$Unique_ID{bob00140} $Pretitle{} $Title{Brazil Chapter 4C. Electoral Politics} $Subtitle{} $Author{James D. Rudolf} $Affiliation{HQ, Department of the Army} $Subject{party elections electoral government political parties local pds state mdb} $Date{1982} $Log{} Title: Brazil Book: Brazil, A Country Study Author: James D. Rudolf Affiliation: HQ, Department of the Army Date: 1982 Chapter 4C. Electoral Politics Electoral politics have had a checkered history in post-World War II Brazil. After being waged vigorously during the Second Republic by a multiparty system and a growing electorate, the post-196 military government imposed an artificial electoral system designed to give the illusion of democratic competition while preserving the rule of the armed forces and their civilian allies. By the mid-1970s, however, the contrived opposition began acting like a real opposition, and the regime found it prudent to alter drastically the system that had been in place since 1965. A new law promulgated in 1979 governing political parties and a new electoral system, which had its first test in November 1982, reinstated the popular election of major federal, state, and local officials. (The president, however, continued to be elected indirectly by an electoral college.) Critics argued, though, that executive officials would continue to use their legislative prerogatives (as they had in the past) to modify the electoral system further to their advantage. The next test of the evolving electoral system lies in the selection of the president: first, whether the opposition within the electoral college will have a hand in naming Figueiredo's successor in 1984; and second, whether future presidents will once again be elected by a popular, direct vote. Political Parties The origins of Brazil's political parties, like so many of its political institutions, go back to Vargas, who organized the rural-based Social Democratic Party (Partido Social Democratico-PSD) and the urban-based Brazilian Labor Party (Partido Trabalhista Brasileiro-PTB) in 1945 to support his declining political fortunes (see The Crisis of 1945, ch. 1). The National Democratic Union (Uniao Democratica Nacional-UDN), the last of the three major parties that were to dominate electoral politics for two decades, was organized by Vargas' opponents. Neither ideological nor representative of constituent interests, these parties functioned to channel local political machines, headed by paternalistic bosses (coronels in rural areas) into the national electoral arena. Personalism pervaded the party machinery: delivering votes brought patronage in the form of government jobs, federal development projects, and cash to the local bosses. To a considerable extent this characterization of Brazilian party politics persisted into the 1980s (see Political Dynamics under the Second Republic, ch. 1). The PSD was the most successful of the Second Republic parties (see fig. 9). Its candidates won the presidency in 1945 and 1955, and the party supported the PTB victor in 1950 (Vargas) and President Goulart (1961-64). Only during the brief incumbency of Janio Quadros in 1961 was the PSD "out of favor" with the president, and it consistently dominated both houses of Congress. Nonideological, though conservative in the sense that it supported the status quo, the PSD attracted many traditional coronels, as well as bureaucrats, industrialists, landowners, and bankers who benefited from the Vargas and PSD economic programs. The PTB acted as the "partner" of the PSD thoughout most of the 1945-64 period. Its strength grew steadily and culminated in the Goulart presidency. Its appeal was populist, drawing on nationalistic sentiment in calling for active state intervention in the economy and extended benefits for the working class. The makeup of the PTB was heterogeneous: Goulart was one of the nation's wealthiest landowners, while new urban middle and upper classes, as well as leftist intellectuals, were party adherents. The PTB tried, but generally failed, to gain a working-class following. Except during the brief rule of Quadros in 1961, the UDN acted as the opposition party thoroughout the Second Republic. Moderate and middle class, attracting urban professionals and conservative intellectuals, the UDN espoused amorphous issues, such as individual liberties, honesty and efficiency in government, and government decentralization. Essentially, it wanted to reverse the Vargas legacy. Many civilian allies of the military government were recruited from the UDN. Eleven other parties competed in elections between 1946 and 1964. Only one of these, the Social Progressive Party (Partido Social Progressista-PSP), was significant in the electoral arena. Dominated by its personalist leader, Adhemar de Barros, it appealed to the urban lower class in the tradition of Vargas. PSP success peaked in the mid-1950s, then gradually waned. Increasingly during the Second Republic, various parties formed temporary alliances for electoral purposes. This was especially true in congressional elections, where votes cast for alliances rose to over 40 percent of the total by 1962. Alliances ended on election day, however, and candidates elected on an alliance ticket assumed their positions in Congress as party members. Indicative of the shallowness in party platforms, the electoral system thus contributed to depriving the political parties of purpose beyond serving as electoral machines for personalistic leaders. In the public's mind, nevertheless, these parties continued to retain their identities long after they were officially abolished in October 1965 under the provisions of Institutional Act Number 2. Two months later two new parties, the National Renovating Alliance (Alicanca Renovadora Nacional-Arena) and the Brazilian Democratic Movement (Movimento Democratico Brasileiro-MDB), were formed under the terms of restrictive legislation that required new political parties to have at least 120 adherents in Congress. Arena, the majority party of the government, was formed largely out of the UDN and the conservative wing of the PSD; the MDB, the minority party of the opposition, was made up largely of the PTB PSD liberals, and adherents of a wide spectrum of smaller parties. The contrived nature of these two parties, unrepresentative of national political sentiment, was widely acknowledged. For years the Brazilian press continued to include the pre-1965 party affiliation, in the political identification of politicians, e.g., MDB, ex-PSD. The party system that was to persist until 1979 was further distorted by the government's practice of suspending for a period of 10 years, the political rights of individuals they deemed threatening to their political designs. This action was taken against over 1,500 persons, mostly politicians. Not surprisingly, most were associated with the MDB. Such practices led to widespread cynicism and apathy among both politicians and voters during the first decade of military rule. The Government Party Cynicism and apathy favored Arena, which in 1970 gained overwhelming control of both houses of Congress, thanks largely to 6.6 million blank or spoiled ballots and another 10 million voters who did not bother to participate. Thereafter, however, Arena's fortunes steadily declined, and it faced the possibility of losing its congressional majority in the 1978 elections. In 1977 the Geisel administration averted this possibility however, by closing Congress and amending the Constitution by decree so that one-third of the senators were elected in the state assemblies, which Arena controlled, rather than in direct, popular elections. Arena's association with the government gave it another advantage-access to patronage-which made it the most important party in rural areas and in most state and local governments, where the traditional political machinery of coronelismo was strongest. Factionalism within Arena threatened it from its birth to its death under the November 1979 Law of Party Reform. The major division was defined by individual pre-1965 party loyalties. In addition to PSD and UDN factions, however, Arena was factionalized at the local level by personal loyalties. The government dealt with this factionalism among its supporters by an electoral device known as sublegenda, which allowed separate tickets to compete in elections under the same party label. Its effect was to institutionalize rather than resolve the factionalization that was inherited, in part, by Arena's post-1979 reincarnation as the Democratic Social Party (Partido Democratico Social-PDS). The end of the sublegenda electoral device led a considerable number of Arenistas (members or adherents of Arena) in electoral districts where rival factions predominated, to shun the PDS. Other Arenistas joined the opposition in the belief that the momentum of political liberalization would inevitably lead to a loss of popular support for the new government party. Nevertheless, factional struggles between PDS candidates and powerful rivals within the party cost the PDS a number of important races in the 1982 elections. Such factionalism was probably inevitable as long as the PDS lacked a cohesive party platform, having little identity beyond being the party of the government. The electoral strength of the PDS was strongest in rural areas and in the Northeast and North, where the powers of patronage and the tradition of "clientelistic" politics were strongest. Both its lack of ideological definition and its reliance on local political machinery to deliver votes gave the PDS a large measure of continuity with traditions first established in Brazilian political parties during the Vargas era. Opposition Parties The opposition party formed in December 1965, the MDB, was ineffective for nearly a decade. With political rights stripped from many of its principal leaders, gubernatorial and mayoral elections barred in many of its local strongholds, and little access to the patronage and other prerogatives of power granted its opponents, the MDB had few options. It boycotted the 1966 elections and lost disastrously in the 1970 national and 1972 local elections. Then its fortunes began to change. In 1973, for the first time, it nominated candidates for president and vice president, who gained a mere 76 of 502 votes in the electoral college. In the 1974 popular elections for Congress, state legislatures, and municipal councils, however, the MDB made a surprisingly strong showing, adding 13 Senate seats and 78 seats in the Chamber of Deputies to its previous total. The electoral success of the MDB, attributed largely to the protest vote arising out of the nation's mounting economic difficulties, continued in the 1976 local and 1978 national elections. In all probability only the manipulation of the electoral system in 1977 and its complete overhaul in 1979 prevented the MDB from shedding its minority status to become the majority party in Congress. Factionalism within the MDB, a heteregeneous agglomeration of groups from conservatives to Marxists who shared only their opposition to the government, was more rife than that within Arena. During its early years the principal division was between the "moderates and the more leftist "authentics." With the passage of time each of these splintered further. The left was especially factionalized, the "authentics" dividing into the "historical" and "new authentics," and the "popular tendency" coalescing around Lula and others associated with organized labor. The "moderates" were divided by the questions of whether to collaborate with Marxists as well as whether to collaborate with the government. As anticipated by its architects, the November 1979 Law of Party Reform, which made it much easier to organize a political party than had the 1965 legislation, led to various MDB factions each forming its own party. A divided opposition, it was assumed, would be a less potent opposition. Although some MDB leaders were glad of the opportunity to organize a party to distinguish themselves from other MDB leaders with radically different ideologies, still others held the opinion that a large, though ideologically diverse, party of the opposition could successfully challenge the PDS in the elections. It was this latter group that formed the core of the Brazilian Democratic Movement Party (Partido do Movimento Democratico Brasileiro-PMDB) in January 1980. A considerable number of disaffected Arenistas also joined the PMDB over the course of the next two years. In February 1982 the PMDB received a tremendous boost when the Popular Party (Partido Popular-PP), after two years as the third largest party, disbanded in order to merge with the PMDB. The PP had been formed by an MDB "moderate," Tancredo Neves, and a dissident Arenista, Magalhaes Pinto, to represent businessmen who generally supported the status quo but resented the domination of the government by the military and their technocratic allies. By early 1982, to many observers' surprise, the PP had gained nearly 100 adherents in Congress. The subsequent merger, prompted by a government ruling that disallowed alliances for the 1982 elections, contributed in large measure to the PMDB success in that election. The PMDB remained factionalized, though less so than its predecessor, the MDB, had been. In 1982 the major sources of dispute seemed to be the inclusion of the leadership of the outlawed Brazilian Communist Party (Partido Comunista Brasileiro-PCB) on the one hand and former Arenistas on the other. These disputes were suppressed for purposes of the 1982 election but in all likelihood would reappear in the future. The business faction surrounding Neves, formerly president of PP but made first vice president of the PMDB in 1982, may also reassert its separate identity. In late 1982 the PMDB remained headed by Ulysses Guimaraes, who had also served as president of the MDB. During the early 1980s the PMDB had made a large effort to increase party membership and develop a widespread base of local organizations. It had the most success in the urban areas of southern Brazil. The program of the PMDB, as articulated in 1982, called for the full exercise of the political rights of all citizens, including the rights of illiterates to vote, and free and direct elections for governmental representatives at all levels, including the presidency. Ultimately, the PMDB called for the convocation of a representative constituent assembly that would write a new, liberal-democratic constitution. Its economic program called for the renegotiation of the foreign debt, the lowering of interest rates, and public works programs to combat unemployment. It generally supported the government's independent foreign policy. Although the 1979 Law of Party Reform was designed to ensure the division of the MDB into a number of parties. requirements for legal registration as a party were stringent enough to prevent an unstable proliferation of small parties. To compete in the 1982 elections, a party, therefore, was required to gain the support of at least 10 percent of the members of Congress or to have branch organizations in at least one-fifth of the municipios in each of at least nine of Brazil's 23 states. Three parties, in addition to the PDS and the PMDB, met these qualifications. To be legally recognized after 1982, a party will have had to receive 3 percent of the vote of nine states and 5 percent nationwide for the Chamber of Deputies. The post-1982 fates of the three smaller opposition parties under such restrictions were uncertain. Perhaps the most endangered was the Brazilian Labor Party (Partido Trabalhista Brasileiro-PTB), organized in 1981 by Ivete Vargas, the niece of the founder of the original PTB, and Quadros, attempting a political comeback two decades after his brief presidential tenure. Similarly attempting to resurrect the urban populist tradition of the Second Republic was the Democratic Labor Party (Partido Democratico Trabalhista-PDT) of Leonel Brizola. The symbol of radical popularism during the early 1960s when he was governor of Rio Grande do Sul, then a federal deputy from Rio de Janeira, Brizola undertook a more moderate stance while in exile, where he was influenced by European social democrats. The third party to be formed out the of opposition MDB between 1980 and 1982 was the PT. The PT was unique among all post-World War II Brazilian political parties in that it was organized in a grass-roots fashion, rather than in the top-down, personalistic, and clientelistic tradition of other parties. In one sense it was forced into this position by the Law of Party Reform. Lacking the support of a sufficient number of congressmen to qualify for the 1982 election, it was allowed to compete only because of its widespread organization at the local level. Its grass-roots organization was, in another sense, a product of the belief of the PT leadership in democratic decisionmaking within the party to distinguish itself from the personalism that pervaded other parties. Conceived in 1978 by the "authentic" trade union leadership, the PT elected Lula as its president at its first national party congress in 1981. Party membership was dominated by workers, both blue collar and white collar. The PT also attracted a number of students, leftistss intellectuals and, especially in the rural Northeast, the Roman Catholic clergy. In 1982 the party claimed a membership of 300,000 in local organizations in all but one of the 23 states. Because its membership adhered to a wide variety of leftist political philosophies, the PT had difficulty in articulating a concise platform of its own. Its long-term goal was the establishment of a vaguely defined socialism. In the short term it sought restrictions on the activities of multinational corporations operating in Brazil and a variety of benefits for workers, including trade union freedoms and government programs to address unemployment and low wages. Barred from participation in the 1982 elections, although operating openly in the early 1980s for the first time since 1964, were the pro-Soviet PCB and a variety of smaller, splinter communist groups. In 1980 the aged and longtime general secretary of the PCB, Luis Carlos Prestes, was ousted upon his return from exile and replaced by Giocondo Gervasi Dias. The PCB subsequently supported the PMDB in the 1982 elections, while Prestes was said to favor the PT. The major activity of the PCB during the early 1980s, however, was its concerted effort to gain legal recognition. Other communist parties, the products of earlier factionalization, included the Communist Party of Brazil (Partido Comunista do Brasil-PCdoB), formed in 1962, not to be confused with the pre-1960 PCdoB, which was pro-Albanian (formerly pro-Chinese); the pro-Cuba Revolutionary Communist Party (Partido Comunista Revolucionaria-PCR); and another Castroite group that had been active in the guerrilla activities of the late 1960s and early 1970s, the Revolutionary Movement of October 8 (Movimento Revolucionario 8 de Outubro-MR-8). A number of Trotskyite groups also existed, one of which, Socialist Convergence, was said to work closely with the PT (see Threats to Internal Security, ch. 5). Elections under Military Rule One important characteristic that distinguished military rule in Brazil from that in other Latin American nations ruled by military governments during the same period was the fact that elections continued to be held after 1964. Not all offices that had traditionally been filled by elected officials were contested, however. Formally elected by an electoral college, the president and vice president were, in fact, selected by the military hierarchy. From October 1965 until November 1982 state governors were indirectly elected by government-controlled state assemblies. After 1966 a large number of local mayors and councilmen in many of the most important municipios were appointed state governors. And finally, in 1978, half of the 44 contested senatorial seats were selected by the government-controlled state assemblies. On one occasion-the 1980 elections for local government officials-scheduled elections were canceled. The major reason given by officials for this decision was that candidates would not have had time to prepare themselves, given the newness of the Law of Party Reform. With this exception, then, popular elections for some of the elected officials (federal deputies and senators, state assembly members, and most local mayors and councilmen) were held every two years between 1966 and 1982. (Another reason given for the 1980 cancellation was to bring local elections into step with state and national elections, so that henceforth there would be elections only every four years.) There were very few accusations of vote fraud made during those years. The Brazilian electoral code was administered and enforced by a widespread system of electoral courts, headed by the Superior Electoral Tribunal, which was generally accepted as efficient, honest, and nonpartisan. These courts lacked any power to alter the electoral system, however. This prerogative was used extensively by the federal executive through numerous constitutional amendments, as well as a new electoral code in 1965 that was amended repeatedly in subsequent years in order to retain political control over the system of government under the guise of democratic procedures (see Structure of Government, this ch.). Elections were halted during the mid-1960s for the president, governors, and local officials in key municipios because military authorities believed that they would lose control of these positions should they be contested in popular elections. For a decade the government was able, through the Arena party, to win comfortable margins in elections for federal and state legislatures and in the overwhelming majority of local government contests. This was made possible by a combination of its holding a near monopoly on the benefits from patronage and coronelismo, gerrymandering and, when necessary, intimidation (such as revoking the political rights of powerful opponents). Heavy Arena losses in federal elections in 1974 and again in local elections in 1976 led the government to amend substantially the electoral code governing subsequent elections in order to retain its controlling majorities within the elected bodies. The "April package," decreed in April 1977 after Congress had been summarily closed, addressed the 1978 federal elections. To prevent the opposition MDB from gaining a majority in the Senate, the regime amended the Constitution so that one of each state's three senators was selected in the Arena-controlled state assemblies. With respect to the Chamber of Deputies, the system of proportional representation was changed in two ways designed to increase the representation given to smaller rural states, where Arena held a stronger voter appeal. First, the minimum number of deputies for the smallest states was doubled to six; second, the number of seats accorded each state became calculated on the basis of total population, rather than the number of registered voters as in the past. Clearly, the higher proportion of nonvoters in rural areas meant that this subtle change gave additional representation to Arena-controlled states. The 1982 elections-the first conducted under the 1979 law that created a multiparty system of electoral competition-were widely viewed as the most open and free elections in 18 years of military rule. Indeed, they included the first popular elections held for state governors since 1965. Of equal or greater significance, they were the first elections under the political liberalization of abertura that had allowed exiled opponents to return under the 1979 amnesty, returned political rights to those who had previously had them revoked (the so-called casados), and ended the harsh media censorship that had been in place since 1968. More broadly, it was the first electoral contest since the January 1979 abrogation of Institutional Act Number 5, which had been the principal source of the military regime's dictatorial powers. Potentially the most significant aspect of the 1982 elections was that its victors-all the senators and deputies and six members of each state assembly-would comprise the electoral college that two years later would select the successor to President Figueiredo. The liberalized atmosphere of the 1982 elections did not prevent the government, nevertheless, from what had become a tradition: the alteration of the electoral system to the advantage of the government party, now under the banner of the PDS. The size of the Chamber of Deputies was raised from 420 to 479; although government spokesmen stated that this reflected population increases measured in the 1980 census, others labeled the redistricting as a gerrymandering exercise and charged that the newly created districts were in regions of PDS strength. More clearly partisan in design was the voting procedure that emerged out of a series of electoral "reform packages" introduced between November 1981 and August 1982. A single ballot was used for all six electoral contests. The blank ballot contained only the title of each position to be filled (governor, senator, deputy, state assemblyman, mayor, and city councilman) followed by a blank space where the voter was required to write in the candidate's name or four-digit number assigned to each contestant. Furthermore, each voter was required to vote a straight party ticket. Ballots with votes that crossed party lines, those without a name or number after each position, and those indicating the name of the party, rather than the individuals of choice, were declared invalid. All parties concerned agreed that these voting regulations were designed to favor the PDS. Such manipulation, in the Brazilian context, was considered a prerogative of those holding power. First of all, the complicated voting procedure led to many ballots' being invalidated; had 50 percent or more been invalidated, the entire election would have been annulled. Second, the straight party ticket (voto vinculado) requirement led rural voters, primarily concerned with local affairs in which PDS candidates were strongest, to vote for the PDS at the national level, where their candidates were often weaker than those of the opposition parties. Third, although the estimated 25 percent of the voting population that was illiterate had legally gained suffrage rights, the complicated procedures and the need to write a name or number on the ballot effectively barred them from casting a valid vote. Legal manipulations designed to hinder the oppositions in electoral contests went beyond the electoral laws to include access to the mass media. Restrictions on the media were far less than they had been previously, however. Censorship was first imposed in 1968. The degree of censorship varied greatly, from cases where every word was subject to prior censorship to those where only occasional, ex post facto censorship came into play. In general, however, it was not as stringent as the censorship practiced by many comparable regimes. The most common explanation for this fact was the generally conservative point of view of the majority of the mass media organs. The government's own news service, Agencia Nacional, and its radio program, "Hora do Brasil," gave widespread distribution to its interpretation of events. REDE Globo (formerly known as TV Globo) was launched in the mid-1960s with considerable financial backing from private United States interests, and by the mid-1970s the highly successful network dominated 60 to 70 percent of the 45 million-viewer television audience. Its apolitical programming and conservative projection of the news made Globo enterprises, which diversified into magazines, newspapers, and radio stations, as well as nonmedia concerns, an important de facto supporter of the military government. A total of over 200 radio stations broadcast to an audience estimated in the mid-1970s at 85 million. Low literacy levels and a generally low consumption of printed media made television and radio (along with word of mouth) particularly important vehicles for the transmission of political values. The most important daily newspaper was the conservative O Estado de Sao Paulo, having a daily circulation in early 1982 averaging 200,000 and nearly twice that figure on Sundays. The three other major dailies-O Globo and Jornal do Brasil, in Rio de Janeiro, and Folha de Sao Paulo-were also conservative. There were 23 additional daily newspapers, although their circulations were much smaller. A number of these smaller dailies, generally known as "alternative dailies," were inaugurated in the late 1970s and were openly critical of the government. Weekly newsmagazines had a considerable political impact. By far the most influential was Veja, published by large Sao Paulo corporate interests. Isto E, also from Sao Paulo, ran a poor second among weeklies. Censorship was gradually eased during the late 1970s. By 1982 there was no prior censorship of the variety that had been ubiquitous a decade earlier. Even the technically outlawrd PCB published its own newspaper. By no means, however, did it print whatever it wanted to: self-censorship was assiduously practiced by the "alternative dailies" and all other media that criticized the government. The 1979 National Security Law established prison terms up to 13 years for nebulous "crimes," such as "creating subversive propoganda" and "enabling or permitting . . . the use of communications media for the execution of a crime against national security." Television and radio station managers and publishers were understandably careful to avoid such penalties. Certain subjects, such as the private lives of military officials, were taboo. Self-censorship played a major role in limiting the subjects of discussion and moderating the tone of elcetoral campaigns. Another piece of legislation, popularly known as the Falcao Law (after its primary author, Armando Falcao) also restricted access to the media during the 1978 and 1982 electoral campaigns. During the two months prior to each of these elections, the Falcao Law limited television and radio campaigning to a small number of five-second spots (paid for by the government) showing only a photograph of the candidate, his name, party, and the position for which he was running. Debates or any statement of a candidate's position on an issue on radio or television were outlawed. The law was widely criticized, particularly because the president continued to appear on a weekly, prime-time television discussion, called "The President and the People," throughout the period up to the elections. As had been widely predicted before the 1982 elections, the manipulation of the electoral laws and the mass media was not able to prevent (although it undoubtedly did lessen its magnitude) the victory of the opposition parties over the PDS in the gubernatorial and congressional races. Although the PDS won 12 gubernatorial seats as opposed to nine for the PMDB, the opposition won in all but one of the important industrial states in the populous southern part of the country. PDS victories were concentrated in the rural northeast. Brizola captured the state of Rio de Janeiro for the PDT; neither of the other two parties competing gained a gubernatorial seat. One surprise of the election was the poor showing of Lula's PT, which gained only about 10 percent of the vote in Sao Paulo, its regional stronghold. The voto vinculado led to election results for other offices that closely paralleled the vote for governor. The PDS won 15 Senate seats, giving them a total of 46, or exactly two-thirds of the seats in that chamber. The PMDB won nine Senate seats for a total of 21. In the Chamber of Deputies the PDS won 235 and the PMDB 200, so that neither major party commanded a majority. The electoral college, to be made up of members of the national congress and those elected in the state assemblies, remained firmly in control of the PDS, thus enabling the government to control the indirect election of the successor to President Figueiredo in October 1984.