Fernando Alcoforado *
The collective suicide of the Brazilian nation may occur if the next presidential elections in Brazil are decided in the second round among Jair Bolsonaro on the extreme right-wing, with a fascist tendency, and Fernando Haddad on the left, with a socialist tendency. It is considered a collective suicide of a nation when its people choose a path that will inevitably lead to political, economic and social disaster. Nazi Germany is an example of a nation’s collective suicide when its people were confronted with extreme political violence among left-wing Communist and right-wing factions of Nazi tendencies, backed the acts practiced by Adolf Hitler after his rise to power and suffered the consequences of Nazi dictatorship and military defeat in World War II with all its evil consequences.
Be Bolsonaro or Haddad the winner of the presidential election, Brazil could be convulsed, in these circumstances, by political violence among left and right. This means that neither Bolsonaro nor Haddad will acquire the conditions of governability. They are totally cheated those who think that the result of the elections will be accepted by those who are defeated and that governability can only be achieved with the support of the majority of Parliament in an extremely divided society like Brazil. The conflict between the ideological extremes will inevitably lead Brazil to a social conflagration or to an unprecedented civil war in its history, which may result in the establishment of a fascist dictatorship of the extreme right, either with Bolsonaro’s victory or with the victory of Haddad who would be overthrown of power through a coup d´État.
This conflict is placing, on the one hand, the supporters of the PT and its allies who ruled Brazil for 13 years and contributed to the greatest economic disaster in the country’s history and, on the other hand, Bolsonaro supporters who reject Lula and the PT and fight against corruption that has spread throughout the country during the PT governments. Just as SA (communist militias) and paramilitary groups emerged and confronted extreme violence in Germany during the Weimar Republic after World War I, the same can happen in Brazil after the 2018 elections. Likewise than the old Fascism in Hitler’s Germany and Mussolini’s Italy, reason is rejected in favor of passionate emotion.
Brazil’s current situation is very similar to what happened in Germany in the period before the rise of Nazism to power in 1933. Like Brazil today, in 1923, Germany was a society on the verge of economic and political chaos when it was already the outlines of the nascent Nazi-fascist movement. In Germany, the struggle for survival and fear accompany the faltering actions of a decomposing society. Ten years before the rise of the Nazis to power in 1933, a ghost waved Germany with the presumption that amid the disorder, the economic crisis and the political vacuum, a seed of radicalism and violence was yet to come. This ghost that prowled Germany is present in the current conjuncture of Brazil.
The fascism that is explicit in Bolsonaro’s discourse is based on the cult of order, on state violence, on authoritarian government practices, on social disregard for vulnerable and fragile groups, and on anti-communism. The Bolsonaro danger lies in oppression, machismo, homophobia, racism, hatred of the poor. History tells us that once it reaches power, the fascists can destroy the last vestiges of a democratic government in Brazil. Fascism supporters consider that the cause of Brazil’s current ills is related to corruption and the use of the state by parties with a communist tendency. The fascists seek to purify Brazilian society from the toxic influences of parties and political leaders, especially those linked to the PT and its allies, who would be to blame for the unfortunate situation in which the Brazilian nation lives.
In the escalation of fascism in Brazil, the alliance between the conservative elite and the fascists is already being realized when the transition to an openly fascist government begins. In Brazil, this alliance is already consummated with the support of conservative elite and conservative parties to candidate Bolsonaro. The advance of fascism in Brazil results from the fact that economic, social and political organization finds itself in complete disintegration. The inability of the Brazilian government and political institutions in general to offer effective responses to overcome the recessive economic crisis in which the Brazilian nation is debating and to defuse rampant corruption in all the powers of the Republic today is contributing to the advancement of fascism as a solution to the problems of Brazil.
There is only one way to avoid the collective suicide of the Brazilian nation that is initially to prevent Bolsonaro from facing Haddad in the second round of presidential elections. For that, it would be necessary for the voters of Geraldo Alckmin, Marina Silva and the other candidates to vote in Ciro Gomes so that he defeated Fernando Haddad in the first round of the elections in order to face Jair Bolsonaro in the second round and defeat him in the presidential elections. This is the only way to avoid Brazil’s collective suicide by electing Bolsonaro or Haddad. It is worth noting that Ciro Gomes, in addition to presenting a government proposal capable of overcoming the current economic crisis, is, according to the electoral polls, the only presidential candidate who can defeat the rightwing candidate Jair Bolsonaro in the second round.
When peaceful coexistence is put in check between social classes and between their respective political parties, as is the case today in Brazil, the victory of Bolsonaro or Haddad would not collaborate in the pursuit of political, economic and social consensus. In a society divided into antagonistic social classes and antagonistic political parties, peaceful coexistence between social classes and between political parties will occur only to the extent that there is a President of the Republic like Ciro Gomes with the capacity to celebrate a political and social pact based on a social contract that meets the multiple interests at stake. Without this solution, Brazil will be condemned to political suicide. It is in the hands of the Brazilian people to prevent this from happening.
* Fernando Alcoforado, 78, holder of the CONFEA / CREA System Medal of Merit, 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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