A crise da “ideologia da mineiridade” e perda de protagonismo político das lideranças mineiras no cenário nacional

Abstract

This master's dissertation intends to discuss the loss of leadership of politicians from the Brazilian State of Minas Gerais, connecting this phenomenon with the crisis of the so called “ideology of mineiridade”. To this end, an attempt was made to recover the political trajectory of the State’s elites, considering some key moments of their projection at the national level, when developmental policies were predominant. These regional elites have historically articulated themselves in favor of an economic recovery project that could modernize the State, based, to a large extent, in the orchestration of the regional identity known as “mineiridade”. In other words, attributes as the belief in political skills, the convergence of divergent interests, the ability to create synthesis and the valorization of national unity, among others, came to be attributed to politicians from Minas Gerais. These variables have historically been used to justify the need for union among the State’s elite groups around a common regional development project. The projection of political leaders from Minas Gerais on the national scene is, however, compromised from the 1980s, but mainly from the 1990s, when the neoliberalist project came to dominate and reflected, in contemporary times, in new standards on the role of the state and the politics itself. The managerial logic then started to rule public policies, displacing the performance of the state in relation to society and reinforcing a technicity based discourse. In this way, the ideology of mineiridade, before largely responsible for bringing together different sectors of Minas Gerais’ elites, is now going through a moment of “crisis”, which compromises the emergence and projection of new political leaders.