“Right, unashamed"

conformations on Brazil’s political right through Jair Bolsonaro’s discourses

Abstract

How is the “new right” different and similar to the traditions of the Brazilian conservative field? In what sense is the “shamed right” phenomena affected by these groups discourses? The paper discusses these issues by analyzing the discourses of one of the main leaders of contemporary right in Brazil – federal deputy Jair Bolsonaro. By highlighting the importance of narratives as mechanisms for conforming political groups, we try to understand how this actor contributes to the transformations in this field through his discursive operations: what are the values, actors and practices the congressman attributes to the left and to the right fields. As primary material, pronouncements in the 54th and 55th legislature were used for quantitative analysis and interviews and other declarations were selected for qualitative analysis. The results point to low saliency of economic issues and an emphasis on issues of moral character and opposition to the Worker’s Party (PT) government. The military period is valued in a highly positive way and anticommunist narratives are updated through a coupling with anti-PT discourse.