The Right-Wing Backlash in Brazil and Beyond

Who is entitled to have rights? This essay examines how right-wing movements attempt to prevent individuals, especially women and members of LGBT groups, from accessing equal rights through the use of terms such as “moral worth” and “family values.” At the core of our discussion of the backlash against social rights in Latin America is the need to compare and contrast the case examined here with similar movements outside the region. The vast enterprise of studies on right-wing movements in Western Europe rarely travels outside a few national boundaries. Eastern Europe and the United States are occasionally included. For the most part, right-wing movements are not seen as comparable. Sometimes the reason for excluding Latin America is expressly stated, particularly because the historical experiences are so distinct—for example, the long duration of personal or military dictatorships. Interpretations of right-wing movements in Latin America by scholars outside the region tend to view them as associated with the period of authoritarian rule in the 1970s and 1980s or misunderstand them as having little impact on political life (Meyer and Staggenborg 1996, 1630). Analysis within the region has tended to focus on right-wing political parties, religious groups, or the military (Fortes 2016, Goldstein 2019; Hunter 1997; Luna and Rovira 2014). There are few studies of right-wing movements comparing regions. Latin America is thus seen as largely irrelevant to the comparative study of right-wing movements.