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Estimating Ideology of Brazilian Legislative Parties, 1990–2005: A Research Communication

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 September 2022

Timothy J. Power  and
Cesar Zucco Jr.
Timothy J. Power
Affiliation:
Latin American Centre, University of Oxford
Cesar Zucco Jr.
Affiliation:
Instituto Universitário de Pesquisas do Rio de Janeiro
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Abstract

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We present a new data set on the left-right placement of major Brazilian political parties serving in the first five legislatures under democracy. On the basis of survey responses of more than 850 federal legislators from 1990 to 2005, we generate party placements on an ideological scale where 1 = “left” and 10 = “right.” The data are rescaled to account for idiosyncrasies in responses as well as variation in use of the survey scale across time. We discuss both the validity and the reliability of our new measures by comparing them to other data sets. We further discuss three substantive issues that the data reveal. First, ideological polarization has moderated over time. Second, the median legislator has shifted noticeably to the left and now stands equidistant from the influential PT and PSDB, the parties that have anchored recent presidential elections. Third, Brazilian political elites continue to shun self-identifications associated with political conservatism or neoliberalism.

Resumo

Resumo

Este artigo apresenta uma nova classificação ideológica dos principais partidos brasileiros durante as cinco primeiras legislaturas do atual período democrático. Utilizando como base surveys realizados entre 1990 e 2005 com 850 legisladores federais, estimamos as posições ideológicas dos partidos numa escala 1–10. A estimação leva em conta tanto a variação na interpretação da escala original por legisaltores individuais, quanto mudanças no significado da escala no tempo. Analizamos a validade e a confiabilidade das nossas medidas através de uma, comparação com outras bases similares, e discutimos três padrões revelados por nossas estimativas, quais sejam: (1) polarização ideológica é menor hoje do que quando do retorno à democracia, (2) o legislador mediano está mais à esquerda do que no início do período analizado, e (3) elites politicas continuam evitando associações com a idéia de consevadorismo.

Type
Research Reports and Notes
Information
Latin American Research Review , Volume 44 , Issue 1 , 2009 , pp. 218 - 246
Copyright
Copyright © 2009 by the Latin American Studies Association

Footnotes

*

We are indebted to the late Maria D'Alva Gil Kinzo (1951–2008), a pioneer in research on Brazilian political parties. We are also grateful to Manuel Alcántara, Nina Wiesehomeier, and Kenneth Benoit for sharing their data. Thanks to Jeff Lewis, Tim Groseclose, Chris Achen, and the LARR anonymous reviewers for comments and suggestions. The original survey responses, legislator and party rescaled ideological placements, and a Web appendix with details of the estimation are available at http://hdl.handle.net/1902.1/11567.

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