The central political figures were involved in unprecedented corruption scandals. Dilma Rousseff, the former president of Brazil, has been impeached. The political cupula is nervous about being implicated in plea bargaining testimonies in a big corruption investigation. The emblematic former president Lula is very likely to be charged, and so is the former head of the Congress, the head of the Senate, ex-ministers, ex-governors and maybe even the acting president, Michel Temer.

As a result, a massive popular movement has emerged and protesters have taken to the streets all over the country. Interestingly, among the traditional "Fora Dilma" (Dilma Out) signs and Lula's inflatable dolls dressed as a prison inmate, it was not uncommon to see Gadsden flags, and "Less Marx, More Mises" and "Olavo is Right" signs. Mises was the leading economist of the Austrian School of Economics, which advocates radically free markets. Olavo de Carvalho is a Brazilian conservative philosopher who lives in America.

A Long Time Coming

The intellectual underpinnings of the recent Brazilian protests are the result of a decades-long movement seeking a deep ideological change in the country. It is said that Hayek advised Anthony Fischer not to go into politics, but to influence intellectuals instead, believing that the intellectual arguments would prevail in the long run. Fischer went on to create the Institute of Economics Affairs. Some years later we saw public figures like Thatcher and Reagan. Something similar is happening in Brazil.