Democracy is Anomaly
By: Bruno Ribeiro Oliveira
Tags: South America, Politics, Brazil, History, Democracy

A Brief Political History of Brazil.

According to Auguste Comte: “Love as a principle, the order as a foundation and progress as a goal.” We just forgot about love.

From Colony to Periphery (1500–1822)

First inhabited by autochthonous indigenous groups, Brazil became a Portuguese colony from 1500 to 1822. The colonial times were long and were once called a sweet hell. Sugar was produced by slave hands, brutality was routine, the natives were shaking hands with genocide and nature was met with fire and iron. Today there are only small islands of the once great Atlantic Forest and indigenous peoples live in poor villages in the hinterlands or in the outskirts of urban areas.

Most people who inhabit Brazil today did not come to the New World by their own choice. Brazil was the country that most received enslaved Africans throughout the period of the slave trade. More than 5 million (out of a total of 13 million brought to the American continent) were brought to Brazil. That makes slavery one of the foundations of Brazilian society. It is also one of the huge problems left by our past history until our present days.

The colonial status ended with the opening of the Brazilian harbors for free trade in 1808. Resentful Portuguese left in the former metropole complained about the same status level of Brazil and because Rio de Janeiro was the home of the royal family. Brazil had to break away so it would not return to its colonial phase. A new Brazil was declared over the bones of African and indigenous. From a colony, Brazil became a peripheral player as a free state.

In 1822 Brazil became the owner of its own state. It does not mean that Brazilians were in control of their country (that is the anomaly, the rule is the opposite). While everyone else in the American continent was becoming a Republic, Brazil (or Brazilian elite) declared the country one Empire under a new Emperor who was actually Portuguese but is considered Brazilian.

The Empire of Brazil lasted from 1822 to 1889. Society was a deeply conservative and its economy was based over slavery. We were stratified by free humans, enslaved humans, and non-white humans who don’t have the same rights or social status but are not enslaved. Brazil was the last western country (can it be considered Western? A discussion for another time) to abolish slavery in 1888 and the monarchy fell in 1889, in a coup led by the military (the first of many to come).

From non-Democracy to a Little of Democracy (1889–1964)

As the norm of human history, autocracy was the rule and the rule of a few over many was the norm. Brazil entered the period of what is now called the Old Republic (1889–1930). Elections? Yes, but just for a few white men with money. Electoral fraud? Yes. Citizenship? Yes, but just for a few white men with money. Reparations and integration policies for the black population and indigenous? Unthinkable. Order and Progress meant Order and Progress for a few Brazilians.

The Old Republic was a play yard for the few Oligarchies who had power at the Federal level and for those smaller state elites who gained with their rule. Brazil was a big agriculture goods seller with a population selling its workforce for what it could.