Verbs, nouns and adjectives: the old Brazilian political grammar
30/09/2005Brazilian politics remains firm in its desire to present the strangest and most – to maintain the sense of humor that marks us – hilarious. With unmatched mastery we managed to keep the discourse almost incommunicable, practice and social reality. Like this, our words inflate the verb, our practices decrease the noun and reality continues with the same adjectives!
On the last day 5, the statutory deadline for party affiliations with a view to the elections of 2002. In simpler terms, the idea of this law is to prevent politicians from negotiating their affiliation with a certain party, seeking political and / or financial support for the elections in return. We can analyze it with the most varied perspectives, each showing a conception of Brazil.
Let's start with political scientists and other academics. Theorists point to the illegitimacy of these actions. They say that politicians receive votes because they defend ideas similar to those that voters have; party switching would be a betrayal of the vote and, therefore, to the voter. If we dare to leave the gym (and here I include myself, as a political scientist) and walk around the city, we will see that things are a little different than the classic books translated into Portuguese. Concepts such as ideological fidelity and normative compatibility have no practical significance. Pragmatic interests prevail whose only ideology is self-interest.
Another important group in this story is the politicians. Estes, at least in theory, present well-argued positions and, at the same time, practices. According to São Paulo state deputy Eduardo Soltur (PTB, PPB, property, PL e PFL), "sou a favor da fidelidade partidária desde que o partido seja fiel ao que promete". Excuse me the reader, but reading these words a question came to me: who forms a party? Talvez as "forças ocultas" de Jânio Quadros also act in the political parties! Perhaps the blame for this calamitous state is not really our politicians', we must also look for causes in the social structure that transforms the political system into a defense of privileges and not of rights.
And this is how a third group gets into this mess: the people. In a first moment, the impression we have is that your participation is merely supporting. On election day we took our title, we voted and went home happy to be rid of this uncomfortable obligation (in most cases). However, when we try to deepen our analysis a little more, we will see that the people gain a fundamental importance in the argument, but it doesn't appear in the script. In Brazilian political life our participation is restricted to formalities; we are not concerned with what our leaders do or speak. Like us, citizens & atilde; the, we can ask for party loyalty if we don't even remember which deputy or senator we voted for?
If we want to change Brazil through the political path, we must be willing to assume our mistakes and failures to propose alternative ways. Closed in our fields of expertise and seeking to adapt the world to our ideas, all we will be able to do is to deepen the distance between the chapters of this exotic grammar of Brazilian politics..
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Yes I – N. 4 – October 2001