The Brazilian Institute of Corporate Governance (IBGC), in partnership with the consulting firm Better Governance, revealed that over 80% of board members and directors in Latin America recognize the strategic impact of geopolitical disputes on business. However, the survey exposes a paralysis at the top of the corporate chain: the region’s financial elite lacks structural tools to transform risk perception into material economic protection decisions.
The survey consulted 424 executives, with 357 in Brazil and the rest distributed across Argentina, Colombia, Costa Rica, Mexico, Panama, Peru, and Uruguay. The data highlights the disconnect of a peripheral bourgeoisie that, despite feeling the tremors of the global economy, operates with improvisation against the powers of the Global North. About 50% of the interviewees admit to not having formal monitoring processes for geopolitical crises.
Dissonance at the Top of the Corporate Pyramid
While international financial capital uses cutting-edge technology to predict logistical disruptions and sanctions, the adoption of artificial intelligence for geopolitical analysis in the region gathers negative or neutral evaluations. The lack of technological metrics exposes the vulnerability of the Latin American economic infrastructure, making local corporations hostage to the fluctuations and tensions imposed by economic imperialism.
The asymmetry of perception among the peers of command themselves is the most severe symptom of this governance blackout. In Brazil, board members positively evaluate their response capacity, but they clash with the harsh criticism of their operational directors. Around 43% of these executives disagree that the board possesses the necessary technical competence to handle the geopolitical chessboard.
This fracture shows how corporate governance in the Global South is often shaped to fulfill bureaucratic compliance rituals, neglecting the real protection of the productive arrangement. The view on the international scenario also varies drastically depending on the operating territory.
| Global Scenario Perception | Executives in Brazil | Executives in the Rest of Latin America |
| Predominant View of Risk and Opportunity | 66% | 71% |
| Scenario Viewed Only as Opportunity | 10% | 36.4% |
| Director’s Trust in the Corporate Board | Low (Discredit in analytical capacity) | High (Greater strategic alignment) |
Risk Outsourcing and Structural Failures
The lethargy of the boards of directors transfers the cost of unpredictability to the entire base of the productive chain, affecting the pricing of inputs and the precarious maintenance of jobs. The inability to read the reconfiguration of global trade, warned by less than 40% of Brazilians who feel adequately informed, results in a loss of competitiveness against transnational capital.
The diagnosis formulated by the research classifies the corporate analysis collapse into three central deficiencies that keep directorships inert:
- Cognitive Gap: Superficial understanding of global dynamics, treating geopolitics as a distant abstraction rather than a direct credit risk.
- Behavioral Gap: Entrenched resistance of power instances to absorb external perspectives, perpetuating endogenous and biased analyses.
- Structural Gap: Material absence of formalized tools, advanced technology usage, and updated risk panels for capital allocation.
The final finding of the survey dictates the urgency of a tactical overhaul. The continent’s corporate elite is fully aware that the multipolar order is rapidly transforming, but deliberately fails to institute solid governance, subjecting the national economy to the shockwaves dictated by the center of capitalism.
