This article was originally published in early June 2026, in issue #3 of International Marxism, the international political journal of International Socialist Alternative. Click here to subscribe or to buy a copy of the full issue.
The formation of the Party of Socialism and Freedom (PSOL) in 2004 was of crucial importance. Despite the difficulties and contradictions of the process which it set in motion, it reflected a real need of the working class in the face of the Workers’ Party’s (PT) shift to the right in previous years, and the qualitative leap in its adaptation to the bourgeois political regime when Lula assumed the presidency for the first time in 2003.
However, more than 20 years on, the construction of a coherent socialist left-wing alternative with mass influence, capable of overcoming the historical limitations of the PT, remains a strategic task yet to be fulfilled in Brazil. In the struggle to achieve this, the experience of PSOL, despite its current profound setbacks, is of great value, and its lessons must be shared among new generations of the working class and the oppressed in Brazil and internationally.
PSOL’s Formation
In 2002, Lula won the presidential election after three unsuccessful attempts in 1989, 1994, and 1998. Compared to the 1989 campaign—when the first direct presidential election took place after the end of the dictatorship, and the PT still maintained a strong leftist stance amid the rise of the mass movement—2002 represented the culmination of a political rightward shift toward “moderation” within the party.
However, it was not because they moderated their policies and profile, adopted a vice-presidential candidate who was a prominent businessman from the Liberal Party, and formed alliances with the center-right, that the PT and Lula won the 2002 elections. The victory was a consequence of the deep crisis of the neoliberal policies of then-President Fernando Henrique Cardoso and the fact that Lula and the PT were still seen, due to their combative and radical past, as an alternative capable of bringing about profound changes in the country.
Lula and the PT, however, squandered the people’s willingness to fight and the widespread desire for real change in the economy and the political system. They chose to try to reassure the ruling class by demonstrating that their government was one of continuity rather than radical change. In addition to appointing ministers and a Central Bank president from the neoliberal right, Lula maintained the core of the previous government’s economic policy—supplemented by a few specific social policies—and promoted cuts and counter-reforms, including to social security.
The response was, on the one hand, a major strike by federal public sector workers, and on the other, serious dissatisfaction among part of the PT’s base. A small group of PT lawmakers (one senator and three federal deputies) refused to vote in favor of these policies. The strike against the social security reform and the expulsion of these so-called “radical” lawmakers from the PT provided the initial impetus for the formation of the “Socialist and Democratic Left – Movement for a New Party.” They organized the founding congress of PSOL in June 2004 and secured its definitive legal recognition in 2005, following a big campaign to collect half a million signatures across the country. A relatively radical program advocating class independence and socialism as a strategic objective was adopted by the new party.
The active base of PSOL came from various directions: thousands of activists who had split from the PT, dissatisfied with the direction of the government and the party; activists from other left-wing forces attracted by the proposal for unity on the socialist left on a more militant basis; and sectors of the youth and working class who, in the midst of struggle, had drawn left-wing political conclusions. The party’s foundation was organized through political agreements between various organized political currents (including our own—the then-Brazilian section of the Committee for a Workers’ International, now ISA), and under the strong influence of the MPs who initiated the process.
Although it remained a historic and necessary step forward for working-class struggle under the PT government, the weight given to parliament within the party was, from the outset, a source of risk and pressures on the young new formation. The enormous efforts of the new party’s militant base to build a democratic, grassroots process for decision-making and defining party policy always ran up against the disproportionate weight of parliamentarians and public figures.
Despite the party’s stated good intentions and inspiring efforts, the grassroots had no real control over elected officials. In practice, the party operated primarily through political agreements made at the top by organized factions and elected officials, with little or no actual power held by the rank and file. The enormous weight of the parliamentary officeholders’ structure (money and resources) always generated serious distortions that were later qualitatively intensified, completely subverting the concept of a democratic, grassroots party that was present at PSOL’s inception.
Furthermore, the centrality of electoral contests and the struggle for parliamentary seats gradually consolidated PSOL as a party operating primarily within the regime’s institutions—fighting to pass progressive measures in parliament, appealing for judicial decisions in favor of just causes, and so on. The direct struggle of workers and the oppressed was increasingly seen as a tool in the service of the institutional struggle, rather than the other way around, as it should be.
Left Opposition to the PT
Despite this, in its early days PSOL generally had relatively sound policies. It supported and drove struggles of workers and the oppressed, and took a stance of left-wing opposition to PT governments while simultaneously fighting right-wing forces in the country. This was the foundation of its growth. The party did not go “all the way,” but it showed that it was still possible to build a left-wing alternative in the face of the PT’s betrayals. It also functioned as a dynamic space for unity of action, political debate, and the rebuilding of the socialist left.
The formation of PSOL also took place amid a process of reorganization of the labor and popular movements, with new initiatives to coordinate struggles and form new militant labor federations that sought to overcome the passivity and pro-government stance of the country’s largest labor federation, the CUT, led by the PT.
A major trade union and popular congress (Conclat) was organized in 2010 with the support of PSOL and others. It aimed to unite all these initiatives into a powerful, militant new trade union and popular federation based on working-class independence and opposition to the PT governments. However, sectarianism and internal disputes over control ultimately led to new divisions, with serious consequences for the movement in the period that followed.
The space for a left-wing alternative to the PT became evident in the 2006 elections when PSOL’s Presidential candidate, then-Senator Heloísa Helena, finished in third place with 6.85% of the vote while taking a clear left-wing stance against both Lula’s PT and Geraldo Alckmin’s PSDB. Since then, PSOL has fielded candidates in opposition to the PT and the right in every election until 2022, when it mistakenly decided not to field its own candidate. Unfortunately, it repeated the same error in 2026.
Brazil experienced massive social upheaval in June 2013, with millions taking to the streets to protest fare hikes on public transport, defend public services, and demand social rights—confronting both the PT government and traditional right-wing administrations at the state and municipal levels. This movement again saw PSOL, despite its limitations, grow in popularity—particularly among young people.
Nevertheless, the absence of a consistent revolutionary socialist strategy and program for this moment of intense mass mobilization paved the way for the movement’s ebb and a serious shift in the balance of forces toward the right.
Rise of the Right and Changes in PSOL
The turning point in the country’s situation came with the 2016 institutional coup, which ousted President Dilma Rousseff (PT), and allowed the right wing to return to power through Vice President Michel Temer in alliance with the traditional right. Shortly thereafter, this paved the way for the rise of the far right to the presidency, led by Jair Bolsonaro.
PSOL correctly opposed the coup, without implying political support for Dilma Rousseff. This stance, however, was soon derailed into a policy of increasing alignment with the PT. This undermined the original profile of PSOL, which was founded to serve as an alternative to the PT and its mistakes and betrayals. This rapprochement with the PT took on tragic proportions when that party returned to power in 2023 and PSOL adopted a stance of collaboration with the government rather than one of independence and left-wing opposition.
The main argument for PSOL’s policy of rapprochement with the PT was the threat posed by the far right, particularly following Bolsonaro’s victory in the 2018 elections. At that time, with Bolsonaro on the rise and Lula in prison (the PT had nominated Fernando Haddad as its presidential candidate), PSOL still put forward Guilherme Boulos as its presidential candidate in the first round of elections, but drew little real political distinction with the PT.
In March 2018, PSOL and its activists experienced one of their most tragic moments: the assassination of Marielle Franco—a Black woman, socialist activist, and city councilwoman in Rio de Janeiro who was confronting the so-called “militias” and organized crime in her state. Several public figures and PSOL leaders have also suffered and continue to suffer attacks and threats—particularly Black and trans women. Confronting the rising far right has indeed become a priority, but the party’s policies in response have not always been the right ones.
The rise of the far right in Brazil is directly linked to frustration with PT governments. For many, including former Lula voters, the hope for “radical change” has shifted from the PT to the far-right Bolsonaro movement. The PT became the party of order and the political system, while “Bolsonarism” demagogically adopted an anti-establishment stance that appealed to the working class and poor, all while defending the interests of the most reactionary factions of the bourgeoisie and channeling the prejudices and resentments of a middle class in crisis and without prospects. Along with this, it promoted its misogynistic, racist, and violent agenda against social movements and the left.
By gradually abandoning its radical, independent profile—rooted in struggles of workers and the poor—to become a somewhat more strident appendage of the PT, PSOL indirectly collaborated with a political strategy that allowed the far right to occupy this space.
Fight the Far Right with Class Independence, Struggle, and a Socialist Program
Watering down the program, backing down on the fight for socialist transformation, and allying with historical enemies is not the way to defeat the far right. We must prioritize the genuine mobilization of the working class, youth, women, Black people, Indigenous peoples, and others. In this arena, it is possible to build unity in action with sectors of the PT willing to fight, helping these sectors to distance themselves from the quietist and passive orientation of their leadership.
But for this to happen, we must maintain independence from PT governments, because a significant portion of our struggles are also against their policies. Along with this, it is also crucial to put forward a comprehensive political alternative to the crisis of the system—the crisis that has revived the far right, and in the face of which the PT has acted merely as a mitigator of the greatest contradictions of the current order. We must therefore put forward a socialist program.
PSOL Since 2022—Capitulation to Lesser Evilism
Starting with the 2022 elections, PSOL definitively adopted the political logic of the “lesser evil” and deepened its subordination to the PT. For the first time since its foundation, the party did not field a presidential candidate. An internal minority led by Congressman Glauber Braga resisted this policy, but was defeated. Lula came to be seen by the PSOL leadership as the only possible bulwark against “fascism” in a context where, in their view, the radical ideas of the PSOL of the past supposedly found no space or justification.
Then, gradually for the PSOL leadership, unity with the PT turned into passive acceptance of the “broadest possible” front—including with sectors of the Brazilian right—advocated by Lula and the PT. Initially, in 2022, PSOL still criticized the nomination of former São Paulo Governor, Geraldo Alckmin, as Lula’s running mate. Alckmin is a politician from the traditional neoliberal right who, among other atrocities, has blood on his hands from the police repression in 2012 during the mass eviction in Pinheirinho, the largest urban land occupation in Latin America.
In 2026, however, without significant internal dissent, PSOL not only refrained from fielding its own presidential candidate in the first round of the elections, but also raised no objections whatsoever to Alckmin’s nomination or to Lula’s other alliances and agreements with the right. Some sectors of the party went so far as to argue that PSOL had been wrong to criticize these alliances in the past.
This strategic construction of the so-called “broad front” has contributed to a significant programmatic retreat on the part of the left, making PSOL complicit in Lula’s policy of class conciliation. Furthermore, it is not true that there is no space for a radical, combative, and militant program. There are public figures on the left with a more radical profile gaining ground among young people and workers, but the far right is also advancing in these spaces by raising an “anti-system” profile that must be fought not with moderation, but with a radical left-wing alternative.
Advocating for and building a left-wing, socialist program is not incompatible with, as a tactical move, calling for a vote for Lula in the second round of the elections in order to defeat the far right at the polls, which can be done without committing to support a future Lula administration.
Dependence on the Capitalist State
PSOL’s political deviations and signs of degeneration stem both from a misguided understanding of how to confront the far right and from the consequences of a failure to develop a structure independent of the bourgeois state and its institutions.
It is worth noting that PSOL today is a party of million-dollar election campaigns thanks to the “party fund”—state funds received for the party’s day-to-day expenses—and the “electoral fund”—public money allocated for election campaigns. For example, in 2020, PSOL received 35.5 million reais (about US$7 million) from the electoral fund, which by 2024 had risen to 128.6 million reais (about US$25 million). In addition to this amount, there are hundreds or thousands of party members employed in positions within the offices of elected officials in the legislative branches at the municipal, state, and federal levels, as well as those assigned to government ministries.
Today, PSOL has no policy of self-financing independent of the bourgeois state. It instead relies on state money to fund its activities, maintain its headquarters, and even intervene in social struggles. Combine this with undemocratic internal operations, and you have the perfect breeding ground for all manner of distortions and political degeneration.
PSOL Inside Lula’s Government
At first, PSOL maintained an ambiguous stance toward Lula’s 2022 administration. The party was supposed to keep its members out of the government to maintain some independence, but it quickly made “exceptions” in some ministries and positioned itself as part of the government’s support base in the Chamber of Deputies.
More recently, the party accepted the appointment of its leading public figure, Guilherme Boulos, as Minister of the General Secretariat of the Presidency of the Republic—a privileged position within the government hierarchy. The purpose of his appointment is to establish relations between the government and social movements, assisting Lula’s 2026 reelection campaign. Boulos—a historic leader of the mass movement for housing rights—therefore now acts as a mediator in conflicts between the government and social movements, which in practice discourages social struggles.
Within PSOL, Boulos’ faction—the party’s most right-wing wing component—now argues that it should go beyond a mere electoral coalition and form a joint party federation with the PT, which would entail a greater degree of subordination extending beyond electoral cycles. This proposal was defeated by PSOL’s national executive committee and sparked a crisis in Boulos’ relationship with PSOL that could lead to his departure from the party into the PT after the elections.
However, many of those who opposed the party federation with the PT did so based on electoral calculations and without questioning the policy of uncritical support for Lula. Even if the more right-wing faction were to leave PSOL, this would not necessarily mean that the party would take a more left-wing course.
Future of the Brazilian Left
This brings us to the discussion about the future of the Brazilian left and the need to build an alternative. The 2026 elections will be the last in which Lula runs as a candidate and will mark the final chapter of Lula’s reign as the “undisputed” leader of the “progressive” camp in Brazilian politics—whether he wins or loses.
The strategy of Boulos and others in PSOL, to occupy the space Lula will leave behind and thus inherit his social base by uncritically collaborating with the PT, is doomed to failure and will provoke new crises within the Brazilian left.
In this inevitable process of reorganizing the left in the coming period, the task of revolutionary socialists is to focus on reviving the mass struggles of the working class and oppressed sectors. This will be the basis for a left-wing and socialist alternative that can unite militant social movements with the left-wing political forces that dare to resist the siren song of “Lulism.”
Part of this process will still involve debates and disputes within PSOL, which remains a point of reference for many workers and young people. But it will also—and above all—unfold directly through the struggles and movements to come. We must prepare for this new cycle of the left and social movements by building a socialist and revolutionary left-wing pole and by putting forward an authentic socialist program.
Photo: Lula Oficial
