The candidates have not been officially declared for this year’s Brazilian presidential elections but we all know who they are, and they can be divided into two categories… By Brian Mier I moved to Rio de Janeiro in 1991 during the inflation crisis when Fernando Collor was president. There was plenty of poverty in my […]
With elections looming in Chile, Honduras, Colombia and Brazil, the Progressive International is formalising a dedicated election observatory to monitor threats to democracy from the far-right. The initiative follows successful observer missions to Bolivia, Ecuador and Peru. By María Luisa Ortega and David Adler Around the world, democratic institutions are under attack. From Narendra […]
In an interview by Leneide Duarte-Plon for Carta Maior, writer, philosophy professor and psychoanalyst Vladimir Safatle spoke of the coming elections and Brazil’s democratic collapse. In 2018, Safatle, then a regular columnist at Folha newspaper, was ridiculed for a literal reading of his suggestion that there would be no election that year. Three years later […]
An October 2018 sketch in Folha newspaper by screenwriter Antonio Prata is viralising three years after it was published. Putting aside what else is known about the manipulated election it preceded, ‘Obsessive-compulsive disorder. But it’s better than PT robbery’ was a tragicomic summary of a violent, manufactured anti-Workers Party hysteria which underpinned Bolsonaro’s vote – a milieu […]
A coalition of 6 urban social movements demands the resignation of Paulo Guedes who was recently exposed in the Pandora Papers as profiting personally from his policy of devaluing the Brazilian Real. On Monday, October 4, I arrived at the Belém metro stop in São Paulo and met members of one of hundreds of community […]
Segments of Brazil’s economic-financial elite don’t care about the country’s institutional corrosion. As long as their interests are met, formal democracy can be raffled off without any problems. by Glauco Faria One of the episodes that drew the most attention during the congressional covid 19 inquiry hearing on Thursday, September 23, was the exchange of […]
You cannot teach a delusional person to use reason. Democracy cannot be taught to a tyrant. by Marcelo Zero President Bolsonaro’s so-called “letter of surrender”, delivered to the Supreme Court after the failed September 7 coup attempt, created an expectation among the optimists that he could somehow be controlled by the institutions. It created an […]
Beleaguered far right Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro’s attempt to boost popularity through public rallies and fascist threats against government institutions has backfired, as his approval rating falls to a new low. by Gabriel Deslandes A survey by Datafolha, the research institute linked to Folha de São Paulo newspaper, shows that President Jair Bolsonaro’s disapproval rating […]
New film generates controversy by suggesting it’s time to take a deeper look into the September 6th, 2018 stabbing incident of Jair Bolsonaro. by Brian Mier A new documentary by Joaquim de Carvalho about the 2018 Presidential campaign stabbing incident involving Jair Bolsonaro has led to a possible congressional investigation and attacks against the journalist […]
The Supreme Court is still operating as usual. The “coup” was getting everyone to think one was about to happen. By Brian Mier On the afternoon of September 6th I headed to Guarulhos airport to catch a flight to Brasilia, where I would cover the planned Independence Day protest, announced by President Bolsonaro and his […]