The article aims at showing the relevance of the concept of electoral cleavages in order to understand Brazilian politics. The starting point is the consideration that federalism and regionalism have been underestimated as analytical concepts partially due to the tendency of social scientists perform political analysis based on either class divisions or formal relations among institutions. Neither denying the importance of such approaches nor thinking of replacing them, the text insists that populations, as well as economical and political forces, are geographically situated and the reality of common territorial interests is unavoidable.