Give Your Life to the Economy: Death Management and Neoliberalism in the Brazil of the Pandemic – A Secondary Publication

Abstract

This essay is a reflection on how the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has re-edited and updated the old mechanisms of neoliberalism and the management of death in Brazil. We discussed the imperatives and messages repeated since March 2020 in the media that transmit a false idea of freedom of choice concerning individual protection, while the State, reinforcing the neoliberal ideology and producing feelings of failure, guilt, and fear materially leaves a large part of the population unprotected. Then, we articulated notions about neoliberalism and the lack of social protection on how death management has been conducted during the pandemic. Finally, we reflected on the possibility of weather insurgency and promoted the idea that the established solidarity networks are expressions of solidarity and class identity based on what resembles us as humans.