The Brazilian Political System: Trends and Perspectives

In: Government & opposition: an international journal of comparative politics, Band 19, Heft 2, S. 178-187

Abstract

IN 1964 THE BRAZILIAN POLITICAL SYSTEM UNDERWENT A basic change. The populist republic (1946–64), which had paved the way for both a formal and an informal extension of political and economic franchises, after the success of Kubitschek's administration (1956–61) and Quadros's resignation (1961), collapsed as a result of decisional paralysis. The economic challen e of accumulation and the political challenge of social justice led, in the early 1960s during the Goulart administration, both to a fragmentation of power and to radicalization. The more demands multiplied, the more the government hesitated, feeding the anxiety of different political grou s in society. The result was a growing distrust of the politicafsystem. Distrust in turn not only prevented a coalition in support of a consistent governmental programme but also brought about an intensification of conflictual demands. This self-sustaining mechanism of decisional paralysis was interrupted by the emergence of what has been called by Juan Linz and Guuermo O'Donnell 'a bureaucratic-authoritarian regime'.