Right-Wing Leninism in Brazil: Reflections on O Movimento Brasil Livre

Abstract

Drawing on the case of O Movimento Brasil Livre (The Free Brazil Movement), or MBL, this article interrogates key assumptions about the nature of networked digital activism. The MBL, formed in the early 2010s by a Koch-funded network of libertarian student groups, utilized a combination of activist training and strategic media engagement to organize a series of mass mobilizations in 2015 against supposed corruption within the Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT) administration under President Dilma Rousseff. Organized through MBL Facebook pages and promoted via YouTube and television appearances by movement leaders, these protests brought millions of Brazilian citizens to the streets in a wave of protests that eventually sparked Dilma's impeachment in May 2016. Deploying the conceptual framework of right-wing Leninism, this article argues that conservative groups like the MBL are able to construct digital protest movements with revolutionary political ramifications due to their embrace of strategies originally formulated by Lenin, including the training of groups of ideologically coherent and committed cadres and the pursuit of dual power formation where the current political order is ruptured from the inside. Understanding how right-wing activists mobilize digital media is of paramount importance for both countering their influence and developing strategies for the Left.