelson Jobim, and the Minister of Strategic Affairs, Roberto Mangabeira Unger. According to a longtime military observer of Brazil, “[T]he National Strategic Defense Plan [END] is the most significant expression of civilian control of the military in Brazil” (Linwood Ham 2009: 26).
Prerogative #4: Active duty military participation in the Cabinet. This prerogative is low, in Stepan's analysis, when there is normally no active duty military participation in the cabinet (Stepan 1988: 95). This rating is currently low in Brazil. Of the 27 members of the current cabinet, none is military. The minister of defense is a civilian. Furthermore, the president herself, Dilma Rousseff, and the minister of sports, Aldo Rebelo, had been insurgents against the military regime of 1964–1985. Only one of the fourteen officials in the expanded cabinet, the head of the Secretariat for Institutional Security, GSI, is a member of the military – and a retired one at that (army general), with no uniform and with no ministry.
Prerogative #5: Role of Legislature. According to Stepan, this prerogative is low when:
Most major policy issues affecting military budgets, force structure, and new weapons initiatives are monitored by the legislature. Cabinet-level officials and chief aides routinely appear before legislative committees to defend and explain policy initiatives and to present legislation (Stepan 1988: 95).
Today, the role of the Brazilian Congress in all areas of governance, including the armed forces, is high, which means the military prerogatives are low. All of the key legislation, which implies the commitment in allocating funds, must pass both houses of the congress. Then, the Congress calls special investigatory committees to review all issues. Finally, all major policies emanating from the MOD are submitted to Congress – not for approval, but for review. Any concerns are communicated by Congress to the executive branch.
Prerogative #6: Role of senior career civil servants or civilian political appointees. To Stepan, this prerogative is low when a:
Professional cadre of highly informed civil servants or policy-making civilian political appointees play a major role in assisting [the] executive branch in designing and implementing defense and national security policy (Stepan 1988: 95).
This prerogative is moderate. The civilian bureaucracy in Brazil is unequivocally strong. However, as there is no civilian career track, nor the required concurso (public academic competition) in the MOD – and with few civilians having expertise – the military fills a vacuum and thereby assumes larger roles in the MOD itself. The Planning Ministry is the entity that could create civilian career positions, but it has not done so to date due to a lack of funds. From what we have been able to determine, the issue is mostly financial rather than political.
Prerogative #7: Role in intelligence. For Stepan, this prerogative is low when “Peak intelligence agencies [are] de jure and de facto controlled by civilian chains of command.” In addition, there are “Strong civilian review boards” (Stepan 1988: 96). This prerogative is also moderate in Brazil today. The Serviço Nacional de Informações (SNI) National Information Service, which was the military regime's intelligence service, was abolished by President Collor in 1990. It was replaced in 1999 by the Agência Brasileira de Inteligência (ABIN), the Brazilian Intelligence Agency, which is led by a civilian who is nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate. However, ABIN reports to the Minister Chief of the GSI, who is a general (retired) officer in the Brazilian Army. The Brazilian Military Intelligence system is also generally intact.
Prerogative #8: Role in police. This prerogative is low when, according to Stepan, “Police [are] under control of nonmilitary ministry or local officials”, and there are “No active-duty military allowed to command a police unit” (Stepan 1988: 96). This prerogative is moderate in Brazil. The control of the Polícia Militar (PM), or Military Police, is a state responsibility, under the democratically elected civilian governors of the states. The Polícia Federal (PF), or Federal Police, is under the Ministry of Justice. The domestic roles of the armed forces in Brazil are defined in the Constitution of 1988, in Article 142, and in subsequent laws. The conditions are very precisely defined in Complementary Law 97 of 9 June 1999. Specifically, a state governor, who is responsible for security in the state, can make a request to the president of the Republic that the armed forces be used to support the police (Mendes 2012: 19–27).
The armed forces have been used since 1988 in Rio de Janeiro State to support local police in Pacification Police Units (UPP), in an attempt to control drug traffickers and other criminal elements in 38 shantytowns favelas. On 21 March 2013, the governor of Rio de Janeiro, Sérgio Cabral, asked the federal government to support local police in seeking control of the Maré favela in Rio de Janeiro, in preparation for the FIFA World Cup. Justice Minister José Eduardo Cardozo announced that the armed forces would support local police to “guarantee law and order.”
In addition, the Brazilian armed forces have police powers along the border, to within 150 kilometers from the border. This police power is exercised especially in the Amazon, where the Brazilian Army is often the sole representative of the State along the porous borders. The total amount of land that corresponds to the 150-kilometer corridor is actually larger than any other single country in South America apart from Argentina.
In the strictest interpretation of this prerogative, as defined by Stepan above, Brazil's military rates low. However, the continued use of the military in police functions counters the spirit of civilian control in this area. This blurred line between external defense and internal security is not unique to Brazil, of course, but the push-pull that leads to the military's involvement in state and local policing emphasizes the need for institutional strengthening.
Prerogative #9: Role in military promotions. According to Stepan, this prerogative is low when the:
Legislature has discussed and approved promotion law. Professional military promotion board makes recommendation to Cabinet-level officials who in turn make recommendations to [the] executive. Executive not typically constrained in selection of major policy-making posts (Stepan 1988: 96).
Brazil's current rating in this respect is moderate. In Complementary Law no. 136 of 25 August 2010, the authority to recommend general officers for promotion and assignment was transferred from the service commanders to the minister of defense, who recommends the promotions to the president for nomination. The services do submit their promotion lists to the minister of defense, who rarely changes the list, but does retain veto power (Skora Rosty 2011: 14).
Prerogative #10: Role in state enterprises. To Stepan, this prerogative is low when “Only exceptionally does an active-duty military officer head a state enterprise” (Stepan 1988: 97). In Brazil, this is currently low. Fundamentally, the state enterprise sector has been significantly decreased in size and importance (Fishlow 2011: 50–61). An example of this is Embraer (Empresa Brasileira de Aeronáutica), which was created in 1969 as a government-controlled aircraft manufacturer. In December 1994, Embraer was privatized under President Fernando Henrique Cardoso in “one of the most successful instances of neoliberal privatization policy” (Gonzales 2012). Today, active-duty officers do not head state enterprises as sinecures. Rather than providing jobs to senior officers, politicians are putting their own people into the senior positions as rewards or to seal political bargains. They are mainly PT or close political allies.
Prerogative #11: Role in legal system. According to Stepan, this prerogative is low when the:
Military have almost no legal jurisdiction outside of narrowly defined internal offenses against military discipline. In all areas outside this domain, civilians and military are subject to civil laws and civil courts (Stepan 1988: 97).
Brazil's rating here is low. Although the military still has its own legal system, its writ does not extend beyond, to civilian areas, except in that which specifically concerns crimes against the military organization. Also, this separate system is currently being scrutinized, with the head of the Federal Supreme Tribunal (the highest civilian court) criticizing the military system. 8 Further, due to the powers of the Ministério Público (Public Ministry), to be discussed below, the powers of all government entities, including the armed forces, are under scrutiny.
We are beholden to Angela Moreira Domingues da Silva for her invaluable information on this topic. Her doctoral dissertation, listed in the references, is on the topic of military justice.
In sum, Brazil is clearly a consolidated democracy and operates similarly to other consolidated democracies. Furthermore, the military prerogatives outlined by Alfred Stepan more than 25 years ago, have been whittled down substantially, again demonstrating that Brazil operates similarly to other democracies, this time in the realm of civil–military relations. The prerogatives were useful in describing the role of the military in non-democratic regimes, and during the process of transition, but are less useful during consolidation. And, most importantly for the purposes of this article, they focus exclusively on control. As Stepan states:
[F]or our purposes, the dimension of military institutional prerogatives refers to those areas where, whether challenged or not, the military as an institution assumes they have an acquired right or privilege, formal or informal, to exercise effective control over its internal governance, to play a role within extramilitary areas within the state apparatus, or even to structure relationships between the state and political or civil society (Stepan 1988: 93; emphasis added).
Democratic civilian control is one thing, but the ability of the Brazilian military to fulfill roles and missions is another. We believe that the framework presented below allows us to better analyze the main elements of civil–military relations in contemporary Brazil, including not only civilian control, but also military effectiveness and efficiency.
The Absence of Civilian Incentives as Brazil “Has No Enemies”
While the civilian politicians have clear incentives to diminish military prerogatives, and thereby strengthen the democracy as well as increase their own powers, there are currently no perceived major threats requiring military capabilities. A widely held perception is that Brazil has no enemies. Brazil is considered a “geopolitically satisfied” country with no major border disputes with its neighbors. This is significant, considering that Brazil shares a border with ten countries in South America. Also significant is the fact that the “geopolitically frustrated” countries in South America, which include at least Argentina (Falklands/Malvinas), Bolivia (exit to the sea, or salida al mar), and Venezuela (territorial claims to the Essequibo River), are not “frustrated” in relation to Brazil. Thus, Brazil occupies an enviable position in the world: it shares borders with many nations, but has no major geopolitical issues with any of them.
Furthermore, Brazil's rivalry with Argentina has largely dissipated. The rivalry peaked in the late 1970s and early 1980s, as the military regimes in both countries viewed each other's missile and nuclear programs with profound suspicion. Competition also extended to riverine resources, as Brazil's bid for hydroelectric power along the Paraná River was met with protests by the Argentine government. Brazil's defense posture at the time was driven in large measure by its rivalry with Argentina. In the final years of the military regimes and especially under civilian presidents, Brazil and Argentina began to cooperate in trade and even in the nuclear and missile arenas, creating an almost textbook example of cooperation. Today, together in UNASUR, Argentina and Brazil enjoy mostly harmonious relations.
This privileged position is vividly captured in a blunt statement in a March 2002 interview with Brazil's Minister of Defense at the time, José Viegas Filho. In response to the question, “Is Brazil immune to terrorism?” he stated:
No one can say that they are immune to terrorism. But if you were to draw up a list of countries that are vulnerable to this problem, Brazil would certainly be in one of the lowest rankings. Brazil has no enemies. There is not one country in the world that hates us or is prejudiced against us (Correio Brasiliense 2003).
Current corroboration for this view can be found in the END of 2008, which states in the introduction: “Brazil is a peaceful country, by tradition and conviction. It lives in peace with its neighbors” (Ministério de Defesa 2008: 8). And, in the same Defense Strategy, under the guidelines section: “Presently, Brazil does not have any enemies” (Ministério de Defesa 2008: 16). If Brazil has no enemies, then why would citizens vote for politicians who say they are going to use tax-generated funds for national security and defense when there are so many other demands in the socio-economic areas? We think this point is clearly illustrated in the retrospect of President Fernando Henrique Cardoso's two terms in office. In Brazil 1994–2002: The Era of the Real, only five of the 397 pages are devoted to defense (Presidência da República 2002). The overwhelming emphasis in this retrospect is on social and economic progress. It must also be remembered that President Cardoso created the MOD in 1999, with important implications for asserting civilian control as noted above under prerogative #1.
There is a widely held consensus among the elite and the general population about the country's peaceful vocation. As Luis Bitencourt and Alcides Costa Vaz state in the executive summary of their report on Brazilian Strategic Culture:
Peace is thus the strategic and cultural norm; it involves active engagement by the State via alliances, diplomacy, economic developments, and trade partnerships. The Brazilian National Defense Strategy underscores and builds perceptions of security upon peace and the peaceful resolution of conflicts. It is remarkable that the first word in the Brazilian National Defense Strategy of 2008 is ‘peace’. This key document states that ‘peace is the main goal of this strategy.’ In general, Brazilians believe that they are a peaceful people, and that peace is an ingrained cultural value (Bitencourt and Costa Vaz 2009: 4).
The view of peace as a vocation is supported by the public's general perception. As the Pew Global Attitudes Project states:
Brazilians also have an upbeat view of how their country is perceived abroad. Eight-in-ten believe that people in other countries around the world generally like Brazil, while only 18% say Brazil is generally disliked. Among the 22 counties included in the spring 2010 Pew Global Attitudes survey, Brazilians are among the most likely to think their country is well-regarded by others around the globe (Pew Research Center 2010: 17–18).
These peaceful perceptions, which are widely shared by all social strata in Brazil, hold important implications for the use of the armed forces, and other security institutions, and for civil–military relations in general. There are minimal incentives for civilian politicians to be concerned about national defense and security issues. As Brazilian Army Colonel Skora Rosty stated, “[…] the media and public opinion are excessively critical about spending money on defense matters” (Skora Rosty 2011: 12). Domestically, the country is a consolidated democracy, including in its civil–military relations. Internationally, while the country may have vague or ambiguous aspirations, there is minimal threat perception that might motivate increased attention to the armed forces. This positive perception of Brazil and its global situation holds important implications for the commitment of resources – attention, political capital, money, and personnel – to the security sector. These facts, centered on this argument, are delineated below in terms of our framework for the analysis of civil–military relations.
A Framework for the Analysis of Civil–Military Relations
It is easy to understand why politicians and scholars would initially focus on civil–military relations from a single perspective, as exclusively democratic control of armed forces, if we recall the classic dilemma captured in the phrase: “Who guards the guardians?” Any armed force strong enough to defend a country is also strong enough to take over a government; that is, to stage a coup. This is the assumption behind most analyses of civil–military relations, which not only leads into military governments, but also out of them. The issue is all the more important in those states, which includes Brazil, where the military served as the government between the years of 1964 and 1985. However, control alone is not sufficient to begin to describe and analyze contemporary civil–military relations. For this reason, the authors have formulated a framework that includes not only control, but also effectiveness and efficiency. This framework has been put forth in five refereed publications, in which it has been applied to the United States and four South American countries, utilized by Chilean scholars in the analysis of civil–military relations in Chile (Flisfisch and Robledo 2012), and even figures in President-elect Michelle Bachelet's Programa de Gobierno, 2014–2018, Chile de todos (Bachelet 2013: 151).
Control
In order to put the first dimension (control) on an empirical basis, we conceptualize democratic civilian control in terms of the following control mechanisms: (1) institutions, (2) oversight, and (3) professional norms. Institutional control mechanisms involve providing direction and guidance for the security forces that may be exercised through organic laws and other regulations that empower the civilian leadership and civilian-led organizations with professional staff. The latter normally includes a ministry of defense for the military, one or more committees in the legislature that deal with policies and budgets, and a chain of authority for civilians to determine roles and missions, such as a National Security Council-type organization (Bruneau 2011: 50–76).
Oversight must be exercised by the civilian leadership in order to keep track of what the security forces do, and to ensure they are following the direction and guidance they have received from the civilian politicians. Professional norms are institutionalized through legally approved and transparent policies for recruitment, education, training, and promotion in the armed forces in accordance with the goals of the democratically elected civilian leadership, thereby internalizing the previous two control mechanisms (that is, institutions and oversight).
These three sets of control mechanisms can be utilized by democratically elected civilians to exercise control over security forces. Indeed, in well-established democracies, they are. However, as we believe there is more involved in security and democracy, we must also consider effectiveness and efficiency.
Effectiveness
It must be acknowledged that it is extremely difficult to measure effectiveness. While there are (limited) cases in which the effectiveness of the security sector in fulfilling roles and missions can be demonstrated, we believe that effectiveness is generally best determined by whether the security institutions are prepared to fulfill any or all of the roles assigned to them. We have identified six major roles and missions that contemporary armed forces implement. They are: (1) fight and be prepared to fight wars, (2) fight and be prepared to fight internal wars, (3) counter-terrorism, (4) support police forces in fighting crime, (5) peace support operations, and (6) humanitarian assistance (see Matei 2013: 26–38).
War-fighting is the one role that may have obvious benchmarks of success, and for which preparedness can be empirically evaluated to some degree through tactical and larger-scale exercises. Finding realistic measures of success for other roles is difficult. Even regarding war-fighting, when countries prepare to defend themselves or their allies against external enemies, the greatest indicator of success will probably be the avoidance of armed combat, whether this is due to the perception that the defenders possess overwhelming force, success in the use of diplomatic tools, or the integration of an aggressor into an alliance that mitigates ambitions or grievances.
The difficulty of proving effectiveness can be seen below. The best recent example is probably the Cold War, which never became particularly “hot” directly between the United States and the Soviet Union thanks to the mutual deterrence imposed by the two sides’ nuclear arsenals. Effectiveness in other roles and missions is very opaque and difficult to measure. Internal wars have deep and historical, economic, political, and social causes that cannot be resolved by force of arms alone. Fighting tends to drag on, and it is all but impossible for either side to ever declare “victory.” Global terrorism differs from internal conflict in that the former is a tactic and has no finite locale such as a state to defend or defeat. Therefore, the fight against global terrorism can be considered successful when no attack occurs. However, it is impossible to know whether the absence of an attack was due to effective security measures or because the terrorists simply chose not to attack. Nor is there a clear moment when it will be safe to say that terrorism has been defeated. Fighting crime is ongoing, as is the provision of humanitarian assistance. Neither criminals nor natural disasters are ever going to disappear. These challenges are a matter of anticipation, preparation, and mitigation, with the goal of keeping the level of crime or loss of life and property within acceptable limits (leaving aside the question of defining the term “acceptable”). With regard to peace support operations, the problem is similar. If conflicts between parties arise due to religious, ethnic, or political grievances, and require intervention by foreign security forces, the troops’ presence in itself will not resolve the fundamental causes behind the fighting. Rather, they may provide some stability, separate the antagonists, and allow space for negotiations.
We must be realistic about what is required in order for security measures to be effective, as well as our ability to measure this effectiveness and to explain success or failure. Under these circumstances, based on our research and studies of what is necessary, although perhaps not sufficient, we posit three basic requirements for security forces to be effective in fulfilling any of the six abovementioned roles and missions. First, there must be a plan, which may take the form of a strategy or even a doctrine. Examples include national security strategies, national military strategies, white papers on security and defense, strategies for disaster relief, counterterrorism, and the like. Second, there must be structures and processes to both formulate and implement the plans. These include ministries of defense, national security councils, joint or general staffs, or other institutions that facilitate cooperation between civilians and the military, jointness and/or inter-agency coordination, as well as international cooperation. 9 Third, a country must commit resources (money, basically) to ensure it has sufficient equipment, trained forces, and other assets to implement the assigned roles and missions. It is difficult to imagine how a country could implement any of the above-mentioned roles and missions without all three of these components. 10
Bruneau has dealt with the importance of these institutions in the US in focusing specifically on the innovations of the Goldwater-Nichols Defense Reorganization Act of 1986. See Bruneau 2011: 80–87.
Although it is difficult to assess effectiveness, what comes out clearly from the preceding discussion is the importance of such institutions as a ministry of defense and a joint or general staff; these are critical to how well the security forces work. There is evidence from new, and even older NATO countries, such as Portugal and Spain, that they have created robust institutions, which are staffed by civilians who offer some level of expertise, and who can count on some career stability within the ministries, security councils, or other security-related institutions. These countries were compelled from outside (by NATO membership requirements) to recruit civilians and give them stable positions.
Efficiency
Efficiency in the use of resources refers to the ability to fulfill assigned roles and missions at an optimum cost. Measuring efficiency in the security sector is complicated by a variety of issues, including the variety of roles and missions; the difficulty of establishing measures of efficiency for any one function, let alone a combination of them; and the methodological challenges inherent in measuring efficiency. Therefore, efficiency represents in most cases a “red herring” in the field of security, in that its use, mainly in the field of defense economics, includes a great many undefined assumptions. Notwithstanding these challenges, we believe there is still a need for a set of institutions to allocate and oversee the application of resources as an integral element of democratic accountability and transparency.
Before addressing how to measure efficiency, it is first necessary to clarify the conceptual distinctions between effectiveness and efficiency, as the terms are often used interchangeably. A review of the literature in organization theory, political transitions and defense economics shows that terms such as effectiveness, efficiency, efficacy, and cost-effectiveness are often conflated and used inconsistently. While there is general agreement that effectiveness is the capacity to implement the policies formulated, with the desired results, efficiency (a concept that is strongly associated with physics, economics, and organizational theory) refers to getting the most out of a given input. In other words, efficiency in the use of resources refers to the ability to fulfill the assigned roles and missions at the optimum cost.
What can be measured in the area of security are the so-called hard data, such as the number of tanks or airplanes produced, or the number of troops trained or equipped at a given cost. What these indicators tell us about the efficiency of security, however, is at the very least limited and probably misleading. Nevertheless, policy makers may refer to them in order to make, or in most cases rationalize, decisions. All of the material that we have discovered in researching on measures of efficiency in the areas of national security and defense is based upon certain assumptions. Some scholars may be willing to make these assumptions, but we are not.
Rejecting pseudo-scientific methodologies to arrive at a precise figure for national security and defense, the use of public funds in a democracy demands that government agencies carry out systematic assessments of program costs and results. From Bruneau's research in the United States, he found that there are extremely extensive and elaborate institutional mechanisms to do precisely this (Bruneau 2013b: 39–47). These include, on the congressional side, the Government Accountability Office (GAO), Congressional Budget Office, Congressional Research Office, special auditing bodies such as the Special Inspector-General for Iraq Reconstruction, the Special Inspector-General for Afghan Reconstruction, and congressional hearings in general and via the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform; and, on the executive side, various inspectors general and the Office of Management and Budget. There is a very extensive spectrum of oversight mechanisms to assess not only the use of public funds, but also the success of government in achieving goals. Clearly, the most important is the GAO, which is the United States’ supreme audit institution (SAI).
Brazil in Terms of the Framework
Democratic Civilian Control
Institutional Basis: Ministry of Defense (MOD)
The MOD was established fourteen years after Brazil's democratic transition, with the passage of Complementary Law 97 on 9 June 1999. Between its creation in 1999 and the appointment of Nelson Jobim as minister of defense on 25 July 2007, the MOD was under very weak and erratic leadership, and did not develop as an institution. Since the ouster of Nelson Jobim by President Dilma Rousseff on 4 August 2011, the MOD has been headed by Ambassador Celso Amorim, who was foreign minister during both of the Lula da Silva administrations (2002–2010). Ambassador Amorim is a highly regarded bureaucrat with no back-ground in defense or national security. 11 Even under Minister Jobim, however, a civilian cadre of advisors was never established. There is no career track within the MOD, or the required concurso to fill positions, which results in civilians having minimal roles in the MOD. A constant theme in Brazilian Colonel Skora Rosty's Strategy Research Paper is the lack of prepared civilians to deal with security and defense in Brazil (Skora Rosty 2011: 8, 13, 21). Consequently, while Minister Amorim may be excellent as an individual, cabinet member, and strategic thinker, he is almost alone as a civilian in the Ministry of Defense. 12
According to Admiral Mario Cesar Flores, then Foreign Minister Celso Amorim did not participate in the drafting of the Estratégia Nacional de Defesa. Estado de São Paulo 31 August 2011: A-2.
For his thoughts on Brazil and international security, see Amorim 2013.
However, the lack of civilian expertise is less of an issue for democratic civilian control than for effectiveness, as we will see below, as there is a national security council-like institution, the Gabinete de Segurança Institucional (GSI) Secretariat for Institutional Security. This is an institutional mechanism whereby the democratically elected president exercises control over the security sector, including the armed forces (see Bruneau, Matei, and Sakoda 2009). There is also a series of other oversight institutions whereby the democratically elected executive and legislative bodies can enforce accountability, including the defense or security sector. Probably the most important of these is the Ministério Público (MP) or Federal Public Ministry. 13
In addition to Sadek and Cavalcanti (2003), see also the works of Matthew M. Taylor and Vinícius C. Buranelli (2007). They review the roles of four of what they term “Midlevel Institutions of Accountability in Brazil”, one of which is the Ministéro Público. The importance of the Public Ministry in intelligence oversight, which is even more difficult than oversight over the armed forces, is dealt with in Joanisval Brito Gonçalves (2012).
Oversight: Public Ministry
The Federal Public Ministry has received a great deal of attention in democratic Brazil as a mechanism to counter the well-known tradition of elite and government impunity. Albert Fishlow, a highly-respected foreign observer of Brazil, citing Fabio Kerche, wrote:
[…] the Public Ministry plays an important role in Brazilian political life and ‘is singular because it combines elements – autonomy, instruments of action, discretion and full array of attributes – that are not common in institutions with few characteristics of accountability’. This structure has become an integral part of the institutions undergirding an evolving democracy (Fishlow 2011: 23; Emphasis in original).
The Public Ministry is extremely powerful and autonomous in defending the public interest. All who are in public life in Brazil are aware of its immense powers, and it can act as a deterrent to public abuse, including in the area of national security and defense. This institution is quite rare in the world and must be taken into consideration when analyzing the autonomy and activities of any public institution, including the armed forces and intelligence agencies.
Professional Military Education
Professional Military Education (PME) is recognized in Brazil as being of high quality and is provided through an elaborate system at several levels. The three service academies concentrate on technical training. Further professional training, as well as education in policy and strategy, is offered at the intermediate schools. A higher level of education is available at the traditional Escola Superior de Guerra (ESG) Higher War College, in which senior military officers mix with civilians. However, there is limited joint education, as senior leadership in all of the services has resisted a broader joint education program.
Civilian control over PME is exerted in two ways. First, everyone who enters the military academies must pass a concurso, the content and evaluations of which are controlled by civilians. Secondly, the granting of some autonomy to the armed services themselves in PME is stipulated in the civilian-formulated and interpreted, via the MEC, Leis de Diretrizes e Bases de Educação Nacional, in Article 83. Furthermore, virtually all of the details are specified in specific agreements (portarias) between the armed services and the MEC.
In sum, democratic civilian control over the armed forces in Brazil is exercised by a wide variety of institutions, the most important of which are not specifically designed for this purpose, but are instead part of a vast array of institutions that exercise oversight and accountability over public bureaucracies. This is consistent with Max Weber's work on bureaucracies, and the more modern Weberian variant of New Institutionalism, which we have outlined in the introduction to our edited book (Bruneau and Tollefson 2006: 5–8). While the relationship between bureaucratic structure and civil–military relations is important in all cases, Brazil's path is different from other democratic regimes that were previously under military tutelage. Civilian control of the military and other security institutions such as Agência Brasileira de Inteligência (ABIN) are part of the ample set of institutions in which democratically elected civilians control all sectors of the state in Brazil. Recognizing this fact requires in-house insight and attention to identify these institutions and their roles. 14
For this reason, we are doubly grateful to a very large group of Brazilian policymakers and scholars who responded to our numerous queries for explanations on state oversight institutions.
Effectiveness
Strategy
In December 2008, the MOD formulated and President Lula decreed the Estratégia Nacional de Defesa (END). However, because the END was created by decree and thus did not go through the Brazilian Congress (according to the Brazilian legal-administrative system), there was no initial requirement for Congressional funding. It was not until 12 September 2013 that the Brazilian Congress approved the END, National Defense Policy (PND), and Defense White Book (Ministério da Defesa 2013). The END does not include any reference to implementation beyond purely bureaucratic measures. The more recent Livro Branco de Defesa Nacional of 2012 is a 275-page review of the institutions, roles, and missions of actors in the defense sector. The Política Nacional de Defesa, PND, is a succinct ten-page statement on goals, institutions, and the international environment. It is noteworthy that the Brazilian government has, under PT presidencies, elaborated and published these three documents.
To what extent do these documents reflect a strategy? Hew Strachan, in his article “The Lost Meaning of Strategy,” which was published in Survival stated:
In the ideal model of civil–military relations, the democratic head of state sets out his or her policy and armed forces coordinate the means to enable its achievement. The reality is that this process-a process called strategy-is iterative, a dialogue where ends also reflect means, and where the result – also called strategy – is a compromise between the ends of policy and the military means available to implement it (Strachan 2005: 52).
If we apply Strachan's formulation as a guide, the three Brazilian documents do not amount to a strategy. Nonetheless, the documents do reflect a serious effort towards developing a strategy. Meeting the Strachan standard will require greater focus and time.
Institutions
In line with Strachan's quote regarding the iterative process between the civilian decision-makers and the armed forces, and based on comparative studies, we believe that there is a need for an institutional basis for bringing the civilians and the leaders of the armed forces together. While the MOD, as discussed above, formally links the executive (the civilian president in the case of Brazil) to the armed forces, we find that increasing numbers of countries have found it necessary to create, or recreate, joint staffs to bring the civilian-led MOD into structured contact with the armed forces. Portugal, for example, created a joint staff in 2009 (Bruneau and Matei 2013: 277–282).
In 2010, Brazil established a joint operational military structure as part of a more general reform of national security and defense institutions. The Lei Complementar 136 of 25 August 2010 specified the roles of the MOD and created the Estado-Maior Conjunto das Forças Armadas (EMCFA, The Armed Forces Joint Command). The minister of defense at the time, Nelson Jobim, proposed a set of four laws, passed by the Congress, that provided for an overall updating of roles, missions, and structures. A pending question now is whether the joint structure will work since Minister Jobim has departed and the officers at the top levels of the three services are four-star, and their positions mirrors to some degree the continuing structure of the services. From our most recent information, development of the EMCFA is definitely a work in progress.
Resources
As Table 2 shows, Brazil commits a relatively low percentage of its GDP to defense: 1.29 percent. And, as Table 3 shows, percentage of personnel costs in this budget (73 percent) is very high compared to other countries. The comparison group is the BRIC and the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, to which the country aspires. As stated in Jane's assessment in 2013:
Brazil, BRIC Nations and UN Security Council Nations: GDP and Defense Budgets
Source: Adapted from Jane's Defense Budgets. Accessed 27 May 2013.
Brazil, BRIC Nations, and UN Security Council Nations: Percentage of Defense Budgets Spent on Military Personnel
Source: Adapted from Jane's Defense Budgets. Accessed 27 May 2013.
Personnel welfare spending consumes a large share of the Brazilian defense budget: fully 73.2% in 2013, when counting wages, salaries, pensions and social security payments. This rate is unlikely to change significantly over the coming five years. Brazil has historically provided generous benefits to both its serving personnel and their families (Jane's Defense Budgets. Accessed 27 May 2013).
Brazil's high level of personnel costs in the defense budget leaves policymakers with little room to maneuver in terms of non-personnel costs, including procurement. Plans for the Brazilian Navy to purchase new ships, an item highlighted in the 2008 END, were put on hold in 2011. The much-heralded nuclear submarine project was first discussed as early as 1989 (Defense & Foreign Affairs Weekly 1989). As Jane's states, defense was one of the hardest-hit ministries in the 2011 USD 30 billion budget cut, which affected procurement significantly. In 2011, procurement was to receive about 11.7 percent of the defense budget, down from the 13.2 percent in 2010. About 30 percent of the procurement funds were frozen due to the budget cut. There is wide awareness in the Brazilian Navy that it lacks the assets to be able to implement the missions defined in the END, including the so-called Blue Amazon (José Augusto Abreu de Moura 2013: 56). The continuing budget limits on procurements is not lost on the Federation of Industries of São Paulo (Federação das Indústrias do Estado do São Paulo, FIESP) which publishes a Panorama Defesa Comercial and laments the lack of opportunity for Brazilian industries to do more in defense due to a shortage of funds (FIESP 2014).
Efficiency
Through Bruneau's research on the United States and six other OECD countries, he found that the supreme audit institutions (SAIs) provide a critically important oversight function, including in national security and defense. Brazil is traditionally known as o estado cartorial, or the notary office State, and the scope and penetration of the State is quite apparent to its residents. The situation is similar to that concerning public finances, including in defense. The SAI in Brazil is the Tribunal de Contas da União (TCU) or Court of Audits, and it is extremely powerful and rigorous in terms of ensuring that government funds, including in the areas of national defense, are used according to the extensive and detailed guidance from both the executive and the legislature. This institution has authority over the implementation of Lei de Licitação, 8666, which is similar to US Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR, which is large and totally authoritative regarding contracting out), and the Lei de Responsabilidade Fiscal, which stipulates further detail on the allocation and use of public funds. The military services have their own inspectors-general, who ultimately report to the TCU. In short, Brazil does have a very robust institutional basis for efficiency in the use of resources. 15
Taylor and Buranelli (2007) have a section on the TCU, but we obtained most of our information on its relevance for the military in interviews at the Brazilian Naval War College, in Rio de Janeiro, and the Casa Civil, or Civilian Household for the Presidency of Brazil, in Brasília.
Conclusions
In conclusion, our argument is that Brazil is a fully-consolidated democracy, with a high level of democratic civilian control over the armed forces. That control is exercised by a wide variety of institutions, the most important of which are not specifically designed for this purpose, but are part of a vast array of institutions that exercise oversight and accountability over public bureaucracies.
Civilian control of the military and other security institutions such as Agência Brasileira de Inteligência (ABIN) are part of the ample set of institutions, whereby democratically elected civilians control all sectors of the State in Brazil. Recognizing this fact requires in-house insight and attention to identify these institutions and their roles. Separately, and given the absence of a credible civilian presence in the MOD, the role of the Ministério Público in exercising oversight over the defense sector in terms of activities and of the MEC in education are crucial to exert control. The lack of civilian expertise is important in the dimension of effectiveness as there are few civilians in the bureaucracy who know enough to be able to formulate strategies and interact credibly with the EMCFA. It is ironic that while there is a dearth of competent civilians in the MOD due to the absence of a career path and the required concurso, a cadre of civilians interested in defense topics is emerging in academia and other sectors. In the bureaucratic realm, there is a substantial lag in the specialization of civilians in defense, especially compared with the level of specialization seen in other arenas such as economics, finance, trade, and social welfare. Also, the relatively few resources that are invested in the defense sector are primarily directed to military personnel themselves. The military are both under democratic control and relatively well cared for in terms of salaries and benefits.
What next? While the relationship between bureaucratic structure and civil–military relations is always important, Brazil's path seems to be different from other democratic regimes that were previously under military tutelage. Further studies could examine that relationship utilizing cases such as Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, and Peru. What is necessary is an analysis that goes beyond mere democratic civilian control of the military to include the effectiveness and efficiency associated with that control.