The Sacrifice of Democracy: Mimetic Theory and the Role of Mainstream Brazilian Press in the Emergence of Bolsonarism

Abstract

This article proposes to discuss how the anti-democratic Bolsonarist uprisings had their embryo in the anti-PT discourse disseminated by the Brazilian mainstream media. In this sense, I understand that Stanley Cohen's concepts of moral panic and popular demons and René Girard's mimetic theory help shed light on the mobilization that took over Brazil. The pacification of the country would take place through violence applied to a scapegoat. Moreover, based on readings by Jacques Rancière and David Runciman, I define that the scapegoat that such movements seek to sacrifice is not about PT figures, but about the exercise of democracy itself. This is perceived since Bolsonarism’s anti-democratic movements developed through the cultivation of ideas of mistrust by figures in the Brazilian mainstream media. The claims of these anti-democracy movements are based on authoritarian, victimism feelings and on the discourse of combating a notion of inevitable corruption that would be ingrained in every form of politics and partisanship.