Doubts about the future of () and (), at a time when debates about intensify, shed light on the lack of renewal in the national leadership framework, which has become a challenge for all colors of the political spectrum.
Alternative names to those are discussed — in case Lula abandons his plan to try to be re-elected and in the event that Bolsonaro remains ineligible —, but creating competitive options is something that will still depend on efforts, in the view of politicians and analysts.
The PT’s dependence on Lula’s figure after the recent events and the possibility that he will not be on the ballot once again. PT ministers such as and are mentioned as possible successors, but there are obstacles.
In the case of the right, governors such as (Republicanos-SP), (-GO), (Novo-MG) and . (PSD-PR) are tipped to compete for Bolsonaro’s estate. But there is also speculation about his wife and children, as well as outsiders like ().
Rising names such as (-PE) and (PL-MG) are seen as future options for both fields, but they still face limitations of age, experience and territory.
One of the recent cases of an attempt to forge a national leadership is that of (), who suffered the bottleneck of space for the political center in 2022 and ended the election with 4% of the votes. The difficulty is attributed to growing polarization, which is harmful to moderate names.
For , who was a marketer for Tebet’s campaign, building a leader takes time and a combination of elements determined by the circumstances. In Tebet’s case, he believes that the result for the current minister, in her first national election, was positive.
“There is no vacuum in politics. Forces organize themselves to occupy spaces, but it takes time to build leadership in a continental country with so many regional disparities”, he says, remembering that Bolsonaro reaped the fruits of strategies initiated at least four years ago in 2018. before.
Although a consolidated presence on social networks — and with reverberation in several states — is today considered a prerequisite for any aspirant, there is an assessment that they alone are not enough. Soutello says that it is essential to have a party structure and a bridge with the political-economic elites.
The former senator (PSD-RS), who in 2018 ran the country as vice president of the presidential candidate (at the time in the PSDB), sees the virtual environment as the main lever. And in this field, she says, the right has the advantage. “The networks today project completely unknown figures.”
Ana Amélia states, in a regretful tone, that the desirable qualities of the past, such as “sparking inspiration, attracting trust and having a respectable biography”, have been replaced by attributes such as “vocifering, attacking, attacking”, in a demonstration that ” Radicalization is here to stay.”
The maxim that there is no ready-made recipe for success is also evoked in this debate. The example of the former president, who left Alagoas to conquer Planalto in 1989, is cited to counter the idea that coming from smaller states is an impediment.
Tarcísio falls into the category that governors of, the richest state, are automatically presidential candidates, but not only that: he is Bolsonaro’s trusted name and seen as the ally with the greatest chance of being anointed by the former president. Tarcísio says, however, .
The right today has a greater perspective of names with national potential than the left, says political scientist Vera Chaia, who is a professor at PUC-SP and helped organize the book “Political Leadership in Brazil: Characteristics and Institutional Questions” in 2022. .
The genesis of many of these leaders is liberal in economics and conservative in customs, in Vera’s assessment. “The right wasted no time. And the left was stuck in the renewal. It was a mistake to bet all the chips on Lula.”
The congestion on the right is a knot that tends to be untied only when Bolsonaro’s situation becomes clear, in the professor’s view. The former president resists bringing forward his choice and signals his intention to try to register a candidacy in 2026, although .
Aspects such as charisma, connection with the masses and knack for capturing electoral sentiment are mentioned as necessary ingredients to gain national reach.
Success depends on understanding deeper values of Brazilian society, according to sociologist Fábio Baldaia, from the Brasil Profundo Study Laboratory, linked to the Federal Institute of Bahia. “That’s what Bolsonaro achieved, by revamping characteristics that remain in the long term”, he says.
Among the traits cited by the researcher are simplism, which consists of presenting simple and obvious solutions to complex problems, and messianism, expressed in the image of the savior of the country.
Lula, in turn, dominates popular communication, for example with the use of metaphors about football, says Baldaia, whose research group released the book “Bolsonarism and Deep Brazil: The Sociocultural Dimension of the Phenomenon and Its Formative Elements” .
“Based on the studies, it seems to us that a candidate or leader who dialogues with representations that are not from one or a few sectors, but rather from a large part of society, will be able to advance. They need to connect with the concerns of ordinary Brazilians, such as family and economy.”
The new right became stronger because “it was skilled in exploring the agenda of customs and bringing together more transversal themes. If the left does not learn to dialogue, it will have difficulty and, when Lula leaves the field, it will be very likely that the right and the extreme right win successively”, says Baldaia.
