The Politics of Agrarian Reform in Brazil

Abstract

SOCIAL MOVEMENTS AND TRANSFORMATIONThis series tackles one of the central issues of our time: the rise of large-scale social movements and the transformation of society over the last thirty years. As global capitalism continues to affect broader segments of the world's population-workers, peasants, the selfemployed, the unemployed, the poor, indigenous peoples, women, and minority ethnic groups-there is a growing mass movement by the affected populations to address the inequities engendered by the globalization process. These popular mass movements across the globe (such as labor, civil rights, women's, environmental, indigenous, and anti-corporate globalization movements) have come to form a viable and decisive force to address the consequences of the operations of the transnational corporations and the global capitalist system. The study of these social movements-their nature, social base, ideology, and strategy and tactics of mass struggle-is of paramount importance if we are to understand the nature of the forces that are struggling to bring about change in the global economy, polity, and social structure. This series aims to explore emerging movements and develop viable explanations for the kind of social transformations that are yet to come.

Communauté et subjectivité politiques

“…26. Voir notamment : Branford et Rocha, 2002 ;Wright et Wolford, 2003 ;Loera, 2006 ;Bleil, 2012 ;Sigaud et al, 2010 ;Carter, 2015 ;Robles et Veltmeyer, 2015. terre, à savoir les « moments mystiques » et l'état d'esprit de groupe. Lors d'une réunion pendant l'occupation de la Fazenda Nazaré dans l'ouest de l'État de São Paulo, un des coordonnateurs a fait l'intervention suivante : « La mística est très bonne !…”

Revisiting Agrarian Reform in Brazil, 1985–2016

“…In other regions of the countryside, notably the northeastern region, the military cracked down on radicalized rural labor movements. Eventually, the use of repression, imprisonment, torture, and murder successfully demobilized these movements (Alves, 1985; Reis, 1998; Robles & Veltmeyer, 2015). Despite pressure from the Catholic Church, the military paid scant attention to agrarian reform, because it was basically incompatible with its agricultural modernization project.…”

“…Afraid of a “radical socialist” coming to power, Brazil’s elite threw all their support behind Collor. With this support, Collor’s political machinery ran an effective media campaign against “Lula” da Silva by fragmenting his political support within middle- and lower-class voters (Robles & Veltmeyer, 2015).…”

“…Over the centuries, the latifúndia shaped the development of a hierarchical social structure. It became a powerful system very resistant to change, and the main source of intermittent land conflicts that persist even today (Caio Prado, 1971; Robles & Veltmeyer, 2015; Viotti da Costa, 2000).…”

“…In 1984, landless rural worker movements from over Brazil gathered together in the city of Cascavel, Paraná, to establish a national landless rural worker organization dedicated to the pursuit of agrarian reform. They established the MST, which adopted a collective leadership structure based on the principles of basismo , or grassroots democracy (Robles & Veltmeyer, 2015). The newly established Partido dos Trabalhadores, or Workers’ Party (PT), welcomed the MST’s called for agrarian reform.…”