Musical Policing in Today’s Brazil: A Study of Jingles in the Bolsonaro Movement

How are music and jingles used to recruit voters during election campaigns? And, to what extent can this be understood as specific forms of musical policing as people are exposed to political arguments and moral visions as catchy melodies take hold in voters’ bodies? More importantly, how are such forms of musical policing shaped by broader changes towards ‘algorithmic governance’ as jingles operate as political earworms on social media by releasing dopamine, oxytocin, and serotonin in voters during elections thus reconfiguring people’s sense of logos, ethos, and pathos musically? This chapter explores these questions through a study of how Jair Messiah Bolsonaro used music to recruit voters in Brazil during the 2018 and 2022 election campaigns. In doing so, I also describe the broader historical context of jingles in Brazil and combine historical research together with music analysis and ethnography, with a focus on the latter.