What will the future of the PSDB be?

The PSDB is going through a curious moment. It's either heaven or hell right in front of it, although only a miracle can save it from the flames.

If Aécio manages to reach the second round, in a spectacular turnaround, he could gain an unexpected emotional boost, increasing the unpredictability of an election marked by many twists and turns.

Otherwise, the party will continue its decline and, for the first time in 20 years, will be completely out of the running.

For someone who overwhelmingly defeated the PT in the 94 and 98 elections with Fernando Henrique, losing a fourth consecutive election (2002, 2006, 2010, and 2014) to their biggest rival, without even reaching the second round, will require them to rethink everything and start from scratch.

Returning to its origins, when, at least theoretically, it occupied the center-left with FHC, Mario Covas, and Franco Montoro, is out of the question. The PT consolidated itself there and pushed the PSDB to the right, which accepted it very naturally because, lacking proximity to the people, it was always identified with the elite.

Having lost its key figures and lacking renewal, the party is likely to remain largely confined to its headquarters in São Paulo. The only remaining pillars, José Serra and Geraldo Alckmin, will hardly be able to sustain and rebuild the party nationally.

In fact, Serra is more likely to implode than to sustain the party. His leadership has brought far more divisions than points of consensus within the party's caucus. The party's shift to the right has led to displeasure and subsequent departures from prominent figures within the PSDB's ideology, such as the philosopher José Arthur Giannotti and the economist and former minister Luiz Carlos Bresser-Pereira.

Even in the Southeast, the party lost a lot. In Rio, after the disastrous government of Marcello Alencar (94/98), involved in several scandals, the party crumbled and almost doesn't exist anymore. In Minas Gerais, Aécio's candidate is likely to suffer a crushing and shameful defeat to his rival Fernando Pimentel.

The PSDB, which elected eight governors in 2010, may confirm a maximum of five this year. The states of Goiás, Paraíba, and São Paulo are practically guaranteed a first-round victory. In Pará and Paraná, it will compete in the second round. The projection for the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate is also not encouraging.

Making Alckmin the hope for the presidency in 2018 shows the party's lack of options. Even being re-elected in São Paulo in the first round, his reach outside the state is limited. Not to mention that in the 2006 presidential election, the candidate managed the unusual feat of decreasing his votes in the second round.

In other words, the power of the PSDB (Brazilian Social Democracy Party) for 2015 will be evaluated now, on October 5th, and the scenario is uncomfortable. In a possible Marina Silva government, the most likely outcome is that it will become a second-tier auxiliary force. However, if Dilma Rousseff wins, the party will either reinvent itself or continue its habitual UDN (National Democratic Union) conspiracy towards laborism, always supported by the old media.