Oliveira, Vanessa Elias de; Rodrigues, G. M. A.; Stuchi, Carolina G. Covid-19 and emergency grant: a Brazil's populist policy. UACES Territorial Politics, London, 24.09.2020. (original) (raw)

The COVID-19 pandemic and the disaster of the response of a right-wing government in Brazil

One Health & Implementation Research, 2021

COVID-19 left a trail of millions of cases and thousands of deaths in Brazil. In the last two years, the country has undergone enormous changes that have brought about a remarkable deterioration in the lives of Brazilians. Brazil registered the second highest number of deaths from COVID-19 in the world, second only to the USA. The Brazilian federal government's policy to fight the epidemic was catastrophic! Now, we are faced with a massive economic decline, the return of hunger to a vast swathe of the poor, a disastrous rise in unemployment, and a concerted attack on science and education, two sectors meant to mitigate the epidemic. Not applicable.

COVID-19 in Brazil: Bolsonaro's Far-Right Authoritarianism in a Pandemic

Australian Outlook , 2020

'Brazil is the only country in the world holding anti-lockdown protests. Deemed by many to be the “Trump of the Tropics,” Brazil’s far-right president Jair Bolsonaro continues downplaying the imminent threat of the coronavirus pandemic. Ironically, Brazil’s coronavirus crisis is unfolding quickly since Bolsonaro’s March visit to the US. His press secretary Fabio Wajngarten has tested positive for the virus. In a twist of fate, Fox news reported that president Bolsonaro himself had contracted the virus. Later, Bolsonaro declared by tweet that his second coronavirus test came out negative, though no evidence was shown either to the Brazilian or international press'.

Brazil and the Fight Against Covid-19

Comparative Federalism and Covid-19, 2021

From the outset of the Covid-19 pandemic, a central feature of federalism in Brazil was the strong role played by state governors and the fact that this stood in contrast to the denialism of the President Jair Bolsonaro, who neglected his federal responsibilities. Whereas the President refused to support isolation measures and import medicines and supplies for curbing the pandemic, governors quickly performed these tasks. Subnational responsibility was confirmed by the Supreme Court, giving governors and mayors important political visibility and shaking up the entrenched structures of Brazil's centralised federalism. This chapter discusses the dual nature of Brazilian federalism, as evidenced by the Covid-19 pandemic. On the one hand, the crisis highlighted the importance of the federal government in the institutional arrangement of Brazilian federalism, which is highly centralised; on the other hand, it has provided greater scope for action by state governments, whose political power has gradually diminished over the 30 years since the 1988 Constitution came into being. The Federative Republic of Brazil is the largest country in South America and the fifth largest in the world. Its Constitution of 1988 makes it a significantly decentralised federation in terms of the distribution of political power and fiscal resources between the three levels of government-federal, state, and municipal-each of which consists of 'federative entities' (Souza 1997). Brazil is also highly socioeconomically heterogeneous, a fact that presented considerable challenges in its efforts to confront the Covid-19 pandemic. Politically, too, the country is fragmented, with 24 political parties represented in Congress, the federal parliament. The 10 with the largest congressional representation are the Brazilian Democratic Movement (MDB), Workers'

How Brazil’s President turned the country into a global epicenter of COVID-19

Journal of Public Health Policy, 2021

In this manuscript, we point out that the federal government headed by President Bolsonaro has pursued a political agenda that contributed to the spread of COVID-19, transforming the country into a major repository for SARS-CoV-2 and its variants, thus representing a risk for worldwide containment efforts. Furthermore his actions are also weakening democratic institutions, which could counter his political agenda, effectively facilitating the spread of COVID-19. Thus, the perpetuation of the COVID-19 pandemic in Brazil is due to human behaviour factors, especially high-level public decision makers.

Brazilian Federalism: Facing the COVID-19 pandemic

Federalism and the Response to COVID-19, 2021

In Brazil, the COVID-19 crisis has led to several conflicts among many of the 26 states and the federal capital as well as between the federal central government, the states, and the municipalities. Faced with uncertainty, political actors adopted blame-avoiding strategies, duplicating the most restrictive actions taken elsewhere as a way of seeking legitimacy among the people. As federated units adopted different criteria to intensify or soften restrictive measures, judicial activism was a mark of the period. A wave of lawsuits flooded state and federal courts, and the range of policies was frequently decided by judges.Nevertheless, the COVID-19 pandemic in Brazil had ambiguous outcomes. Despite the uncoordinated control measures and a huge number of deaths, by the end of January 2021, Brazil seemed to have achieved the goal of flattening the virus transmission curve. Crucially, there was no collapse of the healthcare system

The parliamentary response to Covid-19 in Brazil

Recent research has shown that since the beginning of the global spread of the Covid-19 pandemic, Bolsonaro's presidency has been characterized by “Executive underreach”, and by a fierce campaign against international health recommendations, even as simple as social distancing measures or wearing face masks, adopted by other institutions like the Legislative branch, Courts, and local spheres of governments like state and municipal Executives branches.

Floundering power. Brazil’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic [Fundación Carolina, 2020]

Análisis Caroilna (Fundación Carolina), 2020

Every country on the planet is facing not only the unprecedented challenges of the novel coronavirus pandemic, but also the magnified consequences of policy decisions made by its leaderships during the preceding years. Brazil —a country of continental proportions that, not long ago, was widely considered to be a rising power on the global stage— is clearly floundering in its response to the spread of the virus. This results from an accumulation of errors —some of them dating back decades, but most accelerated under the right-wing government of Jair Bolsonaro.