LOCAL RULE AND LEADERSHIP PATTERN: POLITICAL DISPUTE AND PARTY ORGANIZATION IN THE MARANHÃO PROVINCE (1840/1857)

Abstract This paper address two distinct but related questions: identify how the provincial political elite is configured based on information from the Provincial Assembly and debates in the press of the time; and identify the formation and organization of local political groups that congregated around certain interests, perspectives, and identities. This will allow us to question the current historiographical hypothesis that local political groups / parties were not formed following a leadership pattern, exercising command as an auxiliary, secondary activity. First, the article looks at the composition of the Provincial Assembly to verify if there were groups engaged in the ‘occupation of politics.’ Then, it addresses a key point to understand the organization of Maranhão’s political groups: the repeated reference to the local party organization and its transformations. In this regard, the analysis focuses on the formation of the Liga Liberal Maranhense, an agglutination of dissidents from the two main parties in the Maranhão province: the cabanos (saquaremas/conservatives) and bemtevis (luzias/liberals). This paper seeks to demonstrate that its formation, in 1846, is fundamental to understanding Maranhão’s political groups.

摘要 本研究探讨两个既相互独立又紧密关联的问题：其一，依托省议会（Provincial Assembly）档案史料与当时报刊的公开辩论内容，厘清省级政治精英的构成格局；其二，梳理围绕特定利益、政治立场与身份认同聚合形成的地方政治团体的产生与组织形态。借此，我们可对当前的史学假说提出批判性审视：该假说主张地方政治团体/政党并未遵循领导模式，将执政行为作为辅助性、次要性的活动。首先，本文通过考察省议会的人员构成，验证是否存在致力于“政治操控”的利益团体；其次，本文聚焦理解马拉尼昂（Maranhão）地方政治团体组织形态的核心议题，即学界反复提及的地方政党组织及其演变历程。就此而言，本分析将重点关注马拉尼昂自由联盟（Liga Liberal Maranhense）的成立过程——该联盟由马拉尼昂省内两大主流政党的异见者聚合而成：即卡巴诺斯派（cabanos，萨夸雷马派/保守派）与本特维斯派（bemtevis，卢济亚斯派/自由派）。本文旨在证明，该联盟1846年的成立，是理解马拉尼昂地方政治团体发展脉络的核心关键。