The liberty movement is growing rapidly in Brazil—and Prometheus Foundation is doing its best to make sure that Objectivism is a part of the movement.
In recent years, young Brazilians have increasingly been calling for an end to the cronyism and corruption that permeates the political landscape left to right. In essence, they are demanding freedom to pursue flourishing lives. Student organizations such as Students For Liberty Brazil, União Juventude e Liberdade, #SCLivre, as well as parties such as Partido NOVO who base their political vision on the foundations of liberty, are seeing dramatic increases in memberships and in student activism.*
Ayn Rand held that the only substantive, enduring way to achieve a free society is by advancing the rational ideas on which such a society depends. This means advancing her philosophy of Objectivism and helping others understand how the philosophy contributes positively to all aspects of living on Earth. To this end, Prometheus Foundation (PF) has been ramping up engagement with students from the aforementioned organizations, as well as with other organizations and individuals in Brazil.
In 2020, funds were granted to Bruno Fonseca from Saõ Paolo for disseminating Objectivism in Brazil via the Galt Media Center. Bruno’s main activity is writing for and distributing Revista Galt, an online and print magazine that discusses philosophy in general and Objectivism in particular. Bruno and his partner, Patricia, also run a podcast in which he discusses Rand’s ideas and encourages Brazilians to study her books—several of which are translated into Portuguese.
This spring, our close collaborator Students For Liberty expanded the Prometheus-sponsored New Frontiers of Objectivism (NFO) program into Brazil, thus ensuring that their Brazilian members have an opportunity to learn more about Rand’s ideas and thereby become better advocates of the foundations of liberty. During the month of March, SFL hosted ten Objectivism seminars in five Brazilian cities—São Carlos, Joaçaba, Florianópolis, Belo Horizonte, and Palmas—which were attended in total by 1,074 student participants. SFL will run a second round of NFO seminars this fall.
Many of NFO alumni and other liberty-loving students from Brazil applied for scholarships for this year’s TOS-Con, held in June in Colorado. Eighty-four scholarships were granted and thirty-one recipients were fortunate enough to get visa appointments that enabled them to travel to the U.S. and attend the conference. Jon Hersey from Objective Standard Institute, his (Brazilian) wife Rose, Martin Hooss (head of NFO), and I met with these students for a roundtable lunch discussion, and ideas were forged for future collaboration. Hopefully, more Brazilian students will be able to make it to next year’s conference.
In the meantime, Prometheus Foundation will co-sponsor the Brazilian LibertyCon 2022, the fourth LibertyCon held in Brazil and the first since COVID made such gatherings difficult to hold. At the last LibertyCon, held In 2019, SFL brought together 1,022 attendees. The current demand from students to meet other lovers of liberty in-person is so great that SFL expects this year’s conference to be their largest in history, with over 1,500 attendees from all over Brazil. Among the planned speakers is OSI’s Jon Hersey.
In connection with LibertyCon Brazil, SFL will host a special event for their Prometheus Fellows. The Prometheus Fellowship is spearheaded by young Brazilian entrepreneur Andre Freo, who will be there to promote the program and hopefully spark the interest of many young active minds to join the next cohort of Fellows.
In addition to these activities, Prometheus Foundation is currently investigating new opportunities to advance Objectivism further in this vast country, where young people are both ready and eager to explore Rand’s ideas and to learn how to apply them to their lives.
Stay tuned for more updates from Brazil!
* As reported here, here, and here, and by student leaders from União da Juventude Livre (UJL), Students For Liberty Brasil, and the Movement of the #SCLivre with whom we’ve interacted.
