In this conversation with RevDem editor Ferenc Laczó, Lilia Moritz Schwarcz – author of the book Brazilian Authoritarianism – contrasts mythological and critical-realistic versions of Brazilian history; discusses the main facets of authoritarianism in the country; compares the Bolsonaro phenomenon with the Trump one; and elaborates on her vision of democracy and full citizenship.

Lilia Moritz Schwarcz is a historian and anthropologist. She is a full professor at the Faculty of Philosophy, Letters and Human Sciences at the University of Sao Paulo and a global scholar (visiting professor) at Princeton University. She is an expert on 19th-century Brazil, the Brazilian Empire as well as questions of social identity, slavery, and race relations, among others. Lilia Moritz Schwarcz is the author of a host of major publications and is the co-author, with Heloisa Murgel Sterling, of the book Brazil, a Biography (English translation: 2018).

Brazilian Authoritarianism is published by Princeton University Press.

In collaboration with Lucie Hunter