Has brazilian democracy died?

Abstract

: It has been a while that Brazil's institutional stability has been lacking, the pillars of our young democracy have been weakened, and the politics is getting polarized. The destabilization process that began with the June 2013 protests, gained strength with the impeachment of former president Dilma Rousseff, and culminated with the election of Jair Bolsonaro shows us that the crisis has become normalized in the country's political, social, and economic system. Based on the analysis presented in the book How Democracies Die about the resurgence of authoritarianism in contemporary democracies through the very mechanisms of this regime, this article intends to address the recent history of Brazil, focusing mainly on the role played by Jair Bolsonaro in the process of democratic erosion faced by the country, how it was possible for this political crisis to deepen, and how to reverse it without resorting to measures alien to the Constitution. The relationship of this crisis with the national-populist phenomenon that has been present in the political culture of several western countries since the beginning of the 21st century and that represents the most urgent threat to Enlightenment political values in contemporary times, even in countries with strong and stable institutions, will also be explored.