BETWEEN SANCTIONS AND SOVEREIGNTY – THE RESISTANCE OF BRAZILIAN LAW TO THE MAGNITSKY ACT FROM A DECOLONIAL PERSPECTIVE

Abstract

The advancement of international sanctioning legislation, such as the so-called “Magnitsky Act,” has challenged the foundations of Brazilian law, particularly regarding sovereignty, the principle of non-intervention, and the nation’s historical resistance to legal mechanisms rooted in hegemonic logic. While the Magnitsky Act seeks to extend the punitive reach of U.S. law beyond its borders, Brazil has historically maintained a position that prioritizes the self-determination of peoples and the centrality of an international legal order based on equality among states. Within this tension, decolonial questions emerge, problematizing how global sanctions can become instruments for reproducing legal colonialism, rendering local trajectories of normative resistance invisible. The objective of this article is to analyze the tensions between the international sanctions of the Magnitsky Act and the resistance of Brazilian law, understanding how a decolonial perspective reveals the dispute between hegemonic imposition and the affirmation of national legal sovereignty. The guiding question of this research is: how can the resistance of Brazilian law to the application of the Magnitsky Act be interpreted as an expression of a decolonial legal practice that seeks to affirm sovereignty in the face of the coloniality of international sanctions? Theoretically, the study draws on the works of Moniz Bandeira (2017), Mutua (2002), Koskenniemi (2006; 2010), Chomsky (2004), Bonavides (2011), Pahuja (2011), Mazzuoli (2011), Mignolo (2012a; 2012b), Harvey (1991; 2008), Dussel (1982; 1993; 2001; 2006; 2013), Bolzan de Morais (2016), Kelsen (2006), Lemaitre Ripoll (2009), Anghie (2005), Quijano (2000; 2020), Sousa Santos (2002; 2014), Walsh (2013; 2019), Lafer (1988), and Amorim (2020), as well as normative frameworks such as the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act (2016), the Charter of the United Nations (1945), and the Federal Constitution of Brazil (1988), among others. The research is qualitative (Minayo, 2008), bibliographical and descriptive (Gil, 2007), and employs a comprehensive interpretive approach based on Weber (1949). The findings reveal that Brazil’s resistance to the application of the Magnitsky Act is not limited to diplomatic defense of sovereignty but constitutes a political-legal gesture of a decolonial nature. Brazil reaffirms its normative autonomy by rejecting unilateral sanctions, positioning itself against the coloniality of global legal power and in favor of a plural and cooperative international order. The analysis also demonstrates that this stance aligns with Brazil’s diplomatic tradition and the theoretical perspective of the Global South, which proposes epistemic disobedience as a foundation for legal emancipation. Therefore, it is concluded that the Brazilian case expresses a practice of resistance that transcends the legal field and projects a new international rationality based on equality among states.