Some folks have suggested that because American policies and behaviours often affect all of us that we should all vote in their presidential elections. It’s a good point. This is a highly interdependent world. Elections in many countries have results that affect not only their own people but the rest of us as well. Should we not therefore have a say?
This occurred to me as I read of the reaction to the recent Brazilian election in which the incumbent president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (Lula), defeated his challenger, Flávio Bolsonaro. Bolsonaro is the son of Lula’s predecessor Jair Bolsonaro, currently serving 27 years for inciting a violent coup after he lost the 2022 election to Lula.
Lula has been a very different president than Jair Bolsonaro. He has, for instance, been a champion for the Amazon rain forest, one of the world’s greatest carbon sinks and the world’s most biodiverse region. During his term, deforestation has fallen to its lowest level since records began. Under Bolsonaro, deforestation rose by 6o percent and a similar trend was expected if his son had come to power. Lula is committed to zero deforestation by 2030, as well as ending the use of fossil fuels in Brazil.
And it’s much more than deforestation and fossil fuels. While his opponent was proposing policies that would reduce expenditure on higher education, Lula emphasized strengthening federal universities and institutes and preparing young people for the world of artificial intelligence and robotics. Under his presidency, funding for science generally is recovering after declining under Bolsonaro senior.
Scientists have made their position clear. Leading scientific organizations, including the Brazilian Academy of Sciences, endorsed Lula in the election with an open letter containing over 20,000 signatures. Paulo Artaxo, a physicist at the University of São Paulo, commented, “It’s hard to express just how happy the scientific community and the Brazilian society is with Lula’s victory.”
The U.S. scientific community would no doubt be equally delighted if Trump were to depart. His administration has frozen or cut billions of dollars in federal research grants across key agencies including the Environmental Protection Agency while harassing the country’s universities.
American scientists, like their Brazilian colleagues, have made their displeasure public. An open letter from members of the U.S. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, with almost 2,000 signatures including dozens of Nobel winners, warned that the American lead in science is being “decimated” by cuts and a growing “climate of fear.” The U.S. is the world’s leader in scientific research and development; harm to its institutions hurts all of us.
Beyond its attack on science, the Trump administration has reversed American efforts on climate action. It vigorously promotes the use of fossil fuels at home and abroad while simultaneously discouraging clean energy. It has chosen the side of global warming, humanity’s greatest threat, as we wage the climate war.
When elected leaders such as Jair Bolsonaro and Donald Trump make decisions that harm the environment, that’s our future they are jeopardizing despite us having no vote in their elections. “No taxation without representation,” a rallying cry of the American Revolution, comes to mind.
This lack of representation provides a powerful argument for strong international institutions, our best hope for international awareness and co-operation. Which reminds me, I’m overdue for a donation to UNA-Canada.
And I will be watching the U.S. midterms with great interest. Our futures, mine and yours—innocent bystanders—depend on the outcome.