The Political Uses of the Past During the Cold War: Conservative Intellectuals and the Military Dictatorship in Brazil

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to examine how, in the context of the Cold War and Latin America's National Security dictatorships, conservative Brazilian intellectuals turned to history to demonstrate the country's 'incompatibility' with progressive values and left-wing government. It analyzes a selection of lectures given by acclaimed conservative intellectuals at the National War College during the 1960s and 70s. An examination of these lectures demonstrates that many of the elements chosen to define 'national identity' under the 'Estado Novo' dictatorship of 1937-45 -such as the valorization of miscegenation, a belief in the docile nature of the Brazilian people, the exaltation of work and the idea of a nation founded on cohesion and cooperation -were revived after 1964. Thus, conservative intellectuals made an important contribution to legitimizing the military dictatorship of 1964-85 by inscribing it within what they believed the Brazilian tradition to be, presenting it as the only regime capable of preserving national unity and culture against the threats posed by Marxism and communism.

A tale of missed opportunities: The Cold War in Brazil

“…Broadening our understanding of the multiple facets of Brazil's ditadura, especially of the support (at times pressure) provided by reactionary forces, which saw the need for a conservative moral crusade amidst the transformative years of the Cold War, Ben Cowan's Securing Sex richly examines how the dictatorial period allowed for the strengthening of earlier morally conservative forces and demands at a time when the country experienced accelerated socio-economic and cultural changes. 40 The book rightly reiterates the notion that the military regime built upon earlier administrative centralizing efforts to guarantee that a new controlled conservative modernization phase could be attained. In this new context, changing youth behavior, especially with the rise of counter-cultural expressions of the late 1960s, and the redefinition of gender and sexual norms were at the forefront of concerns by ruling elites, which mobilized to prevent the further dissemination of such trends.…”