Abstract
The article starts with the hypothesis formulated by Gildo Marçal Brandão on the existence of “lineages of Brazilian political thought”, in particular the one he called “constitutional idealism”, which is composed of authors who would find in the supposed polit ical and administrative centralization of the Portuguese-Brazilian State the main explanatory point of Brazilian social malformation and, consequently, would propose decentralization and economically liberal political measures. According to Brandão, Raymundo Faoro would be one of the main examples of this line of thought on Brazil. In brief terms, we argue that there are elements in Faoro’s work that approximate his ideas to this line of argumentation, but also ele ments that differ from it, allowing for reinterpreting the meaning of his contribution to Brazilian social and political thought and, consequently, its place in it.
Keywords:
Raymundo Faoro; Constitutional Idealism; Radical Thought; Brazilian Liberalism