Source: Journal of Politics in Latin America | Published: 2026-08-09
Category: 정권·선거 변동 | Keywords: bolsonaro, brazil, electoral, far-right, politics
The rise and persistence of far-right political movements represents one of the defining challenges to democratic governance in the twenty-first century. Across Latin America, Eastern Europe, and beyond, the electoral ascent of illiberal populist leaders has prompted urgent scholarly and policy debates about the structural conditions that produce such movements and, crucially, about whether their influence dissipates when their standard-bearers lose power. Brazil under Jair Bolsonaro has emerged as one of the most closely watched laboratories for these questions. A country with the largest economy in Latin America, a deeply plural civil society, and an ambitious international development profile, Brazil's political trajectory carries consequences that extend far beyond its borders — for regional stability, for multilateral governance, and for the millions of people who depend on international cooperation and civil society organizations to deliver essential services. The scholarly article under review, published in the Journal of Politics in Latin America, makes a timely and consequential intervention by demonstrating that the far-right alignment consolidated under Bolsonaro cannot be reduced to the electoral fortunes of a single individual. Understanding what endures after a populist defeat — ideologically, organizationally, and culturally — is now among the most pressing questions in comparative politics.
The article's central analytical contribution is its insistence on distinguishing between the electoral performance of a far-right leader and the deeper consolidation of a far-right political project. Bolsonaro's defeat in the 2022 presidential election by Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva was widely interpreted, particularly in international media, as a repudiation of the Bolsonarista project and a restoration of Brazilian democratic normalcy. The scholarly literature reviewed here pushes back against this optimism, arguing instead that the institutional, social, and ideological infrastructure of the Brazilian far right was substantially reinforced during the Bolsonaro years and did not dissolve with his electoral loss. Congressional representation, alignment within the military and security establishments, the mobilization of evangelical and agribusiness constituencies, and the systematic cultivation of online information ecosystems all contributed to a durable political formation that retains considerable capacity to shape Brazilian governance even from the opposition benches. This kind of structural analysis — moving beyond vote-share data to examine the sociology and organizational ecology of a political movement — offers a more honest reckoning with what democratic backsliding actually produces and what resilience against it must address.
The Brazilian case fits within a broader hemispheric and global pattern that development scholars and practitioners are increasingly obliged to engage. Across Latin America, the last decade has seen a complex and uneven oscillation between left-leaning and right-leaning governments, often labeled the "pink tide" and its subsequent counter-movements. What the Bolsonaro interlude in Brazil illustrates, however, is something qualitatively different from the ordinary rightward swing of a political pendulum: a far-right realignment that actively sought to reconfigure state institutions, undermine independent oversight bodies, and delegitimize civil society organizations — including those that serve as implementing partners for international development assistance. The hostility that the Bolsonaro government displayed toward environmental NGOs, human rights organizations, and international treaty commitments on indigenous rights had direct operational consequences for ODA programs and for the international civil society networks that depend on a hospitable domestic legal and political environment. For researchers and practitioners in the development sector, the Brazilian experience is a reminder that political risk analysis must extend beyond macroeconomic and security indicators to encompass the ideological orientation of governments toward civil society itself.
The policy implications of this analysis are substantial. Development agencies and international donors operating in Brazil and across Latin America have long grappled with questions about political conditionality, partnership with governments whose human rights records are contested, and the protection of civic space. What the consolidation of a far-right alignment in Brazil suggests is that these are not temporary problems to be managed until a friendlier government takes office; they are structural features of a reorganized political landscape that will require sustained, adaptive strategies. This means investing in the organizational resilience of civil society actors, diversifying funding channels to reduce dependence on government-mediated disbursements, and building analytical capacity to monitor the enabling environment for civil society across political transitions. It also means taking seriously the question of democratic backsliding as a development challenge in its own right — not merely as background context for other programs, but as a phenomenon with direct implications for poverty reduction, environmental governance, and the protection of marginalized populations whose welfare often depends on the institutional commitments that illiberal governments are most likely to erode.
Looking forward, the trajectory of the Bolsonarista movement in Brazil will be closely watched as a test case for several theoretical and practical questions of broad significance. Can a consolidated far-right alignment be moderated through governing coalition pressures, as the Lula administration navigates an extremely fragmented Congress in which Bolsonaro's allies remain strongly represented? Will the organizational infrastructure of the movement translate into sustained electoral viability at future federal elections, or will internal contradictions and the absence of executive power weaken its coherence over time? For scholars of comparative politics and democratization, Brazil offers an opportunity to refine models of democratic resilience and authoritarian regression in ways that account for the specific role of digital media ecosystems, religious-political coalitions, and security-sector loyalties. For practitioners in the ODA and civil society space, the lesson is one of continued vigilance: the formal restoration of a democratic administration does not automatically reconstitute the civic infrastructure that was targeted under its predecessor, and the work of rebuilding independent, pluralistic public spheres is a long-term endeavor that requires deliberate, well-resourced investment. The scholarly literature reviewed here contributes importantly to that understanding, and its arguments deserve serious attention from researchers, policymakers, and development professionals engaged with Brazil and with the global challenge of protecting democratic governance in an era of resurgent authoritarianism.