Ou ficar a pátria livre ou morrer pelo Brasil: esquerdas e direitas ante a centralidade da questão nacional (1945-1964)

Abstract

The national issue was one of the major axes under which political conflicts took place in Brazil during the Fourth Republic (1945/46-1964). The present thesis analyzes this theme with a focus on the treatment given to it in the discursive formulations of the main leaders of the political forces at the left and at the right in the period. Such political spectrum are comparatively analyzed by the area of knowledge known as Entangled History, aiming to observe the conflicts and exchanges between these sectors, in which the nationalism concept was a disputed target. With this, Conceptual History are also used to identify the nationalism concept and its relations with other fundamental concepts for its understanding (patriotism, development and democracy). While among the political left leaderships was hegemonic to work the national issue from an anti-imperialist bias, centered on social justice searches and on the role of the State (for having in the state institution the means to guarantee national sovereignty and combat social inequalities ); for the rights addressed, Brazil and its specific problems should be prioritized and solved according to (what would be, for them) national traditions, with emphasis on the notion of Brazil as part of a “western civilization” liberalcapitalist and Christian - which would, for these rights groups, be pragmatically advantageous. Present in both political spectrum, the nationalism concept acquired polysemic use so that, when not rejected, at least fit in and, at times, organize these specific perspectives on the national issue.