Evangelical digital activism and counter-secularization in the election of Jair Bolsonaro

Abstract

The rise of digital networks consolidates a new type of religious activism that increases the so-called conservative wave in the Brazilian context. These are new dynamics that support to saturate the boundary between the spheres of religious and politics, a key characteristic of the orthodox ideal of secularization. In this paper, we examine the role of conservative evangelical digital activism in the 2018 presidential election, characterized by the open engagement of churches and religious in the electoral dispute, mobilizing their networks of believers, especially around a moral agenda. The research is based on the combination of the use of available data extracted from secondary sources and the exploratory study on the networks based on a non-probabilistic sample obtained through intentional sampling procedures. It was observed that evangelical electoral engagement in networks is the result of the consolidation of conservative counter-secularization movements. In a context of pluralism, digital networks allow, paradoxically, in addition to giving voice and visibility to many minorities, a reaction to these progressive advances, with a direct impact on the victory of Jair Bolsonaro.