As transformações do Exército Brasileiro na sociedade contemporânea : do individualismo moderno ao hiperindividualismo pós-moralista

Abstract

Based on the assumption that the world's armies are institutions inherent to the waging of war and thus they are the result of social and cultural organizations of societies, this doctoral research is proposed to analyze the transformations that have occurred in the BA - Brazilian Army over recent years. Mainly since the post-modernity, it has occurred production of a multiplicity of cultures, beliefs, ideals, values and technologies, the proliferation of various forms of knowledge, information and sociability, with all in constant change. In this context, we identify that between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries the ideals of modernity became the constituent elements of the worldview of the Brazilian Army. Additionally, we find hints that recent changes have generated antagonisms between military ideals, traditionals in the BA, and the postmodern ideals typical of contemporary times. The hypothesis of the research is that the socio-cultural influences arising from the heightened individualism of postmodernity and the contemporary technological context, starting from the beginning of postmodernity, are the major modifying forces on current military professionalism, running against the traditional orientation of the Brazilian Army, influenced by modern traits. Taking the evidence of antagonisms as hints, we developed theoretical discussions related to the modernity-post-modernity debate. Moreover, based on several authors, especially Max Weber (1982, 1987 and 2004), Daniel Bell (1977 and 1992) and Gilles Lipovetsky (2004, 2005a, 2005b and 2015), we distinguish between the first and the second modernities as the predominant individualisms and socialization processes evolve. In the first case, called modern lay individualism, modern ideals are the rigid concepts that fill the individual's "self", which we relate to the identities of military officers guided by the traditional mores, virtues and duties of the BA - Brazilian Army. The second one, called postmoralist hyperindividualism, occurs removing the rigid concepts that filled the individual's "self" in the previous modernity resulting in an individual constituted and guided by his/her subjectivity, there are no ideals, mores and duties imposed to be followed, only and if the individual so decides. In order to examine the hypothesis made, we conducted an historical survey based on bibliographical and documentary data from Brazilian Military Sociology and Military Anthropology researchers, as well as primary data from interviews and field research with observation participant made in the OMs - Military Organizations of the Brazilian Army. Therefore, we observe the changes that have taken place in the Brazilian Army in recent years are changing the professionalism of the military officers and their identities. The character of the professionalism of the officers and their individual identities are increasingly ambivalents, and today the Brazilian Army presents itself as an institution whose identity elements are diverse in coexistence, some with modern traits and others with postmodern traits. As a result, we conceive that the transformations that have taken place since postmodernity and which have solidified and intensified in contemporary times constitute an advance of the modern processes of rationalization and secularization which, now, not only cover certain spheres to the detriment of other (rational versus irrational) and yet reaches all of them and all forms of understanding reality, rationalizing and secularized them with an increasingly prevalent logic of the contemporary postmoralist hyperindividualism.