Geopolitical thinking ahead of its time: Varnhagen’s Organic Memorial in mid-19th century Brazil
Paulo Roberto de Almeida, diplomata, professor.
Projeto de ensaio a ser preparado para obra sobre o pensamento geopolítico brasileiro.
Draft project essay:
Conventional etymology locates the emergence of geopolitics at the end of the 19th century, notably under the pen of the Swedish political scientist Rudolf Kjellén, who coined the term. In Brazil, the study of geopolitics arose well later, starting with some military and civilian thinkers around the 1930s, but which gained more acceptance only in the 1950s, with the work of an Army intellectual, Golbery do Couto e Silva, author of Geopolítica do Brasil (1955).
Less known, in its early virtual trajectory, at that time, was the existence of the almost ignored work of a predecessor, a brilliant scholar, the “father of Brazilian historiography”, Adolfo Varnhagen, author of a “Memorial Orgânico” (1849), sent anonymously to the General Assembly (the lower House of the Parliament), as a contribution to the reorganization of the Brazilian Empire, at the beginning of the Second Kingdom under Pedro II, a very young monarch.
The present essay departs, in its first section, from the examination of Varnhagen’s proposals for a complete overhaul of Brazil’s economic, political, educational and ethnic institutions, as well of its infrastructure, defense and foreign policy, with the objective of making a more powerful Empire, perhaps similar to some European models of that time, in order to assess, in a second session, the relevance of Varnhagen’s ideas in modern times, that is, contemporary Brazil.
Despite this subjective correlation, the projection, in modern times, of the reforms submitted by the then young Historian — already named secretary of the first national academic institution, the Brazilian Historic and Geographical Institute (1848)— offers a useful opportunity to reflect how the work of the 20th century few Brazilian geopoliticians could have been “instructed” by a century previous proposals, made in the style, if not the form, of a Geopolitical thinking avant la lettre.
Summary and abstract to follow
Paulo Roberto de Almeida
Brasília, 4704, 17 julho 2024, 1 p.
