Description
In this paper, we engage with the psychological strand of ontological security theory to argue that Bolsonaro’s Brazil represents (yet another) attempt to 're-construct' the nation as a projected ideal. We conceptualise ‘bolsonarismo’ as a symbolic order, which provides a form of transitory enjoyment and anxiety-relief by offering a particular interpretation of Brazil’s national self-identity. We claim that, under Bolsonaro, core discursive signifiers, related to an ultra-conservative conception of societal/cultural norms and national symbols, have emotionally underpinned a sense of ontological insecurity in a significant sector of the Brazilian society who had been marginalised since the end of Brazil’s right-wing military dictatorship in the mid-1980s. In that sense, the conflation of an uniquely favourable political, cultural and socio-economic environment with political language that offered an appealing/soothing resolution to Brazil’s alleged degeneration under the previous regime shaped an hegemonic, even if illusory and transient, form of collective subjectivity. By interpreting the Brazilian case through psychological/ontological security lenses, we hope to contribute to current theoretical debates on the emotional/psychological components of states’ national self-conceptions.
