Isolate radicals to deradicalize politics – 02/08/2023 – Maria Hermínia Tavares

The immense majority of the rich and very rich certainly voted for Bolsonaro in both rounds. Many of them, no doubt, wished that, victorious, Lula would not be able to take office. It is likely that some helped the 8/1 coup invasion in different ways. It is to be hoped that ongoing investigations will identify them. But it is unrealistic to imagine that the failed attempt to deny the will of the polls by force is solely their work. Much less assume that their rights are exhausted.

The strength of the ultra-right populisms that thrive around the world –as well as their predecessors of Nazi-fascism– comes from the fact that they are polyclassist, that is, they recruit supporters from different strata of society and, above all, they are capable of attracting the sympathy of considerable contingents of the popular strata. Hence why they constitute a viable electoral alternative; to that extent, when the dispute is polarized, they end up winning the vote of the most moderate.

Here’s the point: coup and authoritarian populism is dangerous precisely because it can win elections within the rules of democracy. In Brazil, since 2018, the phalanx that abhors this same democracy commands a broader political and social field in presidential disputes, amalgamated in anti-PTism. There are people of different levels of income, wealth, political values ​​and religious beliefs.

Scholars of public opinion calculate that the radical right, now incarnated in Bolsonarista populism, represents something like 1/4 of the electorate — a robust, radicalized and faithful minority to the leader. Its ascension, in the very peculiar circumstances of the political crisis that followed the impeachment of Dilma Rousseff, was largely due to the fact that it was able to put forward a popular candidate, with the face of an ordinary Brazilian — therefore, electorally more promising than the egresses of the toucan political elite.

It is impossible to predict whether far-right populism will continue to embody anti-PTism nationwide. After all, the machine of hate and lies fed for four years by the Presidency of the Republic had effects: it created a deep split in society, divided families, destroyed friendships and enclosed common people in closed circuits of absurd shared beliefs. But the democrats and progressives would do well if they did not simplify the opposing field and, on the contrary, try to understand and speak to the millions of Brazilians who, although they voted for Bolsonaro, are neither extreme nor coup supporters, much less rich.

After all, deradicalizing politics only means isolating radicals.

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