In the Coronavirus Pandemic Battle, Populist Leaders Perform Poorly

He says the virus exposed in both countries a distrust of science and data, the systematic weakening of key institutions and a lack of legitimacy of state institutions.

The questioning of accepted facts is one characteristic of populist leaders. Another is to risk alienating their bases — such as by telling people to stay at home or to wear masks in public.

A third characteristic is the sowing of division to gain power along ethnic and national lines or against those deemed elite. Such divisiveness makes cooperation elusive, internally and internationally.

Finally, a fourth frequent trait is a leadership style that favors bombast and crowd-pleasing antics.

After the pandemic hit Brazil, the world’s sixth most populous nation, Bolsonaro downplayed it repeatedly, calling it a “little flu” and saying the cost of a shutdown would be worse than the disease.

He said only high-risk individuals should quarantine, and touted unproven anti-malaria drugs for treatment.

Before he contracted Covid-19, Bolsonaro's administration provided monthly cash payouts to informal-sector workers.

His government paid out a total $22 billion, benefiting more than half of Brazil’s population directly or indirectly, according to the citizenship ministry.

And similar to President Trump printing his signature on the $1,200 coronavirus rescue checks that went out from the US Treasury, Bolsonaro’s government worked to make sure recipients in Brazil knew who to thank — part of what Shifter calls a populist leader’s playbook of adulation and the projection of power.

“If they begin to go along with science. they’re buying into the establishment way of thinking that many of their base sees as the main cause of the country’s problem to begin with,” he says. “It’s seen as kind of giving in or diluting their message, and so they refuse to do so.”