Culture wars and the illusion of politics without culture.

Many see the culture war – a term popularized to describe ideological disputes manifested in values, customs, and social narratives – as something superficial, a trick, a distraction that diverts society's attention from the so-called "real issues"—economic and institutional ones. However, this perspective comes with an underlying flaw: it underestimates the central role of culture in the struggle for power. Culture has never been a detail: it structures the values ​​of a society, defines what is acceptable, and frames what must be combated. In every political dispute, culture is the starting point and the terrain where perceptions of reality are defined, elaborated, re-elaborated, and questioned.

The culture war is not simply a clash of ideas; it is a method designed to disrupt public debate. Its goal is not to persuade through argument, but to transform disagreements into existential threats. In this context, identity takes the place of critical thinking, and hatred replaces argumentation. None of this happens by chance: it is a deliberate strategy that thrives on the radicalization and simplification of problems, making any possibility of mediation impossible.

More than just peripheral political noise, the culture war is a carefully structured mechanism for reorganizing power. Conservative groups have understood that culture is not merely an expression of society, but an active field of dispute where meanings are produced, values ​​negotiated, and power relations naturalized. By shifting their battles from the ballot box and the courts to the cultural arena, they have treated culture as a strategic territory for consolidating hegemonies and reshaping public perception.

Understanding this phenomenon requires going beyond the surface of headlines or daily clashes. It is necessary to investigate its historical roots, methods, and strategies to reveal how the culture war transforms political priorities and reconfigures the very exercise of power. Only with this understanding will it be possible to build responses that transcend immediate concerns and confront the centrality of culture in the political game. Let's try.

The tradition of the Culture Wars

Cultural disputes span centuries, taking on different forms and intensities, but always reflecting the deepest conflicts within a society. Although the term "cultural war" seems recent, its roots go back to historical moments much earlier than its formalization as a sociological concept. In the 19th century, for example, Germany experienced the Kulturkampf, a conflict between the Prussian state and the Catholic Church over control of education, morality, and national identity. This dispute demonstrated that culture is not merely a passive reflection of society, but a dynamic field of power and conflict.

The Kulturkampf demonstrated that, since the 19th century, culture has been treated as a central space of power. This logic intensified in the United States, especially from the 1960s onwards. The advancement of civil rights, feminism, and counterculture was perceived by conservative sectors as a threat to the stability of the social order. In response, a moral offensive was structured that not only resisted social transformations but actively sought to reverse the advances achieved.

In the 1990s, sociologist James Davison Hunter consolidated the notion of culture war in his work. Culture Wars: The Struggle to Define AmericaEmbedded in a sociological tradition that explores cultural transformations as arenas of political and power struggles, Hunter argued that the culture war was not merely an ideological clash, but a struggle between incompatible worldviews. He demonstrated how these conflicts shaped legislation, directed the educational system, and influenced judicial decisions, transforming culture into a strategic field for redefining hegemonies. Andrew Hartman, in A War for the Soul of AmericaHartman continued this analysis by situating the cultural conflicts of the 2010s as part of a continuous historical cycle of ideological disputes in the United States. Hartman highlighted that, by shifting the focus to issues of morality and customs, the culture wars functioned as mechanisms to obscure broader structural crises, such as those of the economic model, allowing declining conservative hegemonies to find new bases of support. This sociological tradition, especially influential in the United States, developed in a context marked by the plurality of values ​​in a multicultural society and by growing political and ideological divisions. Wendy Brown, in Undoing the DemosThe author argues that neoliberalism not only reconfigures economies but also profoundly transforms culture and politics, subjecting them to market logic. In this scenario, culture wars play a strategic role: by mobilizing identity and moral agendas, often urgent and legitimate, neoliberalism shifts the public debate from structural issues, such as economic inequalities, to cultural conflicts that fragment collective solidarities. These disputes are not deviations from the neoliberal project but an integral part of its dynamics, as they weaken the organization of resistance and create an environment in which individualism and competition prevail. Thus, culture wars not only reflect ideological conflicts but also operate as mechanisms that reinforce inequalities and limit the possibilities of social transformation. While in the United States culture wars emerged as a reaction to social transformations and the crisis of conservative hegemony, in Brazil they were deliberately conceived as a political strategy. As João Cezar de Castro Rocha highlights in his work *Guerra* (War). Culture and Rhetoric of Hate: Chronicles of a Post-Political BrazilThe Brazilian culture war did not emerge spontaneously, but was structured as a tool for mobilizing conservative sectors. Its objective was to reshape public debate, shifting it towards cultural and moral issues, as a way to consolidate a power project. In this way, the culture war in Brazil became a central instrument for shifting public debate and undermining the construction of a democratic society, by instrumentalizing moral issues as tools of political control.

The cultural dispute in Brazil: construction and strategies.

In the United States, the culture war emerged as a reaction to advances in civil rights and progressive agendas, marking a moment of crisis for conservative hegemonies. In Brazil, however, this dynamic was not merely a local adaptation of the North American phenomenon. Its emergence must be understood within the context of the political, social, and economic transformations that intensified from the first decade of the 21st century, marked by ideological polarization and a crisis of legitimacy in democratic institutions.

With the rise of social media and the global impact of conservative movements, sectors of the Brazilian right have adopted strategies of cultural warfare to reorient public debate and create internal enemies. Furthermore, the erosion of the traditional political system, exacerbated by the 2013 protests and Operation Lava Jato, provided fertile ground for the emergence of narratives that shifted the focus from structural issues to cultural and moral disputes. In this scenario, as Castro Rocha points out in his... Cultural Warfare and the Rhetoric of HateA coordinated movement consolidated itself to transform the culture war into a deliberate power strategy, aimed at undermining institutions of knowledge and strengthening a conservative hegemony.

Olavo de Carvalho (1947–2022) became a central figure in the articulation of the culture war in Brazil, especially from the 2000s onwards. Initially known in conservative intellectual circles as an essayist and critic of modernity, Olavo gained greater public prominence with the rise of social media and the strengthening of right-wing movements. In the 1990s, his texts already addressed themes such as the critique of cultural Marxism, but it was in the following decade, with the massive use of YouTube and the dissemination of his ideas in digital communities, that he consolidated himself as the main ideologue of the new Brazilian right.

His discourse, profoundly anti-intellectual and conspiratorial, rejected traditional academia, which he accused of being dominated by a "Marxist hegemony." Inspired by conservative authors such as Roger Scruton and Eric Voegelin, Olavo developed a narrative that combined philosophical and religious references to attack the foundations of progressive thought. His writings and videos served as an ideological meeting point for conservative groups, presenting professors, journalists, and artists as agents of a supposed left-wing cultural revolution. This discourse was instrumental in shaping the imagination of a new generation of political leaders and digital activists.

The impact of this discourse was amplified by sophisticated digital structures. Isabela Kalil, in Hate as Politics: The Reinvention of the Right in BrazilThe article highlights how communication segmentation was used strategically, combining digital microtargeting and inflammatory rhetoric against supposed "internal enemies." Social networks like WhatsApp, Facebook, and YouTube played a central role in mobilizing different groups—from military and religious figures to businesspeople—around common narratives. Another central element in this scenario was revisionist audiovisual production, which had one of its main pillars in the production company Brasil Paralelo, founded in 2016. Its content reinterprets Brazilian history from a conservative and conspiratorial perspective, frequently simplifying complex debates to reinforce a narrative aligned with the culture war. As Salgado and Jorge point out in their article published in [publication name missing from original text]. Brazilian Journal of Bibliographic Information in Social SciencesThis strategy not only discredits institutions like the media and academia, but also seeks to shape collective memory around distorted versions of the past, as in the documentary. 1964: Brazil between weapons and books. which minimizes the crimes of the military dictatorship. This strategy also included a revision of the national memory about the military dictatorship. Rodrigo Patto Sá Motta, in The Construction of Authoritarian Truth: The Brazilian Military Dictatorship and the Formation of Social MemoryThis analysis examines how these revisionist narratives have reinterpreted the regime, promoting a view in which the military "saved" the country from communism. This reinterpretation became dominant in certain conservative circles, contributing to the symbolic rehabilitation of the regime and figures such as Carlos Alberto Brilhante Ustra. Although morality occupies a central place in this process, Frederico Rios observes in Neoliberalism as Tragedy and Farce: Chronicles of the Culture War in Brazil The Brazilian culture war was not limited to religious or moral issues. It also incorporated a strong economic and corporate bias, with conservative businesspeople and media groups investing in constructing narratives that link the "free market" to the modernization of the country, while demonizing social and academic movements as enemies of society. The culture war in Brazil advanced not only through the strength of conservative discourse, but also through the absence of an articulated strategy on the part of progressive sectors. As Antonio Gramsci points out in Prison NotebooksPower is not maintained solely through control of the State, but also through the occupation of cultural spaces and the persuasion of the masses. The right understood this logic and invested heavily in social networks, digital influencers, and audiovisual platforms, while the left concentrated its energies on institutional politics.

The digital turn in the culture war has transformed political debate by favoring polarized and conspiratorial discourses. Platforms like YouTube and Twitter have strengthened information bubbles that fuel resentment and create fictitious enemies, hijacking public debate with simplistic narratives. In this environment, any disagreement is treated as an existential threat.

Confronting the culture war requires more than isolated reactions or denunciations of right-wing strategies. It is necessary to understand culture as a central battleground, where values ​​and symbols shape the collective imagination and the perception of reality. Only a proactive and long-term strategy, combining political action and cultural engagement, will be able to reverse the advances of this conservative hegemony and create new possibilities for a more democratic public debate.

Culture as a territory of dispute.

Culture has always been a central field of political struggle, structuring values, identities, and perceptions of power. In public debate, it is often relegated to a peripheral role, treated as a reflection of economic relations or as a mere symbolic expression, without structural impact. This view disregards the fact that it is within culture that meanings are generated, power relations become natural, and political subjectivities are constructed.

The culture war did not create this dynamic—it merely highlighted its structural roots. Raymond Williams, in Marxism and LiteratureWilliams demonstrated that culture is not a passive reflection of social structures, but a space where ideologies compete for hegemony. With his concept of Cultural Materialism, Williams broke with the traditional view that culture was merely a byproduct of the economy, showing how it organizes lived experience and guides what can be legitimized or excluded. This perspective was enriched by the historian E.P. Thompson in his classic work. The Making of the English Working Classin which he revealed that social classes emerge not only from material conditions, but also from the way historical experiences and collective narratives give meaning to political identity. Stuart Hall, in texts such as The Hard Road to Renewal: Thatcherism and the Crisis of the LeftHall engaged with these ideas by exploring how hegemony is constructed through cultural consensus before consolidating into institutional power. For Hall, when an idea becomes common sense, it means the cultural battle has already been won, even without explicit changes in political structures. This interaction between the symbolic and the structural makes culture not only a reflection but a field of contestation and transformation, where worldviews are negotiated and naturalized. Understanding the centrality of culture in the struggle for power requires considering its relationship with structures of control and legitimacy. It is at this point that the ideas of Antonio Gramsci become fundamental. Gramsci, in addressing hegemony in his works... Prison NotebooksHe highlighted that power is not sustained solely through state coercion, but also through persuasion. This persuasion occurs primarily in the cultural sphere, where values ​​and beliefs are internalized and naturalized, becoming seemingly neutral and unquestionable.

This logic is visible in contemporary Brazil, where the culture war reorganizes the frameworks of legitimacy, redefines which discourses are acceptable, and shifts public debate towards conservative issues that consolidate new hegemonies. The struggle for cultural hegemony can be observed in the reinterpretation of national history, the symbolic rehabilitation of the military dictatorship, and the debate over the role of education in the critical formation of citizens. What is at stake is not only the control of narratives, but the construction of a dominant worldview that shapes the political imaginary.

The problem, then, is not that the culture war has emptied culture as a field of dispute—on the contrary, it has made it even more central, but under the logic of the right. While the left concentrated its efforts on institutional and economic politics, the right invested in culture as a strategic space, understanding that it is there that values ​​are consolidated, perceptions are reoriented, and the limits of what can or cannot be contested are established. By transforming the culture war into a strategy of hegemony, the right redirected the public debate towards its agenda, consolidating its agenda without depending exclusively on electoral victories.

The digital turn in the culture war has further amplified its reach and profoundly altered its workings. With social media, the culture war has ceased to depend on traditional media outlets and has begun to operate in cycles of instant viral spread. Algorithmic engagement favors polarized discourses, transforming indignation into political capital. In Brazil, the digital culture war has consolidated itself with the rise of political influencers and the massive use of fake news to manipulate narratives and mobilize voters.

Culture is not an accessory element in the political struggle; it is the field where the foundations of hegemony are built. Whoever controls culture not only dominates narratives, but defines the limits of what is possible, guides values, and shapes the perception of reality. Therefore, confronting the culture war requires more than reaction or denunciation: it necessitates a strategic and long-term effort that treats culture as the primary territory of political dispute. Only by contesting culture in a proactive and structured way will it be possible to reverse conservative hegemony and reclaim culture's capacity to function as a critical tool, capable of broadening the horizons of public debate and transforming society.

Conclusion

The culture war is not a deviation from real politics, but one of its most sophisticated forms of power struggle. It operates in the long term, reconfiguring perceptions, shifting the terms of public debate, and redefining what is socially acceptable or unacceptable. While the right has used this mechanism to consolidate its influence, the left has been slow to recognize culture as a central territory in the political struggle.

The result is a scenario where public debate has been captured by discourses that naturalize inequalities, reinforce hierarchies, and delegitimize critical thinking. In this environment, all opposition is transformed into an enemy, and all questioning into a threat. The moral appeal, frequently mobilized, presents itself not only as a conservative justification but as an effective resource to stifle debates, shift the focus away from structural issues, and strengthen reactionary narratives. The culture war is not limited to the direct confrontation of political ideas; it transforms values ​​and behaviors into permanent battlefields, where what is at stake is not only argumentation but the very limits of what can be imagined, said, and accepted in society.

If the culture war manages to shift politics to where it suits its purposes, confronting it requires more than isolated reactions or denunciations. It is necessary to occupy the cultural field in a proactive and structural way, contesting values, symbols, and spheres of influence. This demands long-term thinking, avoiding the short-sightedness that only responds to the conditions imposed by the culture war itself.

The power of the culture war lies not only in what it imposes, but in what it renders invisible or unthinkable. It doesn't need to censor ideas directly—it simply needs to make them irrelevant, ridiculous, or impossible to take seriously. Its impact is measured not only by what is said, but also by what is silenced.

Politics doesn't happen exclusively in parliament or at the ballot box. It's built on culture, affections, memories, and how people perceive the world around them. Since hegemony is consolidated in culture, any effective resistance must emerge from it. The left's mistake was treating culture as something secondary, allowing the right to occupy this strategic space.