Newbie representatives talk political renewal at the Brazil Conference

On Saturday, as Brazilian college students, billionaires and governors alike gathered in an almost full auditorium at Harvard University, four first-term lawmakers discussed the future of Brazilian politics at the fifth edition of the Brazil Conference, a forum hosted every Spring at Harvard and MIT. The event, which this year featured over 20 politicians, including keynote speaker Vice President Hamilton Mourão and former President Fernando Henrique Cardoso, also invited first-term representatives from all ends of the ideological spectrum to bring the conversation on political renewal to the table.

Despite their contrasting political views, the panelists, who ran on very different platforms, agreed that political renewal is not attached to any specific movement or ideology, nor to the traditional concepts of right or left politics. According to Paulo Ganime, from the libertarian Partido Novo (literally “New Party”), the true meaning of political renewal is “to bring values, that we somehow lost, back to politics,” giving the examples of listening and debating. His left-wing counterpart Mônica Seixas, of the Socialism and Freedom Party (PSOL), agreed, saying that it has to do with defending such democratic values.

“We are entering the political scene in a moment in which people are tearing each other apart on the streets and in Congress,” Ms. Seixas said. “So we have the tough responsibility to recover Brazilians’...