A new world is emerging.

And so, to widespread surprise and astonishment, without us suspecting that this could ever happen, the great world powers are melting in the summer sun of the northern hemisphere, at the mercy of events previously exclusive to third-world countries.

The mighty "Uncle Sam"—democratic within his borders and imperialist beyond them—a defender of the market economy at home and, paradoxically, extremely protectionist, stumbled in 2008 in a crisis that exposed his real estate and financial markets, brought down century-old banks, and today, like a decadent old-hundred-year-old, is revealed to us as a heavily indebted entity. And we, Brazilians, newly rich and rising in the new world economic order, are in line as his creditors! Who would have thought... Such are the twists and turns of this world, indeed.

China, from its stronghold, calls for responsibility from the United States. Who could have imagined that this territorial giant, with a population of 1,4 billion people, would possess the political unity, commercial density, and economic importance to reprimand those who, not long ago, dictated the course of humanity alone and at their whim? Well, it happened.

The Chinese were separated from the world for millennia, anchored in a solid culture, deep beliefs, enviable wisdom, an insurmountable wall, and ultimately, a closed and dogmatic regime. But, precisely because of their cultural solidity, their recognized wisdom, and the pragmatism they display in everything they do today, they have overcome the ideological wall and adapted their regime. They are no longer dogmatic, but pragmatic. And those likeable, awkward, and timid followers of Mao, the "great helmsman," who in the early 70s welcomed Richard Nixon with parties, preceded by the abominable Henry Kessinger, as a tenuous gesture of deference to détente, a few decades later (which is nothing for a people who think in millennia and for whom time is a particularly intimate raw material), recommend prudence to the extravagant spenders who once founded a great democracy, a great capitalism, a great country, and today are floundering badly in the economic process and facing their decline with unthinkable internal pettiness.

If the Americans don't heed the prudent and cautious Chinese, they will miss the train of history in the new millennium, just as the proud subjects of Her Majesty Queen Victoria lost their world leadership at the turn of the 20th century, when they were still the masters of the world. By fomenting wars like the War of the Triple Alliance, when Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay, instrumentalized and financed by the United Kingdom, committed genocide in Paraguay, decimating the adult population, brutalizing a developed nation, and reducing the largest industrial park in South America to ashes, the British committed atrocities here and elsewhere. India was no different. They were a snobbish caste situated above the highest native caste. With disdainful eyes, they delayed the destiny of a multifaceted and unusual country, with a unique culture, today based on two pillars: solid democracy and a thriving economy. The British wanted tea and spices. The Hindus wanted freedom. Today, the English find themselves grappling with the fascist-like actions of a stateless magnate and with the worst aspects of the world press: unrepentant and irresponsible denunciation, which condemns before trial and whose methods are beginning to come to light in a paradigmatic way. Today, their former colonized peoples are, nothing more and nothing less, one of the powers that leave their former colonizers eating dust at the back of the historical line. Queen Victoria would have a huge fit seeing all this. She would cancel afternoon tea with the Prime Minister.

Buckingham, certainly.

There are countries that were practically unknown to the vast majority of the world. For Brazilians, then, it was unthinkable. The one that emerged as the great power of the East, Brazil's preferred partner alongside South Africa, India, and South Korea, forming the "BRICS," was, at most, the land of the corner pastry chef. Today it is a promising market, but also the market of the present. China, Korea, India, and South Africa are no longer "far away." They are, in fact, "right there."

Opportunities have shortened distances more than satellites and jet planes. Mutual investments, companies from both countries betting on partnerships, associating themselves, celebrating protocols that soon become contracts and then come to life on production lines. It is tomorrow that has knocked on the doors of Brazil and its partners in the "BRICS". While some drank tea and tyrannized then impoverished countries and others looked at the world with the illusion of the most despotic leadership and frightening command, these peoples who have known hunger and endemic diseases, illiteracy and all sorts of suffering to which man can be subjected, seek to be reasonable and replace divergences with convergences, seeking in economic development and technological partnerships a common path to prosperity and social fulfillment.

Just a few days ago we saw President Dilma Rousseff opening the 2011 Military World Games in Rio de Janeiro. The incomparable star Edson Arantes do Nascimento, King Pelé, lit the Olympic flame, and the Head of State declared that important event open. We also saw Dilma initiating the construction of five submarines, one of them nuclear-powered, by symbolically cutting the first lath at the shipyard where they will be manufactured in Itaguaí (RJ). There are two very important facts contained in these events.

The first is the maturity of our democracy, put to the test in the last presidential election, when the PSDB and its allies waged the most sordid electoral campaign in our political history, with all sorts of accusations, sowing terrorism and fear, in addition to an absolutely retrograde, if not defamatory, counter-propaganda. Despite this, we won, and Dilma behaves as is her style, with pride and sobriety. She assumed command of the Armed Forces naturally, with grandeur, and has given them maximum prestige. She does not look back, but to the future, with the eyes of a visionary and full awareness of her historical mission. She is not a woman of resentment; she is a warrior and competent woman, ready for the missions and challenges to be faced and overcome. Dilma is the president of Brazil in the 21st century.

The second point is that, without disregarding internal and external problems to be debated and addressed, we already have a positive agenda suited to our new reality as an emerging power. We have already designed a new society, with thirty million Brazilians joining the middle class and with social and economic indicators incomparable to those of the infamous years of the PSDB (Brazilian Social Democracy Party). Now we can and should think about our external defense, about improving the quality of patrolling our territorial borders and combating drug trafficking and smuggling, our sea and pre-salt reserves, and our vast airspace. And the photo of President Dilma holding the model of our first nuclear submarine is reminiscent of Getúlio Vargas with his hands blackened by the oil from our first well, or Lula handing over the keys to her own home to an elderly, black Brazilian woman, deeply moved, who for the first time would have a roof over her head. This moment is of profound and transcendental importance for Brazil, which emerges strong, powerful, full of hope and a future for its children.

Petrobras was relentlessly bombarded by international capital with the support of almost all political parties, employers' associations, and a large part of the Brazilian press. Libraries are there for anyone who wants to consult books, newspapers, and magazines and be surprised by the unpatriotic massacre perpetrated against what is now one of the largest companies in the world! It was Getúlio Vargas, with the support of students, nationalists, and the military, who created it, against all odds. Lula changed the course of our history and recovered a country that had gone bankrupt three times during FHC's government. As if that weren't enough, he positioned Brazil as the seventh largest economy in the world, ended unemployment, and is in the hearts of the people. He had no peace from the first to the last day of his government. He did what he did; he was the statesman that history records, without the approval of the same media that celebrates the octogenarian who repeatedly and humiliatingly led us to the IMF's counters and today occupies his time in a phantom institute and in the defense of the decriminalization of 'cannabis sativa' (marijuana, for those who don't know). This is the very high price we pay for the audacity we had to change Brazil for the better.

A new world is emerging, and Brazil plays a prominent role in it. Some (mainly the people, who are wiser than the elites) grasp these changes well in advance. And in this new world, Brazil is no longer secondary: it is a respected protagonist, sits at the main table in discussions, and participates in the most important decisions.

I write all this to say that history is made by us, the people. It is not made by Rupert Murdoch. He and his partners around the world tell it for a certain time in the way they want and that suits them best. Once discovered, they publish a final edition saying "Bye Bye" and the story will go on. Without them.

 

(*) Delúbio Soares is a professor

 

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