The author argues that Brazil does not truly practice democracy, but rather an elective dictatorship defined by authoritarian rule. Elected officials act without listening to the people and do not respect the constitution, laws, or other branches of government. True representative democracy requires that elected leaders govern according to the desires of the people who elected them, but in Brazil leaders prioritize the interests of economic groups instead. The failure of representative democracy in Brazil could pave the way for non-democratic regimes unless participatory democracy is instituted through mechanisms like referendums.

1. AUTHORITARIAN DECISIONS AND EXERCISE OF DEMOCRACY IN
BRAZIL
Fernando Alcoforado *
The practice of democracy does not exist in Brazil. What we have is the prevalence of
custom forged 500 years ago by a tradition centered authoritarianism. These
authoritarian habits that prevail in Brazil since colonial times are kept to date with the
exercise of representative democracy. Those elected to executive positions in the
Executive and Legislative think they can do what they want thanks to the delegation
given by people without hearing it and do not balance their mandates during his
lifetime. The low level of political education of the population contributes greatly to the
elected act this way, unprepared and elects corrupt individuals to exercise the mandate
and customs authoritarian prosper.
The democratic institutions in Brazil are systematically demoralized given that the
Constitution is not respected by those who exercise power, laws are not complied with
effectiveness, legislative and judicial powers are constantly disrespected by the
Executive that acts imperial powers invading the other powers, impunity and corruption
are widespread. We are in Brazil entirely unfit for the exercise of democracy. And what
is democracy if not "government of the people, by the people and for the people" as
affirmation of Abraham Lincoln in his Gettysburg Address on November 19, 1863.
Democrats contend that such a false definition is merely a fiction trying to find
justifications for his authoritarian incursions.
Democracy is not government of a man, dictator or monarch. Democracy is not a
government group, be it a class or caste. Democracy can only be government of the
people and all of us, for the people who really ought to govern the government,
although it indirectly through delegates, through representatives chosen by voting. This
is the essence of representative democracy. The first condition for democracy there is
the popular election of governors and the choice of their representatives by the people.
Not enough, however, to characterize the election democracy. Democracy does not end
on election. There is no democracy without elections, but there are elections without
democracy there.
To avoid having elections without democracy, it is necessary that the government, once
elected, always proceed according to the ideas, desires, aspirations and interests of the
people who elected them and not the funders of their campaigns as currently occurs in
Brazil. During their mandates should always act in accordance with public opinion.
There can be no democracy in opposition to public opinion. When there is no such line,
the people cannot govern, though elect their rulers. This is the situation faced by
Brazilian society after the end of military dictatorship of 1964. All elections held in
Brazil after the military dictatorship have led to power authoritarian rulers at all levels
realizing true fraud one after the election.
There is no democracy in Brazil, there is elective dictatorship. There is no government
of the people, there is a constitutional autocracy led by the President, the Governors of
State and Municipal Mayors who do what they want in the exercise of power without
take into account the wishes of the population. This was the case, for example, the
decision of President Lula, at the federal level, to effect the transfer of water from the
Rio São Francisco against the advice of social sectors and technical-scientific
community of the Country, the decision of the Governor Jaques Wagner, in the State of
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2. Bahia, for demolition Octavio Mangabeira Stadium and construction of called Arena
Fonte Nova in opposition to the opinions of authoritative technical and city planners and
the decision of Mayor João Henrique, in the municipal area, to establish, at the end of
his disastrous administration, the new Salvador Urban Planning and Laws enjoying the
speculation. In all the cases cited, the rulers have turned a deaf ear to public opinion.
The word democracy, of Greek origin, meaning, by etymology, demos - people and
kratein - govern. It was the historian Herodotus who used the word democracy for the
first time in the fifth century before Christ. In ancient Greece there was a direct
democracy in which citizens themselves taking policy decisions in the Greek city-states.
The model of democracy of the Greeks was called pure democracy because consisted of
a society, with a small number of citizens, who gathered and administered the
government directly. Due to the complexity of modern society, it has become a
requirement other form of political organization, the indirect democracy, also called
representative democracy means that people are elected, by vote, to "represent" a
people, a population, a certain group , community, etc.
Representative democracy presents in Brazil, however, clear signs of exhaustion not
only by corruption scandals in the powers of the Republic, but especially to discourage
popular participation, reducing political activity to electoral processes that recur
periodically in which the people elect its said representatives which, with few
exceptions, after the elections come to defend the interests of economic groups in
opposition to the interests of those who elected them. What is promised in the election
campaign is, with rare exceptions, abandoned by the leaders of the executive and the
parliament after occupying their elected positions. From now come to prevail other
interests that do not correspond to the voters.
In practice, everything works as if people offer to each officer of the executive branch
and each legislator a blank check to do whatever they want after occupying their elected
positions. What one finds, in fact, is the existence in the executive branch and
Parliament elected from a group of uncontrolled social and increasingly distant from the
demands of the citizens. The absence of social control by elected and disengagement
with their campaign promises only tend to reinforce the idea of the absence of
substantial differences among the political parties that have become mere electoral
registries and increasing frustration with representative democracy and political
institutions in Brazil.
To eliminate distortions of representative democracy in Brazil, it is essential to
institutionalize participatory democracy using the plebiscite or referendum, as is already
happening in several European countries, particularly in Scandinavia, considered the
ideal model of the exercise of political power ruled in public debate between
government and free citizens on equal conditions for participation. Participation must be
understood, as well as a necessity due to the man live and get along with others, in an
attempt to overcome the difficulties that may arise from day to day. Participating means
becoming part, to feel included, is to exercise the right to citizenship (having time and
voice). Participation cannot be understood as a gift, grant or as something preexisting.
The failure of representative democracy as practiced in Brazil is paving the way for
their own end in itself constituting fertile ground for the emergence of regimes of
exception with the frustration of the majority of the population who realize every day
that involved a decoy by electing false representatives. This dissatisfaction with
representative democracy is already demonstrated in every election in the growth of
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3. invalid and white votes, as well as the protests on social networks. It is therefore urgent
to convene a new National Constituent Assembly for the purpose of institutionalizing
participatory democracy in our country so that the Brazilian people approve or reject
decisions that are taken by the authorities of the Republic through a plebiscite or
referendum. If we had a participatory democracy in Brazil, certainly there would not be
situations such as the proposed project by the Secretaria de Turismo de Bahia to build
the Castro Alves Arena in Salvador city without listening population.
* Alcoforado, Fernando, engineer and doctor of Territorial Planning and Regional Development from the
University of Barcelona, a university professor and consultant in strategic planning, business planning,
regional planning and planning of energy systems, is the author of Globalização (Editora Nobel, São
Paulo, 1997), De Collor a FHC- O Brasil e a Nova (Des)ordem Mundial (Editora Nobel, São Paulo,
1998), Um Projeto para o Brasil (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 2000), Os condicionantes do
desenvolvimento do Estado da Bahia (Tese de doutorado. Universidade de Barcelona,
http://www.tesisenred.net/handle/10803/1944, 2003), Globalização e Desenvolvimento (Editora Nobel,
São Paulo, 2006), Bahia- Desenvolvimento do Século XVI ao Século XX e Objetivos Estratégicos na Era
Contemporânea (EGBA, Salvador, 2008), The Necessary Conditions of the Economic and Social
Development-The Case of the State of Bahia (VDM Verlag Dr. Muller Aktiengesellschaft & Co. KG,
Saarbrücken, Germany, 2010), Aquecimento Global e Catástrofe Planetária (P&A Gráfica e Editora,
Salvador, 2010), Amazônia Sustentável- Para o progresso do Brasil e combate ao aquecimento global
(Viena- Editora e Gráfica, Santa Cruz do Rio Pardo, São Paulo, 2011) and Os Fatores Condicionantes do
Desenvolvimento Econômico e Social (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2012), among others.
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