Brazilian state, emancipation and social welfare: a critical discourse study of editorials by the newspaper Folha de S. Paulo
critical discourse studies; social welfare; emancipation; state; newspaper Folha de S. Paulo.
This dissertation presents research results of an investigation on how the newspaper Folha de S. Paulo discursively represented the role of the Brazilian state in social welfare, more specifically in the areas of social security and assistance, during the most recent reform of the system. The relations between the state and emancipation in the social security and assistance context were analyzed in the representations elaborated by the newspaper, using interrelated social structures of class, gender and race as parameters. The theoretical framework used was based on the interdisciplinary articulation of approaches to the country's social, political and economic system — focused on welfare and social equity in the areas of taxation, gender and race. From the emancipatory perspective of critical discourse studies, institutional editorials published by the newspaper Folha de S. Paulo on social welfare were analyzed between February 2019 and October/November 2019, timeframe of the congressional process that led to the promulgation of the approved reform's constitutional amendment. The analysis used categories from critical discourse studies consistent with the discursive genre of the texts investigated (opinion article) and their multimodal structure (verbal and visual), namely: critical analysis of argumentation and the meaning of composition. The analytical results showed a representation of the role of the state in social security and social assistance by the newspaper Folha de S. Paulo strongly marked by reductionism, concealment and exclusions of an anti-emancipatory nature. In short, the newspaper reduced the state's actions to the narrow logic of fiscal austerity, hid social actors that are fundamental to the social security system and excluded crucial social issues relating to class, gender and race from the public debate on the role of the state.