How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them

by Jason F. Stanley

Jair Bolsonaro, “the tropical Trump,” was not mentioned in the original edition of this book. Yet soon after it was published, he was elected president of Brazil, the world’s fourth-largest democracy. Bolsonaro ran an anti-corruption campaign centered on the theme of Law and Order. He was openly anti-feminist and anti-gay, and he repeatedly lauded the country’s past of military dictatorship. Since he has been in office, “[a]ll three of Bolsonaro’s politically active sons, along with his wife Michelle, have been implicated in corruption scandals.”*1 In Brazil right now, journalists are being threatened. Universities, a source of protest against Bolsonaro, as well as a target of his political demagoguery, face huge cuts in research funding. On March 15, 2020, far-right-wing demonstrations were held across the country, calling to disband Congress and the courts. Bolsonaro, like Trump, is a climate change denier. Brazil’s Amazon rainforest, whose health is crucial for that of the planet, has faced increasingly catastrophic fires under Bolsonaro’s watch and concomitant increased deforestation.