History of political ideas in Brazil

Research Projects:

State and Nation in the Brazilian political thought

Description: The research aims to map how the themes of State and nation have been developed by the Brazilian political thought. To this end, we will especially prioritize these determined moments: the post-independence and post-revolution of 1930. The choice of these two periods is not random, especially because the Brazilian national state begins to form from the political emancipation. However, although the assemblage of the state apparatus is advanced after 1822, the persistence of slavery limits the scope of the idea of nation with which Brazilians then counted on. A different situation emerges from 1930, when an image of the nation was consolidated concurrently with the incorporation.

Professor in charge: Bernardo Ricupero (bernardoricupero@uol.com.br)

 

Lineages of Brazilian political thought

Description: The purposes of the research are: 1) to map and try to understand the main intellectual characteristics of conservatism, liberalism, and socialism in Brazil; 2) to verify to what extent the concepts of organic idealism and constitutional idealism, originally formulated by Oliveira Vianna, are capable of describing and evaluating the main forms of thought and intellectual families that have dominated Brazilian political and social thought since the last quarter of the 19th century; 3) to circumscribe those which, in the process of naturalisation of industrial Brazil, have been delineated in the opposite sense and, despite their weaknesses, have constituted the first anti-aristocratic conceptions in the country, providing the general outlines of all the social and economic reforms proposed until the rise of neo-liberalism; 4) finally, to formulate a hypothesis on how these chains respond to the challenges raised by the historical and political development of the country. The intention is to make a critical assessment of the state of arts and contemporary production in the area of research on socio-political thought, especially of the main models of interpretation formulated in recent decades, verifying to what extent there is continuity or rupture between the classical formulations of those so-called interpreters of Brazil and the intellectual work being produced at the University according to specialised research methods.

Professor in charge: Bernardo Ricupero (bernardoricupero@uol.com.br)

 

The difficult conservatism

Description: The research aims to examine how much the Brazilian conservatism departs from classic conservatism. To this end, an issue is emphasised: the attitude towards the past, aiming to evaluate the representativity of the analysis of Oliveira Vianna and Gilberto Freyre regarding colony and post-independence in Brazil.

Professor in charge: Bernardo Ricupero (bernardoricupero@uol.com.br)

 

The place of political thought in Latin America

Description: The project investigates how traditions and theoretical perspectives, such as nationalism and subaltern studies, which were not originally elaborated in Latin America, develop a tense relationship and, sometimes, are reformulated in the region. In a complementary way, it also studies how what became known as the Latin American populism conducted class demands, citizenship and nation in its own language, different from both liberalism and socialism.

Professor in charge: Bernardo Ricupero (bernardoricupero@uol.com.br)

 

The paths to modern Brazil: rural issues, rights, and civic consciousness

Description: Project CASADINHO/PROCAD - Capes/CNPq. The project presented here has as its broadest theme the paths to modern Brazil; to this end, it aims to research the articulation between rural issues, rights conception and claims, and regionalism between 1930 and 1988, from the perspective of the Brazilian political and social thought, the formation of social movements, and political and institutional changes. The project proponent is the graduate program in Social Sciences at the Faculty of Philosophy, Languages, Literature, and Human Sciences (EFLCH) of the Federal University of São Paulo (UNIFESP), with partnerships with research groups of the graduate program in Political Science at the University of São Paulo (USP) and the Sociology program at the University of Campinas (Unicamp).

Professor in charge: Gabriela Nunes Ferreira (gabriela.ferreira@unifesp.br)

 

Brazilian political thought

Description: The purpose of this line of research is to map the main intellectual characteristics of conservatism, liberalism, and socialism among us. To verify to what extent the concepts of ‘organic idealism’ and ‘constitutional idealism,’ originally formulated by Oliveira Vianna, are capable - provided that they are critically revised to neutralise their petitions of principle and are void of what they have of ideological rationalisation of a project of monopoly of power and knowledge - of describing and evaluating the main ‘forms of thought’ and ‘intellectual families’ that have dominated Brazilian political and social thought since the last quarter of the 19th century. Then, to circumscribe those which, in the process of naturalisation of industrial Brazil, have been delineated in the opposite sense and, despite their weaknesses, have constituted the first anti-aristocratic conceptions in the country, providing the general outlines of all the social and economic reforms proposed until the rise of neo-liberalism - as ‘middle-class radical thought’ (Antônio Cândido) and ‘Marxism of communist matrix,’ these legitimate fruits of what Sérgio Buarque de Holanda called ‘our revolution.’ Finally, to formulate a hypothesis on how these chains of thought responded to the challenges raised by the historical and political development of the country. The analytical emphasis will be both on the substantive content of ideologies and world views, and on the description of the underlying ‘forms of thought’ – intellectual structures and theoretical categories, from which reality is apprehended, practical experience elaborated and historical action organised.

As part of this project, the intention is to make a critical assessment of the state of arts and contemporary production in the area of research on socio-political thought, especially of the main models of interpretation formulated in recent decades, verifying to what extent there is continuity or rupture between the classical formulations of those so-called interpreters of Brazil and the intellectual work being produced at the University according to specialised research methods. The idea is that this same type of research can be replicated to comparatively understand Latin American political thought.

Professor in charge: Bernardo Ricupero (bernardoricupero@uol.com.br)