Credit, Fernando Cavalcanti/BBC
The victory of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) in this year's elections was, to a large extent, sustained by the government's change in stance, which began to dialogue with the real needs of the population.
Extinguishing bets, recognizing the high price of food and creating measures with a direct impact on the population's pockets were crucial initiatives for the transition from the first to the second round, analyzes political scientist André Singer, professor at the Department of Political Science at the University of São Paulo (USP).
But the author of the recently released Impasse - Brazil facing the reactionary wave (Companhia das Letras), among other works, states that, despite the victory in Brazil and Donald Trump's most recent defeat in the mid-term elections in the United States, democracy is still at risk.
“We are facing a violent and openly anti-democratic far right,” says Singer in an interview with BBC News Brasil.
One of the explanations for the advance of the radical right, according to the researcher, would be the worsening of inequalities caused by the 2008 financial crisis, considered the worst global recession since the Great Depression of 1929.
Since then, it doesn't really matter who wins the elections: people's lives aren't improving, argues Singer. "Society continues to have a noose around its neck and no future horizon for itself and its children", he states.
Part of this population, therefore, moved to the radical right, which has advanced a lot in recent years throughout the world.
"The good news I can give to those who are in favor of democracy, like me, is that the extreme right is not finding a solution for these people either."
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BBC News Brasil - Anthropologist Rosana Pinheiro Machado, who also researches the effects of the platformization of work, argues that a new aspirational class, which seeks to prosper financially and is frustrated by considering that their needs are not covered by current public policies, represents a "time bomb" that almost exploded in these elections. Is this bomb defused or was it just delayed?
André Singer - Let's take this image of the time bomb as a starting point. I would say that an exceptional thing happened: it, let's say, exploded in the first round and "unexploded" in the second.
In fact, it was reversed, as if its effect had been reversed. And this is the incredible phenomenon, because we have to remember that President Lula won against Flávio Bolsonaro by twice the difference with which he won against Jair Bolsonaro in 2022. So, the end of the process is the opposite of what happened in the first round. And I'm talking not just about the numbers, but about a deep political interpretation of what happened.
So the idea of the time bomb is excellent, but I think what happened between the first and second round was the reversal of this process. This does not mean that the bomb was deactivated, but from a strictly political point of view, and whoever analyzes politics needs to analyze each situation, there was a reversal of this process in the second round.
BBC News Brasil - And why? What happened? Can we already point out concrete factors for this reversal?
Singer - There were three factors. It begins with a change in the president's stance and, therefore, in the character of the government. This is perhaps the least noticed aspect. The president, in my opinion, changed the campaign completely in mid-September. In fact, the specific milestone is the Porto Alegre rally on September 11th, when he acknowledged that supermarket prices were expensive, specifically citing coffee and meat. From then on, a big change occurred. He began to take measures to dialogue with the needs of the population. And perhaps the most emblematic was the ban on betting.
Because what happens here is a confluence of several factors: an increase in the cost of living, a family debt crisis and, thirdly, the betting epidemic. I'm not saying it's just that, but it's partly because people were in debt and trying to earn extra income to pay their debts. And the betting mechanism is designed so that the person loses. So, most of these people ended up deeper in debt, in a very distressing situation.
If we look at this triad, we can clearly see what happened. Of course, it wasn't just the ban on betting. There was a series of measures, including MEIs, Desenrola 3, the readjustment of Bolsa Família, the approval of the end of the 6x1 scale, the [proposal of] zero fares on public transport on the weekend... We had a package that, in my opinion, changed the character of the government.
Added to this was a kind of social explosion in the second round. Young people, especially, took to the streets en masse in a phenomenon that I hadn't seen since 2013. I would even say that it's a similar phenomenon [to 2013]. The demonstrations on Avenida Paulista on October 11th and 24th are equivalent to the large right-wing demonstration for the impeachment of President Dilma [Rousseff] in March 2016.
BBC News Brasil - But these large demonstrations that took place in 2013 and then in 2016 were against something: the tariff increase or the Dilma government. It was very difficult to gather people on the street in favor of something...
Singer - The demonstrations that were called against the Bolsonaro government during the end of the pandemic had no results. No demonstration reaches the scale of those that took place on the 11th and 24th if they do not have a popular content. You can't fill Avenida Paulista like that without the popular classes being involved.
The big news is that it has, in fact, a positive and purposeful aspect, which was for the re-election of President Lula, but let's also remember that it was very against the extreme right. There was a spectrum of the extreme right that almost materialized in the first round, because, to everyone's surprise, since the polls said otherwise, Flávio Bolsonaro was ahead by two percentage points.
This stance of fear and repudiation of the extreme right was also very important in those demonstrations. This is the fundamental combination, between the change in the government's stance and a social explosion comparable to that of 2013, with repercussions in 2016, because we know that 2016 was a bit of a continuation of 2013.
Along with this, there was the digital operation, let's call it that, of the Janones Army, which spread this movement across the entire country, because an extraordinary thing was the fact that these demonstrations took place in hundreds of cities. This, in a continental country like Brazil, is very significant. We had a rarely seen national movement of great significance.
BBC - Did you join the Janones Army?
Singer - I personally didn't participate, because I don't know how to operate it and I was absolutely focused on the work I had to do, but I followed a lot.
BBC News Brasil - From what has been said so far, the election was turned around by the combination of two factors: social mobilization, inflamed by fear of the advance of the radical right, and measures that directly and immediately affect the pocketbook.
Singer - Exactly, and it is in this sense that I say that the election reversed the effect of the time bomb that exploded in the first round. In fact, the group that was oscillating and wanted to decide the election is this group of voters who receive two to five minimum wages of monthly family income, which is a group that chooses pragmatically, looking at their situation, which is a very difficult situation.
Evidently, it is not as difficult as that for those at the bottom of the social pyramid. But here you need to remember that the historic programs of Lulism, such as Bolsa Família, protect, in some way, this most vulnerable segment, for example, in the interior of the country, in the interior of the Northeast, where the cost of living is lower. And this sector of two to five minimum wages, in general, has to live with the higher cost of living, which is the metropolitan cost of living.
Credit, Brian Snyder/Reuters
BBC News Brasil - The end of the 6x1 journey was something that, since the beginning of the campaign, Lula tried very hard to approve to use as a platform. What is the weight of this change? Because a lot of people are informal.
Singer - You are right that there are a lot of people who are informal, who are micro-entrepreneurs, we should already mention the fact that there was a very significant package for individual micro-entrepreneurs, dialoguing directly with this sector and these needs.
But there is still an important contingent of CLT workers. Sometimes, one gets the impression that everyone has become a platform worker, which is not true. It is a significant and perhaps growing contingent, but there is still a huge contingent of workers and employees.
The measure of change in working hours is fundamental, because it speaks directly to these young people who took to the streets. And these young people took to the streets partly because they realized that the government had really committed to this measure. It wasn't a campaign promise.
BBC News Brasil - Did the PT campaign benefit from Flávio Bolsonaro's defense of negotiations between boss and employee? The senator also said that, if he won the elections, he would change the Constitution...
Singer - She favored herself a lot. Flávio Bolsonaro made a mistake, from a tactical point of view, by disregarding that the first round is not the second. He was not the president and metaphorically sat in the chair too soon. This is a mistake that no candidate can make, because it is fatal. In his case, it came at a high price.
But, besides being a tactical error, there is a fundamental issue there. In fact, Flávio Bolsonaro's proposal was an open contract for the worker to receive payment for hours worked, which he would agree, voluntarily, in quotation marks, with the employer. This simply means eliminating all labor protection, which is, deep down, what was in his head, because it is no coincidence that he spent the entire campaign until the first round saying that he was targeting [Argentine president, Javier] Milei. It is an ultra-liberal position. When he sees the tide of the social movement, he starts to retreat from all his proposals, including Milei's example, and say that he would maintain all social benefits, that he was committed to the end of 6x1, etc.
But the second round of the election had a very interesting aspect for those who study electoral behavior, which is to show that there is a certain rationality in the voter, because the voter perceives it, he has a sensitivity, especially towards what directly interests him. So, it was not just the tactical error right after the first round that he actually committed, but also the whole one.
BBC News Brazil - Lula was re-elected, but across America the radical right has been making great strides in recent years. Why has the discourse become so radical? And is it possible to contain this radicalization?
Singer - It's not the speech that has become radicalized, it's the action. We are facing a violent and openly anti-democratic far right. Here in Brazil, we had the ultimate case, which is an attempted coup d'état. So, it's not a speech problem, it's a fundamental problem.
Why does this happen? There is an open debate. My hypothesis is that neoliberalism, after the 2008 crash, worsened inequalities around the world. Neoliberalism, in a way, means that the result of the election does not change much the living situation of this part of the population. So, you win A, you win B, you win C, you win D, but society continues to have a noose around its neck and no future horizon for itself and its children.
A block of this population moved to the extreme right and gave support to extreme right positions that would, in principle, belong to the middle strata. The good news I can give to those who are in favor of democracy, as is my case, is that the extreme right is not finding a solution for these people either.
Trump's defeat in the midterm elections means that, in the next two years, he will not have the same power as he did in the first two. President Lula's victory in Brazil has a similar dimension, making the situation in the Americas, at this moment, more balanced, creating a space of hope, so to speak, that has to be taken advantage of, because the threat will not stop.
BBC News Brasil - Could Flávio Bolsonaro's trip to the United States, in any way, interfere with Lula's resumption of relations with Trump? How could Flávio’s trip there interfere with bilateral relations?
Singer - At first, he doesn't interfere, because Flávio made a second tactical error, in my opinion, by not recognizing the result of the election. He had been presenting himself, since before the first round — therefore, it was not an occasional movement — as the moderate Bolsonaro, explicitly. He was obviously discussing the fact that the natural candidate would be Tarcísio de Freitas. And Bolsonaro Sr. decided to nominate his eldest son to make it clear that he was the one who decided, and that he wanted to have his name on the ballot box.
Flávio made a third mistake by leaving Brazil in an entirely discredited manner. Of course, there must be pockets of Bolsonarists who believe that the election was rigged and who may believe in absurd things, but they are small groups. Brazilian public opinion is unanimous in recognizing, even among right-wing sectors, that the election was completely fair, that the extension of the deadline was necessary, because there were difficulties in several cities, such as Salvador and São Paulo, so much so that the PL entered together with the PT, with the same request for an extension of the deadline, which completely dismantles the hypothesis of fraud.
His departure from Brazil delegitimizes him as a leader. So, at first, it doesn't affect anything. Including because President Trump took a distant position on the issue, saying that there were problems in the Brazilian election, but that he likes Lula, these inconsistent statements, which are typical of the current White House. The problem is knowing what will happen from now on. Because now a new process is slowly beginning, which is the process that will take place in President Lula's fourth government. It didn't even start.
Credit, Divyakant Solanki/EPA/Shutterstock
BBC News Brasil - Looking at 2030 and succession, can you think of lessons that can be learned from this election now?
Singer - 2030 is not on the table at the moment, because there is a lot until then. The only reason 2030 is on the table is because, in presidential systems, when one election is over, everyone starts thinking about the next one. And it is normal for this to be the case, because it is part of the expected mechanism.
Governor [of São Paulo] Tarcísio Freitas [Republicanos] is already moving to be the candidate in 2030. But I don't identify anything like that on the winning side of this election. What I think can be drawn are conclusions regarding the process that occurred between the first and second rounds and the possible effects this will have on the fourth government.
BBC News Brasil – The question about succession is inevitable, given that Lula will no longer be able to run. Tarcísio is a natural candidate, as he was until Bolsonaro decided on Flávio. Fernando Haddad gave us an interview in which he raised the possibility of PT running for president. Which is something that hasn't happened in the party for a long time. What do you think of this idea?
Singer - The preview mechanism is always a good mechanism, I think. It is interesting, democratic, allows participation. In fact, it pays off electorally, because he has already started the process. It all depends on how things are at the time this decision has to be made, but, in principle, I think it's a good idea.
BBC News Brazil - Still talking about the fields with which Lula should talk, he gave a speech in Santa Catarina during the campaign saying that agriculture had to "kneel" to him, due to the resources and volume of credit made available by the government to agriculture. At the same time that the government opens its doors a lot in the financial sense, with the Safra Plan, on the other hand, agribusiness is, to a large extent, very pocket-friendly. Is there a lack of dialogue with this sector of society?
Singer - I don't think there's a lack of dialogue. What I think is happening is that this fraction, let's call it that, of the bourgeoisie, has taken a position that is very contrary to the PT, to Lulism, to President Lula himself.
But we have to consider the following: the dialogue is open because it is visible, even in this third term, that the government treats this sector of the economy as a priority sector, because it is. The way the Brazilian economy is configured today, no one who is responsible can ignore the importance of agriculture, it is the most dynamic sector of the Brazilian economy.
The PT, Lulism and the forces that organized themselves around President Lula's third term must have the country's reindustrialization on the horizon. There is no possibility of us taking the necessary step to include the poor part of Brazil without the prospect of good jobs. And it's not just CLT employment, it's also the possibility of prosperity for workers who are today individual entrepreneurs. This is Brazil's greatest historical challenge.
Now, how to carry out reindustrialization, we know that it is a huge problem, because it involves international issues and a reorientation of the economy that is not easy to do. But, considered as an element of great transformation, agriculture has to be together. It cannot not be together, because it is the most dynamic, most prosperous sector of the Brazilian economy. No government that has the slightest responsibility will fail to dialogue with agriculture.
If you look in the newspapers, there was no conflict with agriculture during President Lula's third term. This is a bit of a construction. When the moment of the election arrived, this fraction of the bourgeoisie aligned itself, as it did again, with Bolsonarism. And then a serious problem begins. Because there are many points of contact. On the one hand, the idea that social conflicts need to be dealt with more harshly. This is a tradition, because it is a sector of the economy for which, for example, avoiding land invasions and land occupation is a very high priority.
At the same time, it is a sector that has a conception, a worldview, so to speak, that is more radical than others, within the bourgeoisie itself. But it is good to remember that, in this year, 2026, the bourgeoisie did not speak out in favor of President Lula in any of its sectors. This, in fact, did not leave agriculture as isolated as it could have been, for example, in 2022.
Even paying attention to the movement in this sector, there are voices saying that we cannot continue with this far-right option. But they are in the minority. In other words, there was an alignment between agribusiness and the extreme right in Brazil, which is a tremendous problem for Brazil. And it's a problem for all of us. This provides support that, together with evangelical confessions, is the great support of Bolsonarism. A big challenge would be to have, in the next elections, for example, a right that these sectors would certainly support, but that would not be an extreme right.
BBC News Brasil – Would it be going back to the old days? When was there a strong PSDB?
Singer - The PSDB, in my opinion, is a center party. I say this with a certain amount of caution, because it is very difficult to classify parties in Brazil. Because, in general, parties in Brazil are very volatile in their programmatic positions, they fluctuate a lot. And it is very difficult to determine who is in the center, who is on the center-right, who is on the right. But, having made these reservations, I tend to consider today that the best place for us to understand the PSDB is the center.
So, in that period, 1994, 2014, the right was supporting the center. Now, I'm being less optimistic. I'm saying a right, but a democratic right, because our problem in Brazil and in the rest of the world, to a certain extent too, is isolating the extreme right. And I say this because, otherwise, we will continue to have democracy threatened, and this almost hampers us, because you need to give priority to democracy.
At the same time, democracy will not survive if it is not able to serve the majority of the population. Because then the majority of the population will not recognize it as a political regime that matters.
Credit, Raquel Cunha/Reuters
BBC News Brasil - And what is at stake in Lula 4? The scenario is that of a hostile Congress, with measures that President Lula took at the last minute before the election, amid the debate over fiscal adjustment. What does this government need to do to respond to the population’s desires?
Singer - In my opinion, the challenge of the fourth term is to resolve socioeconomic problems in order to produce immediate relief in broad popular sectors and, at the same time, open horizons for future progress. In other words, gradually increase what has been achieved and rediscover the lost path of development. To do this, it will be necessary to face the pressures that began the morning after the second round, with the fall of the stock market and the rise of the dollar.
The fiscal adjustment demanded by financial market agents would mean de-indexing social security benefits from the minimum wage and removing the education and health floors from the Constitution. The president promised to preserve existing social rights and I am sure he will do so. The proposal launched by economist André Lara Resende to reduce the interest rate, on the other hand, has the merit of shifting the debate, showing that the majority of public debt is due to the level at which the Selic is maintained by the Central Bank.
As I lack technical knowledge in this regard, I avoid stating that Resende's formula should be adopted. The fact that it reappeared at this moment, however, has everything to do with the meaning of the second round, when an intense youth and popular movement, leaning towards the left, changed the result.
Young people took to the streets, touched by the end of the 6X1 scale, free transport on the weekend and, indirectly, by the ban on betting, among other measures taken from mid-September. Given this political novelty, it makes sense to suggest innovative proposals for managing the economy, in order to break the knots that tied up President Lula's third term.
Finally, the increase in the weight represented by the extreme right in the Senate and Chamber is indisputable. We had a first shift on the right and a second on the left, which is unusual. However large the PL benches are, however, they do not constitute a majority. They will need to negotiate all the time and, I think, their focus will be on rehabilitating Jair Bolsonaro so that he can run in 2030. Lula's two main socioeconomic agendas — exemption from Income Tax for those earning up to R$5,000 and changing working hours — were approved practically unanimously.
BBC News Brasil – As a person who studies labor relations, how do you see the reduction of the 6x1 working day? Are we entering a new era of work in Brazil?
Singer - I think we are undoubtedly entering a new era of work around the world, due to the shrinking of the industry, which is a double phenomenon. In part, it moved to Asia, but in part the industry also absorbs fewer people, due to technology. Which means that there is a service area expanding a lot, because agriculture also absorbs few people, so there is an expansion of the services sector. On the other hand, there is the platformization of this service sector, which implies profound changes in the sense of fragmentation of the working class.
The working class no longer finds itself in factories where there were thousands of people working together and, by dividing the work, it becomes cooperative. It may not seem like it, because it is aimed at capital accumulation, but it is cooperative. And this is what made the labor movement very strong, because, if the workers decide to stop, it stops everything.
Today there is no longer that. This sector still exists, but it has shrunk, at the same time as a fragmented sector has grown a lot, which works individually, separately, you don't meet your colleague. And platformization means that you have an algorithmic mechanism that forces you to compete with your colleague, rather than cooperate with your colleague. This changes everything. This change means that the traditional mechanisms built by the labor movement no longer work.
This is the explanation, in fact, why we are facing a situation in which the working class's alternatives have been greatly weakened. And now, with the arrival of the reduction, I think it is becoming clear to a greater number of people that, in reality, it would not be as important to have more money as to have more time.
This question of time over money, comparatively, has gained a prominence that it did not have before. However, in a semi-peripheral country like Brazil, this does not apply. So much so that some people will use the time off they gained with the change in working hours to do extra work. Because your income doesn't cover the bills you have to pay. So we need to adapt this world that we see in rich countries to our conditions, which are quite different.
BBC News Brasil - From the first to the second round, Lula complained about the organization of the campaign and communication, which is always the first sector to be blamed. And then, after he won, he said that now it's going to be different, he's going to talk to people every day, he started making selfie videos, he changed the way he tried to get closer to voters. Could you give the president some advice regarding communication at this time?
Singer - No. Absolutely (laughs). I think I'm not the person made for this. I mean, communication is going through a complete revolution, a total transformation, which my generation probably no longer understands how this is actually happening. I even recognize that it is a shortcoming of mine and that I will try to study it, read about it and see if the authors guide me, from a theoretical point of view. From a practical point of view, I have no illusions that I can adapt.
As I want to continue working, I will try to understand, but I am definitely not the person to give advice to the president in this area. But, from a practical point of view, the example is the second round. He adapted to what was necessary, it seems he did well, communicating and playing his role within this new communicative format.
But notice that I said in my answer that I think communication is auxiliary. I continue to think, as a political analyst, that the big movements are the political movements. What communication can do is enhance, spread and so on.
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