From resentment to hope?

A comparison analysis between the 2018 and 2022 Brazil presidential elections in Natal/ RN

Abstract

Political resentment has, in recent years, been marked by the rise of far-right leaders and movements across the ideological spectrum in Europe, North America, and Latin America. In Brazil, this scenario gained prominence during the 2018 presidential elections with Bolsonaro’s victory, as he became the spokesperson for resentful voters dissatisfied with politics, who viewed the country’s future—and democracy itself—with hopelessness. However, Lula’s victory in the 2022 elections brought with it the promise of a new political moment in Brazil, raising the question: does this victory represent the end of such political resentment? This study aims to comparatively outline the profile of voters resentful toward Brazilian politics. To do so, we chose to analyze one of the country’s capitals, Natal (RN), located in the Northeast region. Although this region concentrates the largest share of PT voters nationwide, it has shown growing resentment in recent elections. We used mapping tools to allow a spatial immersion into this phenomenon across neighborhoods, which enabled an interpretation of the general characteristics of the electorate. The data indicate that Lula’s political figure was able to penetrate more deeply into the city’s neighborhoods than Haddad’s in the 2018 election, possibly because it revived in resentful voters the memory of a period of economic prosperity.