From police to politics: analyzing the profile of candidates from the State’s Repressive Forces to the Chamber of Deputies

Abstract

The present article explores the social profile and political party preference by members of the State Repressive Forces with a career in institutional politics during the last two decades in Brazil. By means of descriptive statistics, we underline the particularities of Police and Military candidates for a federal deputy office. Findings from this research indicated abrupt changes, from one election to another, among the parties in which these candidates were most highly concentrated. If the transition from police to politics during the 1990s occurred through major right-wing parties, in the 2010 decade it takes place through small parties without clear ideological identities (“physiological parties”). In addition to the constitutional impediment of military personnel affiliation to political parties, the lack of a systematic preference for a party college type may be the effect of a strategic behavior, since not only is it easier to obtain a nomination within these small parties, but there also exists a greater lenience toward personalist discourses, such as those espoused by these policeperson-candidates. This behavior is also related to a negative view of traditional politics and established politicians within major parties as well as a condemnation of political programs with overly generic ideological appeals. Such candidates favor certain specific agendas, such as the demands from their own professional corporations.

Keywords:
Repressive Forces of the State; party preference; social profile; elections; candidates.