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Ipsos Flair Collection years of Ipsos in Brazil Brazil 2018: The Mask Slipped! Time for Truth Brazil 2018 The Mask Slipped! Time for Truth Ipsos editions August 2017 ©2017 – Ipsos 3 | [ Guide ] Ipsos Flair: understand to Forese. Globalisation, fragmentation, digitalisation and socialisation, innovation through technologies and heavy marketing and sales spending: all these words change the game. What are the consequences? Increased competition and volatility. Ipsos leverages assets thanks to its broader knowledge of countries and cultures, and their social and political environment. In 2006, Ipsos Flair was created in order to demonstrate the originality and sharpness of Ipsos, because « Flair » is about instinct and intuition. It is the ability to capture the mood, to perceive the right direction, to know when to act. It is also another way of looking, one that considers survey results as sociological symptoms to understand the real relationship between people and everything around them: brands, ads, media… Ipsos is uniquely positioned around five major specialisations: marketing; customer and employee satisfaction; media and advertising; public opinion research; and survey management. By bringing together these diverse and complementary perspectives, the Ipsos Flair series helps our clients to formulate and to fine-tune strategic planning approaches. Since 2015, Ipsos Flair has been a strong, loyal and illuminating tool in Brazil thanks to the great reception of our clients and the commitment of our teams. This year, we are pleased to present the fourth edition for 2018. Last year, we were betting about “a new sequence and a real transition” and “a time when wise choices are imperative”. Such a sentiment is particularly apt today. Henri Wallard CEO Adjunto Chairman of Loyalty and Public Affairs 5 | [ Editorial ] In its second edition, the Ipsos Flair series in Brazil described the year 2016 as "a year of turbulence". Hence came our title, "Disenchantment, Pragmatism and Hope." The third edition, about 2017, pointed to a turning point with a clear choice to be made: "Seeds or debris". It would be good if this year we could continue the metaphor of the seeds, bringing the plants with flowers, blossoming with new opportunities. Unfortunately, the country's current news does not encourage optimism. The mayor of Rio’s decision, aiming at cutting the funding the city gives to samba schools (US$ 7 million) by half speaks for itself. One can interpret it as the moral choice of a conservative religious minister. It also can be seen as one of the consequences of country’s economic crisis: several states, such as Rio de Janeiro itself, are on the verge of bankruptcy, accumulating several months of delay in the salaries of public servants. Where did the Lula years go? A time when commodity prices were high, giving the impression to Brazilians that the time to get rich had finally come. A time of internal growth, with social policy, access to credit, development of a middle class and development of the market through consumption. A time of external growth, with investors coming from abroad, expanding the financial resources of the country. It was a period of a 4% annual growth, twice the growth of previous years. But it was not the era of structural reforms: infrastructures, training and education, among others, did not benefit from this period. After her election in 2010, former president Dilma Rousseff held herself to one belief: GDP growth would come from increased public spending. It brought deficits, an expanding public debt and inflation... The consequences would have been less severe if commodity prices had not fallen as they did. And it was not just that. Repeated political scandals, impeachment of the president in 2016, revelations that now involve the name of the current president, Michel Temer, accused of "passive 7 | corruption", "obstruction of justice" and "participation in a criminal organisation", with numerous requests for his impeachment in the House of Deputies... a reality far, far away from the cheerful images of samba and carnival. In 18 months, unemployment almost doubled, jumping from 7.4% to 13.2%, with immediate consequences on consumption, credit and purchasing power. Of course, some companies adapt themselves to this scenario, such as Renault, which will market a new popular car line from August. But it can also be seen as a kind of downgrading. What stuns and disappoints most Brazilians is to see that they have been literally "cheated” by the media, the politicians, and by all those who inform and govern them. The question of truth is so important this year. When it comes to post-truth, when it seems clear that "fake news" is part of daily life, it's worth remembering Hegel and Guy Debord. The first, who wrote in The Phenomenology of Spirit (1807), "the false is a moment of truth (but no longer as false)." And the second, 160 years later, said: "In a truly inverted world, the truth is a moment of the false." Why? Because "societies in which modern conditions prevail presents itself as an immense accumulation of spectacles. And "the spectacle is the affirmation of the appearance." This discovery is funny for a critic or writer, inspiring for the revolutionary. But it is terrible for a society that loses, in an instant, all its references and does not know in whom or in what to trust anymore. Literally, the air is heavier. Yves Bardon Ipsos Flair Program Director | 8 [ Perspective from Alex Grönberger, CEO of Ipsos Latam Region ] I have been working on consumer understanding for more than 30 years now, and always felt very confident explaining why people and societies behave in one way or another and anticipating what they would probably do next. For several years, Ipsos’ mantra was Nobody is Unpredictable, and we all strived and succeeded at it. Thirty years, and I have never felt as lost as trying to understand Brazil today and where it is going. It is so puzzling! Impeachment, corruption, loss of credibility of all leaders, not only political but also social and corporate leaders, left us in the dark and there is no sign of any light that could show us the way out. The economy has shrunk more than 3.5% two years in a row despite an unhealthy inflation rate. And still, people and consumers are going on and, in the first quarter, the GDP went up by 1%. How? Why? Can our people in Brazil come back from everything you throw at them? Their skin has hardened, their eyes too, but they keep moving on with their inner force, even despite the missteps and misguidance of their leaders. Maybe they have seen all possible masks covering the darkest and most secret intentions, but they have now learned to see through them? As Lula gets a 9-year, 3-month sentence from Judge Sergio Moro and Michel Temer’s popularity fell even lower than Dilma’s before the impeachment, nobody seems really surprised, and keeps walking. Temer may step down, but probably not, and the status quo will remain until the next elections in October 2018, and people will keep going? We can infer that their expectations from the leaders are so low that they care very little about what might happen at the top of the political agenda; they hardened up and they continue by themselves. 9 | Our key learning in this Flair Brazil 2018 is that to understand what is going on in the country we should look more at people and less at its leaders; people have achieved a level of maturity and are making decisions and taking action by themselves regardless of what traditional leaders may say. And the one piece of advice coming from this learning, is that if you have to address the Brazilian people today, make sure you use no mask. I trust this Flair will inspire and empower you to get better connections with this new Brazilian. | 10 [ Marcos Calliari, Ipsos Brazil CEO ] Moments of sadness and disappointment in Brazil’s political- economic scenario woven into moments of hope in finding a solution for such problems, always with a touch of good mood to handle things, Brazilian style”. These were the words used in the foreword to the Flair 2017 edition (published in 2016), a year marked by the expectations arising out of the legacy of the World Cup and Olympic Games, as well as by the inevitable changes brought forth by the impeachment and consolidation of the largest anticorruption operation ever seen in the world, which affected levels – and names – previously deemed untouchable. Hitting rock bottom and appropriating of citizenship were the words of the day. We spoke of seeds found amidst the gravel, bits and pieces, promising to flourish. From the political-economic standpoint, the following remarks almost seem naïve with the unfair benefit of retrospective: one year later, Ipsos’ Global Advisor study (May 2017), conducted with citizens in 26 countries, ranks Brazil last in perceptions on the domestic economy – only 10% of the interviewees classified Brazil’s economy as good. Though there are a few positive signs, such as the GDP rise in the first quarter after 8 consecutive quarters of lows (1Q17), Brazilians still have not perceived such changes and still suffer with income drops and record unemployment. The Consumer Trust Index in the May 2017 Pulse Brazil study remains at a discouraging level: 68 out of a 200-point scale. As for politics, hopes for a new ethos is even further marred by frustration, caused by recent developments in Operation Car Wash, including testimonies, investigations, warrants and imprisonments galore, bags full of money exchanged in the most unbelievable of ways, up to and including Brazil’s highest ranking authorities.

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