The election of Jair Bolsonaro and its implications for the region

On Sunday, October 28th, Jair Messias Bolsonaro was elected as the new president of Brazil. Without a doubt, a very concerning fact for the region. The newly elected President represents the far right of Brazil and is very well known for his homophobic, transphobic and misogynist remarks as well as the apology of death and torture, especially when referring to the dictatorship that ruled Brazil from 1964 to 1985, whose “big error was to torture and to not kill”. Furthermore, he beatifically proposed to shoot former president Fernando Henrique Cardoso (a well known and renowned scholar amongst the most important international thinkers). Such a politician in charge of the 5th largest country in the world and the 6th in terms of population has important implications for the region. But why and how did he get there? And, more important, which could be the implications?

There are huge sectors of Latin American populations who firmly believe an iron fist could solve the structural problems of the countries, an idea reinforced by claims such as that Pinochet regime did wonders for Chile, according to US economist Milton Friedman, or a very widespread idea that with the excessive use of the force people are going to be dissuaded of behaviors, ideas, beliefs and/or practices even some that don’t have anything to do with personal decisions. That is an important part of the explanation of why Bolsonaro ascended to power. Being the country clouded by corruption, with a large number of members of the government were responsible for corruption charges (mostly related to the Odebrecht case) and the disappointment of the people with the Workers Party (Partido dos Trabalhadores), Bolsonaro’s campaign took advantage of social frustration by seducing the middle classes affected by the political and economic issues of the country, misruled by the former political force, as the corruption scandal seemed to prove. They had governed Brazil for more than 10 years, under Luíz Inácio da Silva and Dilma Rousseff.

With such a panorama, people turned to the messianic personality claiming to be the one able to solve the multiple problems of the country through draconian measures against all the populations that represent or could be politically made to represent the difference or diversity and, thus, a threat and the cause of the problems: LGBTIQ people, afro-Brazilian people, social leaders and indigenous peoples to name the most prominent. The murder of social afro-Brazilian activist Mariele Franco this same year is a reminder of what can happen when such a regime seizes power. Far right regimes tend to be selectively populistic to one part of the population, while very aggressive toward the difference, hence the messages it presents can take the form of “one part of the population destroying what’s considered most valuable or very important to a large sector of it”. He has made clear mention of his plans to erode the Amazon and its indigenous peoples, as well as an apology of violence toward LGBTIQ people.

This is one more stance of the rising of the far right throughout the whole world, due to critical conditions occurring in the places where it has risen. We have already seen examples in the United States, Colombia, Italy and the number of Parliament seats gained for Alternative for Germany (AfD, Alternative für Deutschland) in 2017. The far right politicians use the despair of the people to awake sentiments of fear and uncertainty about the future and need to have a tangible enemy to target and destroy through their rhetoric and the use of the law against them. Law is, in those cases, a weapon of war pointed toward that difference to exclude, for it was already discredited, mistrusted and disdained amongst the general population.

The explanation behind his ascent to the power is far more complex, but those are key historical and political facts to take into account when explaining how Bolsonaro ended up being President and what the implications can be. With an authoritarian leader, the first to be in danger on their physical personas and their rights are the ones of the aforementioned groups representing diversity from the traditionalist self-proclaimed white or mixed race Christian (above all protestant fundamentalist) heterosexual populations. But, further than that, an authoritarian regime usually intends to dissolve the system of checks and balances to gain all the power and implement without opposition from other political contenders and favors the use of the force over dialogue and agreement. And, as well, it holds the power through instilling fear in the populations, so they see no other alternative but to keep them in power.

What it potentially means for the region is an international endorsement to other Latin American governments leaning to authoritarianism and a legitimization of their rule, as they have been democratically elected, yet retain profoundly counter-democratic ideas at their core, as the discriminatory behaviors and policies they promote against all real or perceived difference and the subjacent opinion that force (and its close cousin, propaganda) is to be used for controlling and achieving the desired behavior. Plus, it’s an enormous reminder of what the extent of corruption can be, mustn’t we forget those same Brazilian politicians (Bolsonaro and his supporters) are involved in the Odebrecht Case, which was widely known since a few months ago. In turn, this widens the extent of the implications to all of its international associates and leaves more questions open than it responds.