Right now, when the pillars of the Brazilian government are falling down and the political judgement against President Dilma Rousseff is being approved, the only thing that remains unchanged is the Itamaraty Palace Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
For years there were two countries in Latin America that had two very internationally respected foreign affairs institutions. One was in Brazil and the other was in Mexico, in Tlatelolco.
But now with the ambassador’s career being less important; with the situation that the consuls, who are placed, removed and invented, find themselves in; and with the lack of importance in our foreign policy, an air of panic begins to descend.
However this is not just happening from wanting a system, which in its time managed tourism, to now manage foreign affairs. It is happening because every president has the right to make mistakes and to name his party. There are only specific structure areas in the federal government which are convenient to not improvise, and one of them is foreign policy.
Without a doubt, we have had great figures in foreign affairs, including the era of Jorge Castañeda Gutman, when the Foreign Affairs Secretariat (SRE) in Tlatelolco was stronger that the secretary.
The problem is that with the new world arrangement, we need a policy where Mexico has a place in the new balance of Latin America.
We cannot continue to be witness to the magnitude of the disgrace that is happening now in Venezuela. It is a situation in which Mexico does not have a clear policy, leaving aside the actions that characterize Mexico for following the old lesson from diplomat Isidro Fabela, who through the “Carranza Doctrine” respected the principle of not getting involved in other countries’ issues, but at the same time was reigned in by moral supremacy.
Thanks to that, our political asylum policy — now so damaged — allowed us to be an example for the world: First, for the Spanish — in Lázaro Cárdenas’ era — who fled from the Franco regime, and second, for countries like Argentina, Chile and Uruguay, where new fascisms began to erupt with the help of Washington, during the administrations of former Presidents Luis Echeverría and José López Portillo.
Now in Mexico, bringing a vanguard policy to the new American order can’t be so insignificant, after the reestablishment of the relationship between the U.S. and Cuba. It can’t only be a passive element in the middle of a strong international demonstration. Because that will only lead to positioning Mexico as a country that doesn’t matter in the Latin American scene anymore.