Fernando Alcoforado*
Brazil, as an economic, social and political organization, is in disintegration. Signs of disintegration are evident in all parts of the country. It is well known that the level of well-being enjoyed by the population of a country determines the governability index that exists at a given moment. In other words, the greater the state of social welfare, the greater the political stability of a country. Therefore, in order to be able to govern, every government must seek to improve the material well-being of the population. And to improve it, the government needs to promote economic development to generate employment and income distribution. The current economic stagnation that tends to worsen in Brazil, besides raising unemployment and negatively affecting the distribution of income, can reduce state revenues and demand cuts in the Brazilian government budget as it is already occurring. With cuts in the budget, the Brazilian government is unable to make investments to benefit the population to raise their level of social welfare.
The inability of the Brazilian government and political institutions in general to offer effective responses to overcoming the recessive economic crisis in which the Brazilian nation is debating and overcoming unbridled corruption in all the powers of the Republic today tends to contribute to the increase of political violence in Brazil. Without the solution of these problems, the country may be convulsed as it did in the 1960s when sectors of the extreme right managed the coup d’état that toppled President Joao Goulart. Chaos may once again settle in Brazil with the increase in street demonstrations and the presence of right and left militias to fight against its opponents.
Just as SA (communist militias) and communist paramilitary groups emerged and confronted with extreme violence in Germany during the Weimar Republic after World War I, the same can happen in Brazil before, during and after the 2018 elections depending on whoever wins these elections. Violence by right-wing and left-wing militias could create an atmosphere of social upheaval that would provide the necessary justification for sponsoring a new coup d’état in Brazil aimed at maintaining political, economic and social order. If this violence reaches critical levels before the elections, it can even contribute to the absence of elections.
The German sociologist Ralf Dahrendorf, who followed the terrible Nazi years in Berlin, wrote in 1985 a book called The Law and Order (Editora Instituto Liberal, 1997), when he stated that anarchy, defined as a general absence of respect for social norms, usually precedes totalitarian regimes. In the state of anarchy, the norms regulating the behavior of people lose their validity. Violations of standards simply are no longer punished. In this context, all the sanctions seem to have disappeared. The “social contract”, understood here as standards accepted and maintained through sanctions imposed by the competent authorities, is torn, leaving the vacuum in its place. Everything happens to be seen as allowed, since nothing else seems to be punished.
There is no way to dissociate this situation described by Dahrendorf from Brazil’s current grave situation where impunity is increasing and the basic values of civilization are completely weakened. Politicians commit crimes in the light of day, nothing happens, and voters themselves still vote for them again. Convicted of “white collar”, for example, go to the prison, but soon they are released. The belief that laws no longer work is widespread in Brazil. Brazil is already experiencing, unfortunately, the anarchy described by Ralf Dahrendorf. Something must be done urgently because we are experiencing an economic crisis and a crisis of moral values with the bankruptcy of the institutions necessary for the maintenance of law and order that are demanding a reform of the State and radical political reform. The continuity of the situation currently experienced by Brazil in the context of the State and Civil Society is unsustainable, opening the way to a time of catastrophe in the country.
In the national political scene there are political forces of the left, political forces of the right and liberals that fight each other in the struggle for political power. Among the leftist political forces there are radical sectors that fight for the socialist revolution and there are other sectors that participate in elections to accumulate forces making alliances with liberals or even with forces of right to rise to power democratically. What unifies these forces of the left is the struggle against social inequalities. Among right-wing political forces there are sectors that are in favor of military intervention to fight against corruption, to prevent the rise to power of the left and the return to power of PT (Workers Party) and allied, and other sectors that consider it important to maintain and rise to power by participating in elections only when the conditions are favorable to them. What unifies these forces of the right is the struggle for the maintenance of the political, economic and social status quo. Among the liberals there are sectors that consider it important to maintain and rise to power by participating in alliances, including with certain right and left forces, and others who are in favor of military intervention to prevent left-wing forces from gaining power. What unifies the liberals is the struggle for the maintenance of the political, economic and social status quo, or, ultimately, for changes that do not compromise their fundamental interests.
The future of the confrontation between left and right will depend on the outcome of the 2018 elections. If a presidential candidate is elected who has no prospect of overcoming Brazil’s political, economic and social problems, be he or she liberal or right-wing, will not be able to govern because there may be the outbreak of violence by the forces of the left and reaction of the forces of right and liberals in defense of the new government that can lead the country to the state of civil war. If a candidate is elected who proposes to overcome the political, economic and social problems of Brazil that compromises the dominant interests, be he or she of the left, will not be able to govern because there will be the outbreak of violence by the forces of the right and the liberals and the reaction of the forces of the left in defense of the new government that can lead the country to the state of civil war. It is clear that left-wing political forces, especially radical ones, find the right in power unacceptable, especially if Bolsonaro wins the presidential elections. The country could be convulsed in those circumstances. Right-wing political forces and liberal sectors find the left in power unacceptable, especially candidates for PT and other leftist parties. The country could be convulsed in these circumstances.
The confrontation between left and right forces can contribute to the realization of political, economic and social changes if the left gains political power and realizes the social revolution or for the maintenance of the “status quo” or in political, economic and social retrogression if the right comes to power. History has proven that, from the confrontation between the forces of left and right, the social revolution can result with the victory of the left or the counterrevolution with the victory of the right and the establishment of dictatorships, respectively, of left or right. To illustrate, the confrontation between left and right forces in tsarist Russia in 1917, China in 1949 and in Cuba in 1959 resulted in the socialist revolution with the introduction of dictatorships. This confrontation between left and right forces in Italy and Germany, after the First World War, resulted in the counterrevolution represented respectively by the fascist and Nazi dictatorships, in Spain in 1936 resulted in the Franco dictatorship and in Chile in 1973 resulted in the dictatorship of Pinochet. In Brazil, after the so-called Communist Intent in 1935, Getulio Vargas gave a self-coup in 1937 with the establishment of the “Estado Novo” (New State) dictatorship and the João Goulart government was overthrown in 1964, resulting in a 21-year military dictatorship.
The only scenario that would prevent the triggering of violence between left and right with the consequent implementation of dictatorships to carry out, respectively, the social revolution and the counterrevolution would occur with the emergence of a candidate for President of the Republic who has the ability to bring together the Brazilian nation around a common project of political, economic and social development that should result from a broad debate in an exclusive National Constituent Assembly that the future President of the Republic would call after his election in 2018. The National Constituent Assembly would serve not only to deliberate on the economic, political and social future of Brazil, but above all to celebrate a social pact and thus to make social peace overlap with the social conflict that would result if this path were not adopted.
To avoid that political violence reaches critical levels in Brazil, it is therefore urgent to reconstruction of the Republic, which is, at the moment, a mere piece of fiction. Republic is a form of organization of the State whose term comes from the Latin res public that means “public thing”, “people’s thing”. A republican government is one that puts emphasis on the common interest, in the interest of the community, as opposed to private interests and private business, fact that does not occur in Brazil. The political, ethical and moral crisis that is currently undermining Brazil is fundamentally due to the bankruptcy of the political model approved in the 1988 Constituent Assembly. The bankruptcy of Brazil’s political model is demonstrated by the fact that presidentialism in force since 1989 has been a generator of political and institutional crisis such as are occurring. In addition, the country’s political system is contaminated by corruption as evidenced by the processes of the “Mensalão” and Lava Jato Operation. To rebuild Brazil’s political institutions and build social peace, it is necessary for the Brazilian people to mobilize to demand the immediate convocation of a new National Constituent Assembly to celebrate a new social pact aimed at reordering national political and economic life on new bases.
* Fernando Alcoforado, 78, member of the Bahia Academy of Education, engineer and doctor in Territorial Planning and Regional Development by the University of Barcelona, university professor and consultant in the areas of strategic planning, business planning, regional planning and planning of energy systems, is the author of 13 books addressing issues such as Globalization and Development, Brazilian Economy, Global Warming and Climate Change, The Factors that Condition Economic and Social Development, Energy in the world and The Great Scientific, Economic, and Social Revolutions that Changed the World.
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