Abstract
This paper utilises the Brazilian Landless Movement’s (MST) National March for Agrarian Reform as a lens through which to analyze the social movement challenge to the Lula government’s submission to neoliberalism and suggests lessons for movement activists in South Africa. In focusing on the national march, the paper highlights the importance of marches as a strategic weapon of struggle for the MST, and situates this in historical, philosophical and tactical context. This paper asserts that the MST’s stress on organisation building and political education, its ability to forge strong rural-urban alliances, and its strategic vision in moving beyond narrow corporatist struggles for land to take up broader national popular demands is fundamental to understanding the MST’s consistent mobilizing capacity and its status as a vibrant counterhegemonic actor in Brazilian national politics.
Highlights
In October 2002, Luis Inácio ‘Lula’ da Silva won nearly 53 million of the 83 million votes cast to become Brazil’s first working class president
In South Africa, almost 80% of agricultural land is controlled by whites
This paper locates the national march in the context of the Lula government’s fiscally restrictive economic policies and proceeds to outline the political demands of the national march document, arguing that the strength of the document lies in the fact that it goes beyond narrow corporatist demands for agrarian reform to take up broad national-popular demands
Summary
Resumo: Este trabalho utiliza a Marcha Nacional pela Reforma Agrária do Movimento dos Sem Terra (MST) como lente para analisar a luta dos movimentos sociais contra a política neoliberal do governo Lula e sugere lições para ativistas na África do Sul. Este trabalho afirma que a importância que o MST da para a formação politíca e a construção organizativa, a sua habilidade de construir fortes alianças rural-urbanas, e a sua visão estratégica de ir além das lutas corporativistas pela terra para levantar reinvindicações populares nacionais é fundamental para entender a sua consistente capacidade para mobilização, bem como o seu status como um ator vibrante contra-hegemônico na política nacional do Brasil. Este trabajo afirma que la importancia que el MST da a la formacion politica y la construccion organizativa, su habilidad para construir fuertes alianzas rural-urbanas, y su vision estrategico que le permite ir mas alla que una lucha corporativista por la tierra y para levantar reinvidicaciones populares nacionales es fundamental para entender su consistente capacidad de mobilizacion popular y su estatus como actor vibrante contra-hegemonico en la politica nacional de Brasil. Palabras-clave: Reforma agraria, Movimientos sociales, MST, Neoliberalismo, Proyecto popular “Marching As To War”: A letter from Brazil to South Africa about Landlessness, Agrarian Reform and Social Movement Struggles against Neoliberalism
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