{"id":35491,"date":"2022-08-26T16:06:21","date_gmt":"2022-08-26T12:06:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/?p=35491"},"modified":"2022-08-26T16:06:21","modified_gmt":"2022-08-26T12:06:21","slug":"brazil-how-populist-politicians-use-religion-to-help-them-win","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/brazil-how-populist-politicians-use-religion-to-help-them-win\/","title":{"rendered":"Brazil: how populist politicians use religion to help them win"},"content":{"rendered":"

Evangelical protestants, around one third of the population, are likely to play a key role in the upcoming Brazilian election.<\/span><\/h4>\n

<\/p>\n

This autumn\u2019s Brazilian presidential\u00a0election\u00a0offers a glimpse of how 21st century populist leaders are using religion to enthuse their support base. The incumbent, right-wing firebrand Jair Bolsonaro, rose to power in 2018 with support from evangelical Christian voters who warmed to his\u00a0social conservatism.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"Brazilian leader Jair Bolsonaro is attempting to win the Christian vote in the upcoming electon.\u00a0Joacy Souza\/Alamy<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

And while\u00a0some polls\u00a0suggest this support may have eroded since, Bolsonaro continues to court evangelical support. He has framed the election as a battle between God-fearing\u00a0\u201cgood\u201d and opposition \u201cevil\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n

On August 13 2022, he was being prayed over at the\u00a0March for Jesus rally\u00a0in Rio de Janeiro among thousands of his evangelical supporters. Opposition candidate and former president\u00a0Luiz In\u00e1cio Lula da Silva\u00a0is attempting to win those votes back by invoking religious language, reflecting how Bolsonaro has re-shaped the political landscape.<\/span><\/p>\n

This is partly a matter of numbers \u2013 evangelical Protestants make up around a third of\u00a0Brazil\u2019s population\u00a0(estimated at around 70 million people) \u2013 but it\u2019s also a matter of political style.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bolsonaro reaches out to the conservative evangelical voter because he needs their vote, but also because their language and values align well with his populist message. Central to Bolsonaro\u2019s politics is a\u00a0conservative pro-family agenda\u00a0that includes negative views of homosexuality and abortion.<\/span><\/p>\n

Populist politicians adopt a distinct style. They are predominantly nationalist, claiming to represent the true will of\u00a0the people, and yet do so by dividing society into binary camps: who belongs and who does not.<\/span><\/p>\n

But this alignment of right-wing populism to a Christian base is not just restricted to Brazil. We see it in the bullish authoritarianism of leaders such as former US president Donald Trump, French far right leader Marine le Pen and Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orb\u00e1n.<\/span><\/p>\n

According to sociologists Andrew Whitehead and Samuel Perry, Trump\u2019s rise to power coincided with an upsurge in\u00a0Christian nationalism. They describe Christian nationalism as a \u201ccultural framework \u2013 a collection of myths, traditions, symbols, narratives, and value systems \u2013 that idealizes and advocates a fusion of Christianity with American civic life\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n

In their research, Whitehead and Perry find that those US citizens who were most supportive of Christian nationalism are more likely to support authoritarian kinds of leadership, \u201ctraditional\u201d models of the family and an understanding of American identity that privileges those who are Christian, white and native-born. They were also most likely to vote for Trump in 2016.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bolsonaro, known by some as the\u00a0\u201cTrump of the Tropics\u201d, is an open admirer of the former US president.<\/span><\/p>\n

In Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdo\u011fan, president or prime minister for most of the past 20 years, has rallied an Islamic populism. Erdo\u011fan\u2019s Justice and Development Party claims to defend the values of Turkey\u2019s Muslim majority against\u00a0its secular elite.<\/span><\/p>\n

Binary divisions<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

The link between religion and populism is, in part, a matter of rhetoric. Populism favours the language of binary distinctions \u2013 truth and falsehood, right and wrong, us and them, citizen and immigrant. Certain forms of religion organise the world into similarly dualistic categories, grounded in a belief that the universe is divinely ordained\u00a0to be this way.<\/span><\/p>\n

Populists also claim to appeal directly to the will of the people, rejecting the authority of \u201celites\u201d,\u00a0attacking\u00a0the media, the political establishment, universities, the intelligentsia, or big business.<\/span><\/p>\n

Populism is not always associated with religion and nor do populists always use religious\u00a0language. But the connection is strong, even if it is not always simple. For example, religion is not universally adopted by populists as an ally.<\/span><\/p>\n

Coalitions of religious-populist movements have found common cause in their opposition to what is presented as a liberal, \u201cwoke\u201d agenda. Orb\u00e1n\u2019s recent appearance at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Texas provides\u00a0a striking illustration. CPAC has become\u00a0a major rallying point\u00a0for Christian nationalists in the US, and this year\u2019s gathering culminated in a closing speech by Trump.<\/span><\/p>\n

Like Trump, Orb\u00e1n characterises his political ambitions as a fight against the \u201cenemies of freedom\u201d, a \u201cculture war\u201d with the forces of \u201cwoke\u201d liberalism. Addressing CPAC delegates, he described Hungary as \u201can old, proud, but David-sized nation standing alone against the\u00a0globalist Goliath\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n

Use of religious images<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Orb\u00e1n\u2019s use of biblical imagery is not unique among populist politicians. Trump has been compared by some supporters\u00a0to King David: an imperfect but anointed leader.<\/span><\/p>\n

Trump has advanced the evangelical Christian cause through his\u00a0decisions as president. He used his executive power to court the conservative Christian vote, with monumental consequences for the American people.<\/span><\/p>\n

During his four years in office, he appointed three justices to the US Supreme Court, tipping its balance in a conservative direction and reinforcing his standing with the Christian right. This led to the controversial overturning of\u00a0Roe v Wade, the ruling that had protected the right of American women to have access to abortions since 1973.<\/span><\/p>\n

The use of religion to buttress political ambition is nothing new. But\u00a0my research\u00a0suggests recent years have seen religion being used as political capital in a distinct way among populists.<\/span><\/p>\n

We are witnessing the\u00a0strategic, cynical use of religion\u00a0as a means of furthering nationalist, conservative agendas. It achieves momentum precisely because of the ideological similarities between populism and certain forms of religion that aspire to transform the social order.<\/span><\/p>\n

How these changes influence religious communities at the grassroots level is not yet clear. But where alignments with religious traditions bear political fruit \u2013 as in Brazil, the US and Turkey \u2013 we can expect those seeking power to carry on trying to use it for their own ends.<\/span><\/p>\n

Mathew Guest<\/span><\/strong>
\nProfessor in the Sociology of Religion, <\/span>
\nDurham University<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Mauritius Times ePaper Friday 26 August 2022<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Evangelical protestants, around one third of the population, are likely to play a key role in the upcoming Brazilian election.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":139,"featured_media":35492,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[8348],"tags":[2835,34589,95,25748,8399,26647],"class_list":["post-35491","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-conversation","tag-brazil","tag-christian-right","tag-donald-trump","tag-jair-bolsonaro","tag-populism","tag-viktor-orban"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/Brazilian-leader-Jair-Bolsonaro.jpg?fit=1200%2C601&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8QzSF-9er","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35491","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/139"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35491"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35491\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35492"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35491"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35491"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mauritiustimes.com\/mt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35491"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}