Measuring Brazilian Foreign Policy Engagement: composition and validation of the Foreign Policy Index

Abstract

This article presents the foreign policy index, a quantitative empirical instrument whose objective is to measure Brazilian foreign policy engagement in a time series with 191 countries and 26 years. Through a factor analysis of 6 key variables for Brazil’s international insertion, we constructed the foreign policy index based on three central dimensions: commercial, diplomatic and regional. In order to assess the validity of the index, we resorted to a systematic analysis of the most cited articles in the specialized literature on Brazilian foreign policy, analyzing the convergence between the arguments mobilized in the texts and the index scores for the sample presented. The results indicate good convergence between both, consolidating the perception of the validity and usefulness of the index as an empirical instrument to measure Brazilian foreign policy engagement.

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