The purpose of this paper is to briefly review the impact of the 2008 National Defense Strategy (NDS). More specifically, the aim is to analyze the main transformations derived from the NDS in the Brazilian defense sector between 2008 and 2013. For this purpose, the most significant Brazilian legislations and academic publications produced on the subject in the period were analyzed. It is argued that, despite not having achieved all the objectives set out in the NDS itself, this document was fundamental to initiate the process of effective immersion of security and defense issues in the public policy agenda in Brazil.
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This paper studies the impacts of the military securitization of cyberspace in the international politics of the 21st century. Cyberdefense is chosen as the object of study precisely because it allows inferences to be made about the political-institutional materialization of this issue, seeking support in the theory of securitization, proposed by the Copenhagen School. In this sense, this paper seeks to: (i) identify the main existential (cyber) threats to the military sector, revealing why this process is intensifying in the 21st century; (ii) project the conditions for such securitization; and (iii) explain its effects on international politics, based on the cases of the United States, Brazil and Canada. To this end, the Spectrum of Military Securitization of Cyberspace (ESMC) is designed, a framework of analysis based on the theory of securitization with a focus on cyberdefense in a given time and space. As for the literature review, Brazilian and foreign authors in Political Science and International Relations figure mostly in the body of this work. As for the methodology, it uses the qualitative-quantitative analysis style, despite the use of interviews, case studies, discourse and document analysis. Its conclusion aims to corroborate the hypothesis that, in addition to the securitization of cyberspace by the military sector, this process is reflected in current international politics. Consequently, it is possible to situate the three cases in this ESMC.
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Brazil's economic performance, political stability, and search for greatness ensure that Brazil will play a strong role on many global issues and will strengthen regional economic cooperation. US-Brazil relations have evolved from an alliance during and after World War II into a wary but crucial engagement today. The April 2012 meeting of Presidents Dilma Rousseff and Barack Obama deepened cooperation on common interests. Brazil's foreign policy is set by economic factors more often than ideology, and Brazil wants to advance its core interests. The US seeks to encourage Brazil's rise. Nevertheless, differences between the US and Brazil on trade and other issues will not be overcome easily. This paper examines how the shifting balance of power in the world has expanded Brazil's spheres of action while outdated concepts like formal trading blocs prevent Brazil from achieving the narrower goals it set for itself.
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Brazil lives within a regional security context, a “securosphere” that is immensely hard to avoid. Strenuous disagreements among defense and security agencies over approaches to precise methods of identification, measurement, and reactions of living and emerging threats on this securosphere proved their shared ability to be mistaken. This article proposes a national security border system of systems with enough power of discrimination and capacity for integration to address danger or take advantage of changing circumstances across Brazil's borders, tied to appropriate outcomes of the security agents. I discriminate sensible topological differences to lay out interconnection patterns of the various elements defining three specific border environments, using them to plan a more successful action. I also discriminate between subtle similarities among practical operational concepts of the armed forces and the police forces to provide better-analyzed premises, using them to build wholeness of understanding. From a better understanding of the whole, we can infer system requirements for the parts, providing capacity to conduct a disciplined exercise of planning with politically and financially affordable costs.
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The National Defense Strategy (NDS) was the first defense strategy made public by the Brazilian government. Approved in 2008, the document marked a milestone in the sector, determining important changes in the stated objectives and the means - political and military - to be used to achieve them and the military means to be used to achieve them. However, the feasibility of its implementation has been widely questioned especially in academic circles. This is due both to inconsistencies in the strategy per se, and uncertainty regarding the government's capacity and/or ability and/or willingness to mobilize the resources required to adopt such the measures. This article discusses the main challenges the NDS faces. This article discusses the main points of the NDS and the main advances in its implementation between 2008 and 2011, as well as the obstacles to its implementation.
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The clamor for the defense of universal peace is quite old, however, perhaps its greatest expression has been consolidated with the institutionalization of peacekeeping operations (PKO) led by the UN. During the Cold War period, such instruments were little used; however, post-1988, there was a substantial increase in instituted PKOs. This paper presents a reflection on the possible reasons that lead countries to wish to join peace operations. It presents arguments that, more than solidarity, the real interests of states are in recognition by the international community and financing for their regular forces. It seeks to address in detail the Brazilian case, making clear what was the option of Brazilian foreign policy to increase its participation in these operations.
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This paper proposes to show part of the transformation process of the Argentine Armed Forces from an exclusively male to a mixed profession. The paper emphasizes, with different emphases, two points: On the one hand, the importance of including in the analysis of what is usually called "the incorporation of women into the Armed Forces" the role that women have played so far within the institution as wives and as the axis of a family model promoted and regulated by the institution itself. On the other hand, the modifications of the regulations in the last five years are analyzed, with the aim of giving an account of the Argentine experience in gender policy in the field of defense, but also with the intention of revealing how the State builds a family model and a gender ideology from the application of its public policies.
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This article discusses the role of nationalism in internal disputes in the Armed Forces that occurred during the years 1964-1979, which period corresponds to the first fifteen years of the Military Regime in Brazil. Over the course of the period that we are studying, issues related to the economic development and foreign policy of the country polarized the debates and conflicts within the realm of the uniformed class, resulting in significant transformations in the strategies implemented by the State with a view toward building a "Great Power." To evaluate the importance of the nationalistic component in the political culture of the military, it was necessary to gather and link the antecedents that gave rise to the convictions and devisions existing in the armed institutions when the 1964 Movement emerged. Next, the military groups that came to compete for the control of the State apparatus are described, examining how the greater influence of one of the other impacted on the decision-making process related to the following issues: nuclear program, arms industry, nationalization of the economy, foreign capital, sensitive technologies, colonization of the Amazon, relations between Brazil and the US, international accords, multilateral forums and foreign trade policy. In discussing this point, special emphasis is given to the pronouncements and declarations made by the officials who were the key players during this period, as the justifications presented by them make it possible to establish a cause-and-effect relationship between the measures that were adopted and the nationalism that permeated the political culture predominant in the Armed Forces.
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