Sociology Mind, 2019, 9, 17-41 http://www.scirp.org/journal/sm ISSN Online: 2160-0848 ISSN Print: 2160-083X DOI: 10.4236/sm.2019.91002 Nov. 6, 2018 17 Sociology Mind Elites in Competition and the Reorganization of Power: The Case of Brazil Cristina Gomes Population and Development, Latin-American Faculty of Social Sciences, FLACSO Mexico, Mexico City, Mexico Abstract This article describes the formation of the traditional elite of Brazil from the colonial period, and the main ruptures affecting the republic during short democratic periods in which changes were observed in the composition of their elite. The most recent change is historically contextualized by the for- mation of a new elite, in the form of the governments of Lula da Silva and Dilma Rousseff, who were never part of the political-military-hereditary li- neage of traditional elites. This was the scenario of the 2014 elections and the impeachment that once again broke away from the democratic system. The historical practices of the traditional elite of Brazil showed themselves to be caught in a vicious circle around the coup d’état to return to power, con- fronting the responses of the new progressive elite that had resulted from elections during the short periods of democracy. A qualitative methodology of bibliographic review is applied for the construction of the conceptual and analytical framework, and the collection of information from the media for recent facts has still been little analyzed with content analysis, and is com- plemented with two interviews with people who occupied high government posts, both before and during the coup. The results indicate that the new government elite undervalued the process of financial globalization and pro- moted the strengthening of representatives of international networks and their entry into the decision-making process, where they formed parallel command structures and networks contrary to government decisions and fa- cilitated the rupture of democracy. Keywords Elites, Competence, Democracy, Coup of State, Dictatorship, Impeachment, Oligarchy 1. Introduction Elite theory focuses on how a small number of elite groups concentrate and dis- How to cite this paper: Gomes, C. (2019). Elites in Competition and the Reorganiza- tion of Power: The Case of Brazil. Sociology Mind, 8, 17-41. https://doi.org/10.4236/sm.2019.91002 Received: October 3, 2018 Accepted: November 3, 2018 Published: November 6, 2018 Copyright © 2019 by author and Scientific Research Publishing Inc. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution International License (CC BY 4.0). http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Open Access