Anti-corruption protests , alliance system and political polarization

Received: 8 May 2020 Accepted: 2 June 2020 Published: 23 Dec. 2020 Abstract: The fight against corruption has become, in recent years, one of the main international causes. Many studies have been done on the effects and consequences of corrupt and corrupting practices for the political system and for the general society. However, there are still few who are dedicated to analyzing the conditions and dynamics of the fight against corruption as a public and international cause and its consequences and impacts on national political systems. Therefore, the objective of this article is to examine the emergence and spread of anti-corruption movements and protests in Brazil, between 2013 and 2018. I aim to demonstrate that the emergence and development of anti-corruption protests and mobilizations in this period are related to the crisis and collapse of the “alliance system” between the main political leaders and organizations, becoming a political resource to recompose and change such alignments. This analysis shows the relevance of the “political dimension” to understand the process of emergence and the development of protests and mobilizations against corruption.


Introduction
In recent years, the fight against corruption has become a real international cause. Like other similar causes (Environment, Human Rights, Domestic Violence, etc.), it became the subject of conferences and meetings of international organizations, of the development of indicators to measure the incidence level of corruption in different countries, as well as the formulation of measures and actions to cure this disease that affects different societies today. As Bratsis (2013, 7) points out, […] the idea of corruption has become so universal and unquestionable, so encrusted in several common meanings, that its determinations, historical specificities and social functions remain hidden.
Therefore, most works investigating the phenomenon of corruption start from an "anticorruption discourse" that takes for granted its existence and even its recurrence in some countries. Thus, they use it as a sort of explanation for "poverty", "delay" and the political and economic "instability" of such countries (Heidenheimer, Johnston, and Levine 1989;Eigen 2008;Bukovansky 2006;Bratsis 2014).
In this way, many studies have been done on the effects and consequences of corrupt and corrupting practices for the political system and for the general society. A similar perspective is grounding those approaches that search the historical, political and cultural causes of the existence of corruption in several nations and their consequences and effects for the functioning of the State, the political and economic institutions, as well as the political system and more broadly society (Briquet 2009;Avritzer 2012;Andersson and Heywood 2010). Also in those works that use an ethnographic approach to the phenomenon, in the sense of apprehending the political and cultural conceptions and practices that support them, the existence of corruption as a "fact" and a "reality" is not questioned, emphasizing, instead, as It is part of a set of native grammars and practices typical of that society. Such assumption is present even in those analyzes that show the problems and effects of the ways of combating corruption through "large media operations" and that show how such "operations" lead to a greater diversification and dissemination of corrupt and corrupting actors and practices, instead of competing for its decrease or even elimination.
In view of this, it is possible to understand why there are still few works that take as their first object of analysis the very social and political construction of corruption as a public problem and which are dedicated to the analysis of the conditions and dynamics of its emergence as a public and international cause, as well as its developments and impacts on national political systems (Bratsis 2013(Bratsis , 2014Sampson 2010Sampson , 2015. Perhaps, for this reason, To address issues like this, we took as a first object of analysis the process of social construction of the fight against corruption as a public cause, taking as reference the analysis of the emergence and dissemination of anti-corruption movements and protests in Brazil, between 2013 and2018. 2 Contrary to the versions that preset corruption as a result of political and institutional dysfunction, it was a question of placing at the center of the analysis "the dynamics of emergence and configuration of the collective action itself" (Cefaï 1996) to fight corruption: apprehend its forms of emergence and development, instead of explaining it by something that preexists, that precedes or surpasses it.
It is, therefore, a matter of taking the definition of corrupt and corrupting practices in their relations with the process of social construction of the anti-corruption struggle as a public and international cause, consequently, with the very national conditions and dynamics of emergency and configuration of the political action to fight corruption. In this sense, it is intended to demonstrate that the emergence and development of anti-corruption protests and mobilizations in this period are related to the crisis and the collapse of the "alliance system" between the main political organizations and leaders, becoming an important political resource to change and recompose such alignments.
To account for this, the article is divided into two main parts. Firstly, it is intended to show that the protests in "June 2013" constitute an important milestone in articulating a series of demands related to the dynamics of the Brazilian political system with a global wave of anti-corruption protests. Secondly, it is a question of examining the consequences of anti-corruption protests on the emergence and consolidation of "conservative", "liberal" and "authoritarian" agendas, groups and leaders in the political spectrum.
This type of approach aims to demonstrate the relevance of the political dimension to understand the process of emergence and the development of protests and mobilizations against corruption and its impacts on the political system. In this sense, Contrary to the domination of the free market, neoliberalism and deregulation related to previous notions of "good governance", the criticism is now directed at the "corruption of democracy" produced by neoliberalism itself due to the growing collusion between the power of the oligarchies, the financial and business world and politicians (Della Porta 2017b). Denouncing the corruption of the ruling elites, the immorality and corruption of the system, the monopoly of politicians and greedy businessmen, etc., such protests present corruption as a "blatant example and cause of inequality": the high levels of enrichment of the "1%" at the expense of the "99%" suffering, it is a clear sign of the system's corruption, injustice and immorality. Therefore, they call for "more" transparency, democracy and freedom, through participatory and horizontal anti-corruption policies and the creation of control mechanisms by the citizens themselves (Della Porta 2017b).
In Brazil, it was in the so-called "The June Journeys" in 2013 that there was a greater articulation with this new anti-corruption paradigm, expressing discontent and dissatisfaction both from sectors that supported the then PT government, but who wanted to move forward with reforms and the quality of public services (Della Porta 2017b). As for those more conservative and authoritarian who invoked a return to "nationalism", conservative agendas and "ethics in politics" and who called for an end to "PT corruption" cents", it shows how widespread discontent and dissatisfaction are against the "system" itself, against its "immorality" and "opacity", in short, against "everything that is there" (Nobre 2013a).
This "anti-system" sentiment will predominate throughout the cycle of anti-corruption protest, ending even in a series of mobilizations and protests against politics, parties, institutions, etc.
Associated with this, this slogan also explains a certain centrality in the demand for "more" transparency, democracy, participation. In a way, this was what allowed the aggregation of the most different types of discontent and dissatisfaction around a kind of common cause: it is for more quality in infrastructure, health, education, public transport, democracy, participation etc. This perspective was associated with different repertoires of action and organizational practices.
However, in the midst of this it is possible, according to Alonso and Mische (2017) In this way, the protests in "The June Journeys" are based on a series of contradictions, tensions, discontent and demands that had long been pressuring the political system, giving rise to diverse organizations, movements and mobilizations. It is, more properly, a contradiction between a significant "pluralism of political positions and tendencies" and "a shapeless multitude of political parties" that did not reflect these tendencies and positions, since they have become an "amalgamation of interests that is always in the government", whatever be it the government, making the party system a universe in which there is no room for polarizations of political positions, but only "amorphous accommodation" of opposing positions (Nobre 2013a). Add to that, the fact that one of the main parties, the PT, which was born and built as a reaction to this type of political and party logic, in 2013 had already become an establishment long ago, the pact with the "peemedebismo" 3 and achieved even more success than its predecessor in expanding a coalition "from A to Z" (Nobre 2013a). Therefore, It is in this sense, from a rejection of the system as a whole, that one can better understand why it was a revolt against "everything that is there".
The very intensification of the use of the internet and social networks in the mobilization and recruitment for protest events, can be better understood when one considers that such tools started, as Nobre (2013a) points out, the breaking of the political system's "armor" which functioned under the logic of "peemedebismo", dampening discontent, dissatisfaction and demands for transformation (Nobre 2013a). On one hand, because such uses expressed a certain discontent with the "monopoly of opinion formation and vocalization of dissatisfactions", by the traditional media. So that, the media itself was the target of constant attacks and slogans in the protests.
On other hand, because they created their own channels for participation and facing the system, mobilizing, recruiting and taking disenchantment, discontent and dissatisfaction to the streets.
Thus, it can be seen that around the fight against the "opacity of the system", which constitutes one of the main ingredients of the wave of protests that emerged in 2011 (Della Porta 2017b), there are actors as diverse as the demands, the action repertoires and the performance logic that support it. However, in the Brazilian case, more than a revolt against the "immorality of the economic and capitalist system", it is more precisely a reaction to the continuity of a political system that is based on a "model of polarization and conflict" centered on the persistence of a "system of political cooptation" (Schwartzman 1988).
A youth who grew up seeing a policy of backstage agreements, in which opposing political figures are always right in a large and unique condominium of power, has no models on which to base their own position, other than the rejection of the policy en bloc. Whoever was born from the 1990s onwards, for example, did not see any real political polarization, but only false polarizations, with strictly electoral objectives (Nobre 2013a, 12).

The strength of "anti", the collapse of the alliance system and polarization
If the revolt "against everything that is there" constitutes the main theme of the protests of "June 2013", in the following years the fight against corruption will turn against a much more restricted part of the political system, which already appeared in the protests of 2013, but which will later become central: the Workers' Party and the alliance system that led to the electoral victory. This conversion of this revolt against "the system as a whole", against its "immorality" and "opacity", in a mobilization and fight against "PT's corruption" was neither automatic nor direct.
It involved a long political work of articulation and mobilization, to make disenchantment and discontent "against everything" that was there, indignation against a specific party and the system of alliances that kept it in power. This work was carried out, basically, by "antipetist" organizations and groups, but it had important institutional allies in the mainstream media, in the legal, business, religious and military institutions and in the political-party system itself (Tatagiba, Trindade, and Teixeira 2015;Alonso 2019), as well as with widespread use of the internet and social networks as "channels for confronting the system" for recruitment and participation in protests and mobilizations (Nobre 2013a;Mendes 2017). This combination of an old network of actors opposed to the PT and relatively new recruitment and mobilization resources gradually made not only the conversion of "June 2013" into a legacy of "fighting antipetism", but also the confluence and realignment of actors and diverse organizations around both "liberal", "conservative" and "authoritarian" agendas and policies as well as "right-wing" movements and groups to replace political forces within the state itself (Miguel 2018).
In order to better visualize all this political work of converting the fight against corruption into an "anti-PT" mobilization, a second phase of the cycle of protests can be distinguished, which begins in 2014 and extends to the impeachment of President Dilma Rousseff. If in the first phase it was a diffuse discontent against "corruption", the "immorality" and "opacity" of the system, demanding more "transparency" and "democracy", in this second phase, the dissatisfaction was centered on complaints of corruption involving the PT ("Big monthly", Petrobrás scandal -"Petrolão") and its allies and the "misuse of the public machinery" of PT governments (Tatagiba, Trindade, and Teixeira 2015;Alonso 2019). Likewise, if in 2013 it was around "autonomist", "socialist" and "patriotic" groups that diverse organizations and groups disgruntled against the system were added; now it was the network of "antipetist" organizations and leaders that was at the forefront of articulating various organizations and "patriotic" groups ("liberal", "conservative" and "authoritarian"). Finally, if at the first moment of the cycle, the inclusion of demands that had been forgotten and the struggle for more democracy, participation, transparency, freedom, etc, was at stake, in this second moment, the tone is clearly contrary and strongly antagonistic, because what emerges with greater force is the anti: "petism", "partisanship", "leftism", "state", "stabilization", "alliance", "politics", etc, leading, sometimes, to a conception antagonistic or contrary to democracy itself. This moment was characterized by the crisis and the collapse of the alliance system that supported the PT, by the emergence of new types of organizations and leaders and by a strong ideological polarization between "left" and "right". Such polarization initially emerged as an opposition between "socialists" and "patriots", through the campaigns "There won't be coup" and "Dilma out" (Alonso and Mische 2017). Subsequently, it was associated with a strong ideological antagonism between "PT" and "anti-PT" and was later generalized as part of a more general polarization between "left" and "right". "Antipetism" was one of the main ingredients in the manufacture and generalization of this antagonism: on the one hand, by enabling the confluence of the various "patriotic groups" based on a clear and pragmatic definition of the "common enemy"; and on the other, by allowing the consolidation and generalization of such antagonism in a more general polarization between "left" and "right".
United by the common belief that it is necessary to take the Workers' Party out of power to solve Brazil's problems, these agents define PT members as terrorists, gangs, usurpers, communists and dictators. These channels are differentiated by the modes of action and various agendas underlying antipetism, among which are: resistance to policies to reduce inequality, criticism of human rights, reduction of the legal age, fight against corruption, disbelief in the political-democratic system, modification the status of armaments, increased repression of crime, defense of the traditional family, dissolution of the National Congress, impeachment, military intervention, economic guidelines independent of the State, and many others (Santos Jr. 2016, 82).
Thus, "antipetism" brought together different antagonisms that made it possible to articulate in a common discourse a series of actors, perspectives and heterogeneous demands (Santos Jr. 2016). On the one hand, an anti-party system based on a "negative partisanship" and a general denial of the party system itself given its weak representativeness in national politics and which materializes disproportionately in the figure of the PT due to "anti-corruption" bias, placing it as the one responsible for what is negative in Brazilian democracy. On the other hand, "antileftism" that rejects and combats the policies of the PT federal government, while rescuing ideological discourses of political traditions of the Brazilian right, such as those of "conservatism", "liberalism" and "anti-communism". Finally, an "anti-establishment" that expresses a strong denial of institutional political activity and the feeling of ineffectiveness and corruption of political institutions, resulting in great disbelief in democratic institutions themselves and a tendency to ignore the rules and legitimacy of the democratic regime (Santos Jr. 2016). These are the principles that are at the base of phrases and slogans such as: "The united people do not need a party!", "CorruPTos out", "The minority cannot silence the majority", "No more impunity! No more bandits", "Military intervention now!", "Flag, here, only from Brazil!", "Our flag will never be red, among many others" (Alonso 2019, 98).  (Tatagiba, Trindade, and Teixeira 2015).
In this sense, the strong political polarization that marked the electoral dispute, stimulated by the accusations of corruption in Petrobras that were disseminated by "Carwash" and received wide repercussion from the mainstream media, made it possible to unite not only the opposition forces to the government, but mainly, served as a basis. and again incentive for "antipetist" organizations and groups to invest heavily in a common enemy: the association between corruption and "PT", putting "PT out" and "Dilma out" as the only way to end corruption in Brazil in the short term. Therefore, immediately after the results that led to Dilma Rousseff's reelection were released, protests against the "elected president" and "PT government" resumed, called by "liberal", "conservative" and "authoritarian" organizations and with the important presence of "opposition figures" (Tatagiba, Trindade, and Teixeira 2015;Santos Jr. 2016). Thus, in 2015, after successive mobilizations and massive protests, the defense of impeachment became the main banner of such groups and organizations. Such protests demonstrated the strength of the mobilization of "antipetism", which also came to be associated with "anti-leftism", "anti-partyism", "anti-statism", rejection of the political class, etc. Thus, it is around the polarization between "left" and "right" that, at this stage, the different antagonisms between the different groups in conflict are articulated. As a result, it is also at that moment that the use of such categories as a form of identification, expression and political accusation emerges more strongly in political discussions and clashes (Miguel 2018).
Also with regard to the resources used for who seek to give more evidence to such a relationship. However, he intended to demonstrate that understanding this relationship necessarily involves examining the national political system itself: its principles and organizational dynamics.
In this sense, it was demonstrated that the protests in "June 2013" were an important milestone in the articulation between a series of disenchantments, discontent and dissatisfaction related to the very dynamics of the Brazilian political system and a new international anti-corruption paradigm that emerged in the wave of protests in 2011 Unlike the anti-corruption discourse centered on notions of "good governance" that emerged in the 1990s, the new international anti-corruption paradigm was geared towards criticizing the opacity of the economic and capitalist system and the "corruption of democracy" produced by neoliberalism itself, calling for more transparency, democracy and freedom. In the Brazilian case, more than a reaction against the "immorality" and "corruption" of the economic and capitalist system, these categories are used to express a revolt against the persistence of a political system that functioned on the basis of "political co-option" and "overwhelming supra This analysis demonstrated the relevance of the "political dimension" to understand the processes of emergence and diffusion of public protests and protests. The characteristics and functioning dynamics of the political system are not secondary aspects in relation to the economic dimension that would be the priority. On the contrary, the Brazilian case exemplifies just how much it was the "crisis" of the political system that triggered a "crisis" over the economic system. On the other hand, it is in close relationship with the political system and with the electoral process that we will better understand how the social movements' own demands and logics of action arise and transform.