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Article

Revista Brasileira de Política Internacional
ISSN 1983-3121
http://www.scielo.br/rbpi
Gianfranco Caterina^[1]
↑  Fundação Getúlio Vargas, History, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
(gianfrancocaterina@gmail.com)

ORCID ID: orcid.org/0000-0002-5769-2533

Copyright:

• This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided that the original author and source are credited.
• Este é um artigo publicado em acesso aberto e distribuído sob os termos da Licença de Atribuição Creative Commons, que permite uso irrestrito, distribuição e reprodução em qualquer meio, desde que o autor e a fonte originais sejam creditados.

Gagarin in Brazil: reassessing the terms of the Cold War domestic political debate in 1961

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/0034-7329202000104

Rev. Bras. Polít. Int., 63(1): e004, 2020

Abstract

This article argues that the visit of cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin to Brazil in 1961 illustrated a change in the perception of part of the Brazilian political elites about the USSR. It analyses how the shift of the Soviet self-representation abroad affected the image of the USSR in Brazil and, consequently, the terms of the domestic debate regarding the Cold War.

Keywords: Brazil; Cold War; Soviet Union; Yuri Gagarin; Modernization

Received: September 12, 2019

Accepted: January 4, 2020

Introduction

During the 1950s and 1960s, the Soviet space program played an important role in the USSR’s pursuit of global superpower status. Andrews and Siddiqi (2011) highlight the “enormous resources” employed in the space missions themselves, as well as their advertising in domestic and international arenas. The launch of the first artificial satellite, Sputnik-1, in 1957, and Yuri Gagarin’s pioneering spaceflight in April 1961 would become milestones of the USSR’s scientific advancements and international projection. As from 1961, Soviet cosmonauts toured the world, industrial exhibitions displayed Soviet technical-scientific improvements abroad and publications on its space technology emerged continuously.

This article adopts Andrews and Siddiqi’s (2011) approach, emphasizing the intersection between the state and culture. More precisely, this text deals with the connection of how material and symbolic elements of the Soviet space program were interpreted by the Brazilian political elite in particular