Brazil’s Ambivalent Challenge to Global Environmental Norms

Abstract

Brazil’s relationship to global environmental governance has long been fraught with contradictions. The nation is bounteous in biodiversity, forest, and freshwater resources, and it is a global leader in creating new conservation areas. Since 1992, when it hosted the Rio Earth Summit, Brazil has been a negotiation leader of the Global South on environmental issues. Yet at the same time, Brazil’s position on environmental issues since the early 1990s has included the adoption of non-committal positions on climate change, increases in its energy production goals to keep up with demand, and the dilution of its forestry laws (Hochstetler and Keck, 2007; Teixeira, 2010).