Intellectuals, the nation, and democracy in Brazil

Résumé 0

To what extent does the tendency of intellectuals to take on the role of architects of the nation produce a matrix of common thought? In Brazil, common components of this thought include the primacy given to national unity, the search for a social “organization,” and the attachment to evolutionist patterns with the promise of modernity. This configuration leaves hardly any space for the idea of democracy. In this article, the author analyzes the formation of this matrix of thought between 1925 and 1935 and its later consolidation between 1955 and 1964, with the appearance of a revolutionary affirmation. In the first part, he puts particular emphasis on the relationships that Brazilian intellectuals have had with the state. In the second part, he examines the development of this relationship. Confronted from 1964 with a military regime lasting more than twenty years, intellectuals were gradually persuaded to re-assess the idea of democracy. The second purpose of this article is to describe the way this encounter took place, and to suggest that it did not eliminate all references to earlier conceptions of politics.