A plea for agency: The Brazilian Jeitinho revisited

Hartmut Rosa; James William Santos; Emil Albert  Sobottka

doi:10.15448/1984-7289.2026.50041

Authors

Hartmut Rosa Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, Jena; Max-Weber-Kolleg, Erfurt, Deutschland https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8030-7405
James William Santos Max-Weber-Kolleg, Erfurt, Deutschland https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9806-1172
Emil Albert Sobottka Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul (Pucrs), Porto Alegre, RS, Brasil https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8615-7305

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15448/1984-7289.2026.50041

Keywords:

Jeitinho, Agency, Cordiality, Responsiveness, Critical Theory

Abstract

This article revisits the Brazilian Jeitinho as a prospective resource for recovering human agency in the face of increasing proceduralisation, automation, and formalization in late modern societies. The diagnosis of a contemporary trend that reduces subjects to mere executors of rules, algorithms, and protocols is drawn up. The argument posed plays with the possibility of a sociability that engages with the creative, situational circumvention of rigid obstacles and reveals the necessary role of flexible, improvised action in all modern societies. However, concepts such as Jeitinho are not devoid of their own socio-historicity. jeitinho is firmly embedded in Brazilian cordiality, a sociability rooted in patrimonial traditions that carries ethical ambivalence. Therefore, one should avoid romanticizing jeitinho and instead engage in a critical, historically aware way. A critically-reckoned jeitinho, exercised with practical wisdom, can function as a practice of critical responsiveness, neither just rule-breaking nor survival tactic, but a mode of acting that interrogates and humanizes deficient social systems. The text opens the dossier on Resonance and diagnoses of the present, which
engages with Hartmut Rosa’s theoretical ouvre across themes such as integral ecology, spirituality, genealogy, technology, revolution, normativity, and social ontology..

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Author Biographies

Hartmut Rosa, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, Jena; Max-Weber-Kolleg, Erfurt, Deutschland

Holds a PhD in Political Science from Humboldt University of Berlin and a Habilitation in Sociology and Political Science from Friedrich Schiller University Jena, both in Germany. Professor of Sociological Theory at Friedrich Schiller University Jena and Director of the Max Weber Kolleg in Erfurt.

James William Santos, Max-Weber-Kolleg, Erfurt, Deutschland

PhD in Social Sciences from the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. Researcher at the Max-Weber-Kolleg for Advanced Cultural and Social Studies at the University of Erfurt, Germany.

Emil Albert Sobottka, Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul (Pucrs), Porto Alegre, RS, Brasil

PhD in Sociology and Political Science from Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster, Germany. Professor in the Graduate Program in Sociology and Political Science at the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil.

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