Between liberty and order: The Liberal Experience of Augusto José Marcelino da Rocha Cabral in the Newspaper O Despertador

Abstract

This article analyzes the newspaper O Despertador: Diário Comercial, Político, Científico e Literário (1838–1840), directed by the portuguese émigré Augusto José Marcelino da Rocha Cabral, in the context of the Brazilian Regency period. The research seeks to understand how a liberal exiled from miguelism articulated his political ideals within a new imperial reality, negotiating spaces of insertion in Brazilian society. To this end, the study examines the editorial project of the periodical, with particular attention to the sections “Parte Política,” “Rio de Janeiro” and “Publicações Literárias,” which highlight the combination of journalistic coverage framed by the rhetoric of impartiality with debates on liberty and order. The analysis thus reveals how Portuguese emigrants used the press to negotiate political identities and strategies of belonging within a liberal field fragmented by intense disputes between regressists and progressists.