A New Volume for 2022
We celebrate a lot in 2022. We have come a long way, but there is still an even longer way to go. We welcome the year with a new special edition in the blog and have others already planned for the year.
Legislative Power and counterterrorism in Brazil
The concern with national security and the defense of the welfare of citizens by the State is not recent. This security provided by the State cannot be absolute, since if it existed, other States would be in absolute insecurity. This restlessness, present since the formation of the nation-state, continued during the years of the cold war, conceived by the socialist and capitalist blocs, and in the 1990s when it started to move to a regional scope. Security, which was not fundamental to politics during the 1990s, becomes prominent at the beginning of the 21st century, with the 9/11 attack in the United States. How can - and how did - Brazil handle security threats internally?
Independence or (the) death (of institutions)
September 7th is one of the most important celebratory dates in Brazil. The value of independence and the release from the Portuguese monarchy meant that we could finally live by our own interests. Tomorrow, a series of protests pro-Bolsonaro are happening around the world to show support to the most rejected president in Brazil’s democratic history. These are also an effort of very noisy few to discredit institutions like the Federal Court and the Legislative Power. How can our institutions hold their trust and stop more far-right movements from getting to power and threatening democracy?
Is there a case for a Parliamentary democracy in Brazil?
Looking from the outside, the Brazilian (political) democracy seems to be a fragile instrument which needs to be fixed to prevent a decision deadlock or, in even more frightening scenarios, a coup. Analysts have pointed out that the change from a multiparty presidential system to a parliamentary one would solve party fragmentation, corruption, and would make Brazilian people believe in democracy again. What makes parliamentarism the promised land and how different Brazilian democracy is from a parliamentary regime today?
Welcome to BraS-Blog, volume 1 number 2
I remember clearly as a child watching Tintin at night before going to bed. It was my favorite time of the day. Tintin was the kind of character I could rely on not only for a good story but also to help me shape (part of) the worldview and aspirations I have today. As much as I could have been brought up to hate communism, I think I leaned into the other values promoted by the character. Fast forward to 2009, my first exam at university, we were given a Tintin cartoon to criticize for an Anthropology course.