First, the good news. The choice of candidates was not great but at least former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva beat incumbent Jair Bolsonaro, in last week’s Brazilian presidential elections. That is a victory of one candidate who had his corruption sentence annulled against another who has his own corruption investigations, as yet untested in court.
However, more importantly, Bolsonaro took a ‘Trumpite’ approach to managing the Covid pandemic with all the terrible consequences that followed; 700,000 Brazilian deaths. Then there is the destruction of the Amazon rainforest. The now former Brazilian President was a pro-development, far-right nationalist who sided with criminal syndicates of illegal ranchers and loggers resulting in record levels of deforestation. An area of rainforest the size of Greater London was cleared in September alone ahead of the elections.
Bolsonaro has questioned the role of democracy and threatened, again like Trump, not to recognise the election result if he lost. Without conceding, he is surely gone and good riddance. But despite his appalling record, Bolsonaro nearly got re-elected with 49% of the vote. Almost a triumph for far-right populism. At Congress level his supporters performed strongly.
‘People over populism’ is not necessarily a winning formula…
In Italy, despairing voters have elected a far-right coalition government led by the Brothers of Italy party with deep roots in a fascist past.
And, adding insult to injury, Netanyahu, another populist right-winger facing corruption charges has made a comeback as Israel ‘s likely next Prime Minister. The price he has paid is an alliance with ultra-nationalist and ultra-Orthodox Jewish allies which is a further challenge to Israel’s delicate democracy and internal stability. Netanyahu’s supporters talk of amending the judicial system to ensure corruption charges are dropped. Shameless and depressing.
Finally, we turn to this week’s mid-term elections in the US. America is more polarised than ever. Despite Biden passing legislation on climate change, gun-control, infrastructure investment and child poverty in the face of narrow majorities in Congress, that is not enough. The Democrats face defeat even as Republicans push to make abortion illegal, give local officials the power to overturn election results at a State level and continue to support Trump in the face of clear evidence he was complicit in supporting an attempted coup on 6th January last year.
The very fabric of democracy in under threat in the US but that doesn’t rank as a priority in comparison to inflation, crime and illegal immigration. Add to this toxic mix the crazy ‘wokeness’ of left-wing Democrats with policies such as defunding the police, and there are grounds for real despair at the future of the US as a stable democracy.
We await the results with trepidation and what it means for the possible return of Trump which seemed relatively unlikely for all his blustering… until now.
Right-wing populism is the Japanese knotweed of politics; deeply embedded with roots that are seemingly impossible to destroy. Despite the public being mostly centrist, if moderates don’t govern competently from a centrist position and deliver, the lurch to the undemocratic Right is always at hand.
As we will probably find out on Tuesday with our most important ally…
Inside Right Politics 