A rich, eclectic set of essays about the causes and consequences of the rise of the new ideological right in Brazil. Based largely on ethnographic research, the essays strike a careful balance between emphasising the role of historical continuities and more recent developments in the 2018 election that brought Jair Bolsonaro to the presidency. It is unlikely that anybody will read this book without gaining new insights into and uncovering new questions about an important phenomenon – the rise of a new, authoritarian, and populist right – that is both distinctly Brazilian and global.

— Anthony W. Pereira, Department of International Development
and the Brazil Institute, King’s College London

A ground-breaking volume that sheds light not only on Brazil’s current affairs but on the Global South as a whole. By arguing that the contemporary conservative turn is not a turn – but a ‘return’ – the authors advance our understanding of the authoritarian features that have persisted in several developing and emerging countries, and how they gain new contours in the twenty-first century. Written by leading scholars, this interdisciplinary book brings original, fresh arguments to understand how what was once ‘the country of the future’ turned into ‘the country of the past’. Yet, more than looking at the past, this edited collection also presents several contributions that look ahead and help us to envision new horizons of hope and possibilities for Brazil and for the world. This book is an original contribution that will impact the field of far right and Latin American studies. 

— Rosana Pinheiro Machado, Lecturer in International
Development, University of Bath

Anybody interested in Brazil, from professional researchers in the country to readers who like to follow its many complicated lives, will want to read this magnificent volume. Through a series of detailed chapters which offer much factual and most updated information, the anatomy of a political event is carefully and collaboratively carried out. Many of the possibilities and impossibilities that Bolsonaro’s election created, the horizons opened and closed to Brazilian citizens, are interwoven in order to understand both how we arrived at that precise moment and what it meant for the immediate future. The book does not offer a direct cause-and-effect explanation but rather scrutinizes the conditions of possibility that led to the political predicament we are now in. In so doing, the flash-bulb moment gradually vanishes and a longue durée with more continuity than rupture suddenly appears in our understanding. History becomes very important because this is indeed a historical moment. The different perspectives on the event and on its pre-existing conditions culminate in a powerful and poignant afterword in which an indigenous perspective on the monopoly of legitimate violence confirms, from an unusually fresh angle, many of the points made by the authors of the preceding chapters. The books is thus not only very informative, but becomes a model of how collaborative social science can be conducted in the decolonial world of today.

— Ramon Sarró, Associate Professor in the Social
Anthropology of Africa, University of Oxford

A Horizon of (Im)possibilities offers a rich and diverse collection of perspectives on the Brazil of Bolsonaro’s presidency. With authors from across the social sciences, and wide-ranging themes – from the work of Brazil’s quilombola and indigenous activists to that of its far-right bloggers and elite philanthropists – the volume is fundamental reading for understanding the rise of the far right in contemporary Brazil.

— Sean T. Mitchell, Associate Professor of Anthropology,
Rutgers University-Newark, and author of Constellations of Inequality:
Space, Race, and Utopia in Brazil

This book is a must-read for all those who want to understand the recent success of neo- populist, conservative movements in Brazil and beyond. Avoiding facile conclusions that portray the election of president Jair Bolsonaro as a radical break with earlier conservative movements or a simple continuation of these, the authors of this enlightening volume uncover and analyse the particular entanglements of political and cultural dynamics that offered Bolsonaro and his allies a chance to present themselves as messianic saviours of the moral and political order. Collectively, the contributors of this book show how deep-seated authoritarian structures that appeared to be deteriorating since Brazil’s democratic turn were rehashed within the neoliberal economic and political orders that prevailed. Anti-progressive gender and sexuality politics, promoted amongst others by popular evangelical groups, resonated forcefully with imaginations of societal catastrophe, caused by corruption and criminality. Meanwhile, persistent resentment against the Workers’ Party nurtured the ground on which a neo-conservative project could be cultivated that presented Bolsonaro and his companions as uncontaminated political outsiders who would cleanse the nation and rid it of crime. While the authors paint an illuminating and grim picture of the illiberal tendencies in Brazilian society, they also highlight the bastions of progressive democratic politics and thus offer the reader some hope for Brazil’s immediate future.

— Martijn Oosterbaan, Associate Professor of Cultural
Anthropology, Utrecht University

Jair Bolsonaro’s rise during 2018 – from a fringe member of parliament to leader of Brazil’s new right and ultimately the president – came as a shock to domestic and international observers. How could this seemingly tolerant and democratic country elect a leader who flaunted violent insults at women, the LGBTQ community, the indigenous, and racially marginalised Brazilians? This rich and insightful edited volume explains the rise and consequences of Bolsonaro’s far-right administration, bringing together chapters from promising new as well as prominent senior scholars, many of them Brazilians. Diverse chapters contribute ethnographic and anthropological perspectives from quilombola communities, indigenous groups, and workplaces in small towns – but also evangelical and Pentecostal communities, online alt-right forums, and elite philanthropic networks. Reading across these chapters, one thing becomes clear: although Jair Bolsonaro’s presidency is harming marginalised communities, his rise is not an aberration in Brazilian political culture. Rather, he is the natural-born son of this beloved but paradoxical country deeply marked by inequalities, violences, and a long authoritarian tradition. 

— Amy Erica Smith, Associate Professor of Political Science,
Iowa State University

In A Horizon of (Im)possibilities, an international network of researchers from different parts of the northern and southern hemispheres, and who belong to various research centres, present their thoughts about the conservative turns in Brazil. This is one of the first strengths of this work, where the reader can learn about Brazilian political reality – past and present – through a distinct ethnographic and empirical focus. Each chapter indicates that the authors conducted deep investigations and careful data analysis to achieve their conclusion about their subject of discussion. Nevertheless, I want to highlight the introduction. The editors of the work in a short number of pages are able to discuss how the last Brazilian political events led to the election of Jair Bolsonaro. Unlike many works on the subject, which, in my view, present a ‘denouncement’ perspective, in the introduction to this book, the editors are able to demonstrate the complexities of this scenario. They carefully reveal how the emergence of a new conservative right in Brazil is actually not a new phenomenon, but the continuity of an authoritarian culture that inhabits Brazilian society and sociability in a diffuse and perennial way. Recognising this allows one to understand where it comes from, how it is currently manifesting, and in what directions it may take Brazilian politics.

— Roberta Bivar C. Campos, Associate Professor in Anthropology,
Federal University of Pernambuco