THE INTERNATIONAL DIMENSION OF OPERATION CAR WASH

LAWFARE AND THE INSTRUMENTALIZATION OF THE FIGHT AGAINST CORRUPTION

Abstract

This paper seeks to understand Operation Car Wash from an international relations perspective, analyzing how US hegemony influenced and interfered with anti-corruption efforts in Brazil. Using lawfare strategies and tactics, the United States of America (USA) managed to leverage the global anti-corruption agenda to achieve geopolitical and economic ends, harming international competitors, as in the case of Petrobras. Through a series of legal and diplomatic initiatives, the USA sought to influence the interests and conduct of the legal elites involved in Operation Car Wash, interfering in Brazil's legal and political processes. In this regard, it is concluded that the fight against corruption emerges as a political narrative that justifies interventions in other sovereignties. In this case, the intervention involved informal international legal cooperation, carried out outside the legal framework, which allowed US authorities to impose billion-dollar fines against strategic Brazilian companies, such as Petrobras, Odebrecht and Embraer, for acts of corruption committed outside US territory.