The pandemic, Eurocentric social theory, and Brazilian social thought

Abstract

The article outlines a theoretical framework to discuss the present relevance of so-called “Brazilian social thought” in the light of the pandemic of COVID-19. The main hypothesis is that while the pandemic is a global phenomenon in scope, the current social theory which seeks to explain it remains deeply Eurocentric. It argues that this shortcoming shows the need for taking in account non-Eurocentric/peripheral forms of social imagination, and that one can regards Brazilian Social Thought as one of such forms. It suggests two theoretical and methodological steps to achieve this task: the ‘deprovincialization’ of Brazilian social thought, searching for connections with global theoretical debates and not only with so-called “Brazilian” themes; a historiographical reconstruction of Brazilian social though that links the history of Brazilian social sciences with the global development of sociology in the twentieth century