Brazilian democracy and the dilemma between the culture of private and public interest: political approaches based on the Protestant Reformation

Resumo

The political history of Brazil reveals a patriarchal and personalist formation that dominates society and the State, permeating all political models and regimes adopted since the colonial period. The confusion between the public and private spheres is observed by authors such as Sérgio Buarque de Holanda (1994), Darcy Ribeiro (1991) and Roberto DaMatta (1991). This situation is motivated, in part, by a culture dominated by the political-economic structure of the sugar mill, part of whose foundation lies in the worldview of Iberian Catholicism. This article is based on the sociological arguments of the above-mentioned authors and is a comparative discussion of the Brazilian society and the notions that are constitutive of Protestant theology as conceived by Luther (1520). Based on this discussion we suggest, with Terry Eagleton, that the search for the common good can only occur upon the foundation of the separation between State and Church, since in this separation resides the possibility of viewing the res publica as having dignity and independence, outside of the authoritarian desires of the sugar mill masters.