desalinho. [De Des + alinho]. S.m.

1.Lack of alignment, carelessness in the costume; derangement; disorder. 2. Mood disturbance*

The research group “Desalinho: postcolonial globality and democracy” was formalized in 2023, but its origin dates back to 2012. From an empirical point of view, its research agenda is oriented towards understanding the socio-political relevance of the problem of decolonization and the crisis of Western liberal democracies. From a theoretical point of view, critical theories of colonialism are studied, as well as transformations in the field of contemporary political theory.

In a play of meanings, the word “disarray” lends itself to descriptive and normative understandings. Transposing it to the socio-political order from a historical perspective, it can refer from the third-world non-alignment of the global (semi)peripheries, to the multiple resistances to postcolonial inequalities to the current crisis of the liberal order.

Under the coordination of Luciana Ballestrin**, Desalinho’s vocation is to constitute a space of original and stimulating reflexivity for the training of human resources from scientific initiation to post-doctorate. In this sense, the group’s broader program encourages the consideration of the global dimension without disregarding the Latin American and Pelotas context in which it is inserted, since it is located on the border between Brazil and Uruguay.

Analytically, the confrontation of the methodological Eurocentrism and nationalism characteristic of the social sciences of the twentieth century is encouraged, while normatively questions about decolonization and democracy are privileged, without incurring in the abandonment of universality as a basic principle of political emancipation and liberation.

*Novo dicionário Aurélio da Língua Portuguesa (second revised and expanded edition, 1986, p. 544).
**Professor of the Graduate Program in Political Science and of the International Relations course at the University of Pelotas.