Pentecostal religion influences the poorest to prefer parties that do not propose  redistribution policies, even though they benefit the most from such policies. One of the factors to explain this preference is that religious leaders act as electoral 'canvassers', emphasizing moral themes in their discourse that often conflict with the agendas of more left-leaning parties, which have traditionally advocated redistributive policies.

This is the argument of Victor Araújo, a researcher at the Center for Metropolitan Studies (CEM), in his doctoral thesis in political science, defended at the Faculty of Philosophy, Literature and Human Sciences at the University of São Paulo (FFLCH-USP). Its objective was to understand why the poorest people do not vote, or vote less than expected, for parties and candidates whose seek to create and implement redistributive policies, such as Bolsa Família (Family Purse) or the Luz para Todos (Light for All) Programs. Entitled “Does religion distract the poor?”, the thesis analyzes Pentecostalism and the redistributive vote in Brazil. "It is not that the poor are irrational or do not want to vote for redistribution, it is that part of them ranks the moral dimension above the question of income", he highlights.

Most traditional political science models assume that the variable that matters most to voters when it comes to voting is income, but this is not consistent with the fact that individuals with lower incomes vote for leftist parties less than expected. “These parties, in turn, are the actors who, historically, in democracies, are linked to redistributive policies. In Latin America, for example, empirical evidence suggests that the rise of leftist governments in the 2000s, a phenomenon that became known as Pink Tide, is associated with increased social spending on health and education”, he says.

The survey compares the voting trends of Catholics, traditional Evangelicals (historic Protestant churches such as Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian denominations), and Pentecostals in Brazilian presidential elections between 2002 and 2018. Araújo was supervised by CEM Researcher and Professor in the Political Science Department at FFLCH-USP, Marta Arretche.

Brazil is a very weakly secularized country. Survey data show that more than 85% of people identify as having a religion. The great majority are Christian, with Catholics being the largest group, followed by evangelicals. Between 2000 and 2010, the number of Evangelical Christians in the country grew by 61%, reaching 22.2% (42.3 million) of the population. In 2010, out of the total number of Evangelicals in Brazil, 57% (24 million) declared themselves to be Pentecostal. Two out of three new converts to Evangelical Pentecostal churches were previously Catholics, and Catholicism is losing 1% of the population every year. This is called the religious transition.

In the more traditional political science literature, the religious explanation for why the poorest do not vote for parties that promote redistribution is because churches create a kind of alternative welfare state. They connect people to different networks that can offer them protection during periods of crisis: basic food packages, networking for jobs, and help to deal with personal challenges such as drug use. However, these networks are present in different religious denominations, but the electoral behavior between them is quite different, observes Araújo.

The quantitative models developed by Araújo show that the probability of Pentecostals voting for left-wing parties is very small compared to traditional Catholics and evangelicals, even when other individual characteristics (income, school level, place of residence, etc.) are held constant. This is a process that has been occurring since at least the 2002 elections. “They have tended not to vote for left-wing parties for a long time. The novelty is the fact that this group of voters has increased and it has become important to have their support in order to win elections in Brazil”, he points out.

For Araújo, this behavior is paradoxical as it is a poorer population – 75% earning less than two minimum wages – lower levels of education, with less access to information and concentrated in the peripheral areas of large cities, where these churches are most prevalent. Despite their low incomes and the fact that they benefit from redistribution policies, the researcher points out that when it comes to voting, moral issues correlate with income.

 
(Photo: Marcos Santos - USP Imagens)

The role of brokers 

According to the thesis, this occurs due to a variety of factors. One is the influence of Pentecostal religious leaders, who act as brokers, or electoral ‘canvassers’. They use moral elements in their discourse and sermons, and this ends up carrying more weight for the voting decisions of religious followers than the factor of income. “These leaders explicitly mobilize the low-income electorate against left-wing parties. They do this because the moral agenda of left-wing parties conflicts with that of these churches ”, he adds.

This is the case with issues such as the legalization of abortion, the consumption and sale of marijuana and same-sex marriage, causes often promoted by left-wing party programs that face great resistance among Pentecostals. According to calculations made by Araújo, based on information from Latinobaròmetro, the probability of support for same-sex marriage, for example, is 57% lower for a traditional evangelical and 71% lower for a Pentecostal evangelical. The likelihood of a Catholic supporting it is 45% higher.

In traditional Catholic and Evangelical churches, this moral agenda is present, but not as explicit as among Pentecostals. Araújo offers an example: when Fernando Collor de Mello was elected in 1989, the national leadership of the Assembly of God church came out to say that, after much prayer, the holy spirit had indicated that he was the chosen candidate that would improve Brazil. “Demonstrations of this kind are frequent in Pentecostal churches. I analyzed data from social networks and historical documents to show that this has happened in all presidential elections since re-democratization and that pastors use moral arguments to mobilize members of their churches against the candidates of the left”, he comments.

Araújo used individual-level data to show the effects of conversion to Pentecostalism on voters' moral judgments. He used panel data that considers the same individuals at various times over several years. Once converted, individuals see more corruption in politicians, but exclusively in those on the left.

The researcher also worked with georeferenced data involving a specific church in Rio de Janeiro (Assembly of God Victory in Christ) and found that in election sessions very close to these churches, left-wing candidates in presidential elections were always at a disadvantage. In the thesis, Araújo also concludes that in municipalities where the proportion of Pentecostals grows, the proportion of votes for left-wing parties decreases. The spatial models used by the author also suggest that rejection of leftist candidates tends to be greater in areas with a high concentration of Pentecostal Evangelicals.

Another factor that explains such voting preferences is the low consumption of information by Pentecostals. Religious leaders and churches end up being their main sources of information. As they tend to attend church more often than followers of other religions, they spend more time under the influence of brokers. They also rely more on their leadership compared to traditional Catholics and Evangelicals. “An individual with Pentecostal Evangelical affiliation is five times more likely to attend church once a week or more. And the likelihood that a Pentecostal Evangelical will positively evaluate the leadership of his church is about four times higher than for other religions”, Araújo points out in the thesis.

In the case of Catholics, it is more difficult for priests to act as brokers because the hierarchy is so much larger. The liturgy follows directives that come from the Vatican. The priest does not have as much scope to position himself clearly on political issues. Traditional Catholics and Evangelicals also have greater access to information, which makes them more critical of discourses.

The weight of moral issues for Pentecostals is also related to theological differences between different churches. “Catholicism and traditional Protestantism is more focused on individual action, and Pentecostalism in the collective”. For Pentecostals, “as well as following biblical doctrine, it is necessary to ensure that the sacred values are also disseminated to all sectors of society, which includes the political arena, the place where decisions are made. Hence the need to vote for candidates aligned with Christian values​​”, he explains. “By 2035, evangelicals will be the majority in Brazil and Catholics will be the second, according to demographic estimates”, says Araújo. In other words, it is an expanding electorate that tends not to vote for left-wing parties. In conclusion, the thesis shows that it will be increasingly difficult for leftist party to succeed in presidential elections in Brazil in the coming years, unless it manages to overcome the barriers and engage with this electorate.
 

Midia Press
Janaína Simões
E-mail: imprensa.cem@usp.br
Phone: 55 (11) 3091-2097 / 55 (11) 99903-6604