According to political scientist Juan J. Linz, the countries that are most vulnerable to democratic breakdowns are those that are relatively new democracies, and this is no exception for Brazil.[1] Brazil is a young democracy, having only been fully democratized in 1989 after a twenty-year military dictatorship. The years following this transition were ones of democratic turmoil, ranging from intense political corruption to international scandals to the outright impeachment of presidents. This series of failures culminated with the election of right-wing populist Jair Bolsonaro as the country’s leader on January 1, 2019. Since the beginning of his election campaign, Bolsonaro has established himself to be an authoritarian demagogue, often denying the legitimacy of his opponents, encouraging violence, and restricting the civil liberties of minority groups.
As Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt detail in their book, How Democracies Die, extremist political figures often emerge during times of economic crisis and public discontent with the current political system.[2] Bolsonaro fits this mold to a T, having run his political campaign on the platform of ending decades of corruption, economic hardship, and political instability that run rampant throughout the South American nation. He promised his followers that he would not only restore the country to stability but to prosperity. Instead, citizens have been met with an extremist leader actively inciting democratic backsliding.
The first example of Bolsonaro’s authoritarian behavior is shown through his complete denial of mutual toleration, a key democratic norm that is defined by Levitsky and Zeblat as “the idea that competing parties accept one another as legitimate rivals.”[3] During his election campaign, Bolsonaro labeled his left-wing competitor, Fernando Haddad, an “outlaw” and promised to incarcerate or deport him for his socialist views. Instead of simply disagreeing with Haddad’s political stances, he completely undermined his opponent’s legitimacy as a politician by labeling him as a criminal and a threat to the state. Moreover, he actively threatened Haddad’s citizenship and freedom without any legal backing.
Bolsonaro once again solidifies himself as an authoritarian extremist through his treatment of indigenous Brazilians. Much of the President’s plan to reinvigorate Brazil’s economy is by commercializing the Amazon Rainforest and exploiting its natural resources for profit. An obstacle to his plan comes in the form of hundreds of indigenous tribes, composed of thousands of native people, who have been living in the rainforest for centuries. During his campaign, he pledged, “If I become president, there won’t be one square centimeter of land designated for indigenous reservations.” This directly threatens the civil liberties of hundreds of indigenous tribes that are granted demarcated land under Brazil’s constitution. Incited by Bolsonaro’s words, land invasions by illegal farmers, loggers, and miners into indigenous reserves have risen 150 percent over the past year, often leading to conflict and even physical assaults against natives. This is a clear example of how rhetoric from a political leader can encourage violence, which is another characteristic of authoritarian politicians described by Levitsky and Zeblat.[4] Even worse, the president attempted to use his executive power to redistribute the role of demarcating indigenous territories from FUNAI, the country’s governmental body that serves to protect and promote indigenous rights, to the Ministry of Agriculture, whose incentives are to use Amazonian land for commercial farming. Thankfully, Brazil’s Congress and Senate deemed the action as unconstitutional and revoked the decision. However, this attempt to exercise executive power to transfer the functions of one governmental agency to another despite legislative and judicial rulings that prohibit this move is a clear representation of Aziz Huq and Tom Ginsburg’s theory of “constitutional retrogression,” defined as the “the subtle and incremental” erosion of democratic institutions.[5]
Bolsonaro’s
anti democratic tendencies continue to grow. Just this week, a Brazilian Netflix
documentary, “The Edge of Democracy”, was nominated for an Oscar. The film
bashes the crippling state of democracy in Brazil and criticizes the dangerous
rise of nationalist President Bolsonaro. In response to the film, Bolsonaro’s
team released a statement
proclaiming the filmmaker to be an “anti-Brazil militant” and the President
himself deemed the movie as “fiction.” Denouncing criticism from the public as
fictitious and categorizing its proponents as enemies of the state is a clear
rejection of one of the key characteristic of democracy formulated by Robert
Dahl; the freedom of expression.[6]
Despite having been in office for only just over a year, Jair Bolsonaro has
established himself as an instigator of democratic erosion and the next three
years of his presidency are likely to follow in this trend.
[1] Linz, Juan J. & Stepan, Alfred. 1978. The Breakdown of Democratic Regimes. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.
[2] Levitsky, Steven & Daniel Ziblatt. (2018). How Democracies Die. New York: Crown.
[3] Levitsky, Steven & Daniel Ziblatt. (2018). How Democracies Die. New York: Crown.
[4] Levitsky, Steven & Daniel Ziblatt. (2018). How Democracies Die. New York: Crown.
[5] Huq, Aziz & Tom Ginsburg. (2017). How to Lose a Constitutional Democracy. Working paper.
[6] Dahl, Robert. (1972). Polyarchy: Participation and Opposition. New Haven: Yale University Press.
This post both contextualizes Bolsonaro’s rise to power and frames his populist brand of leadership within the nuanced context of his gradual, internal assaults on the Brazil’s democratic infrastructure and norms. Emphasizing Bolsonaro’s capitalization upon the pre-existing dysfunction within Brazilian democracy, such Dima Rouseff’s corruption scandal, calls to mind Levitsky and Ziblatt’s observation that “the abdication of political responsibility by existing leaders often marks a nation’s first step towards authoritarianism.” Laying this contextual groundwork bridges together the gradual weakening of public faith in the existing government with the increasing appeal of demagoguery that enabled Bolsonaro’s rise. I also appreciated your exploration of the legal pathways Bolsonaro is taking to consolidate power as he subverts Brazil’s democratic institutions from within. While you reference constitutional retrogression, your analysis also aligns with Lust and Waldner’s conception of democratic backsliding, which entails “changes that negatively affect competitive elections, liberties, and accountability.” Institutional checks and balances and strong civil society constitute critical pillars of government accountability to the people. Bolsonaro threatens the durability of both pillars by attempting to nullify constitutional protections of indigenous tribes’ right to land and refusing to acknowledge the legitimacy of his political and civic opponents. For further exploration beyond this piece’s scope it’s interesting to dissect the parallels between Bolsonaro’s embrace of executive aggrandizement and Donald Trump’s, as both leaders employ similar tactics to weaken government bureaucracy and either co-opt or coerce other branches of government into compliance with their will.