Abstract
Through our case study of a Brazilian not-for-profit focused on sustainability initiatives, we expand knowledge about communicative labor in different Brazilian organizational environments, especia...
Highlights
Brazilian nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) with missions centered on the sustainable preservation of land, water, forests, and other environmental factors have garnered much attention because of rapid deforestation in the Amazon, global concerns about the ozone layer, water and energy issues, and effects on indigenous ways of life and knowledge as well as the Brazilian economy (Correia, 2016)
We present the case of a Brazilian nonprofit NGO called “Meio Ambiente Equilibrado” (MAE), meaning “Balanced Environment”, for which the first author secured permission to identify
Because context is important in case studies not as background but more so as a driving force for communicative labor, we briefly describe the NGO MAE in Brazil that focuses its efforts on sustainability, preservation, and continuity of social, economic, cultural, and environmental assets from various levels of current society
Summary
Brazilian nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) with missions centered on the sustainable preservation of land, water, forests, and other environmental factors have garnered much attention because of rapid deforestation in the Amazon, global concerns about the ozone layer, water and energy issues, and effects on indigenous ways of life and knowledge as well as the Brazilian economy (Correia, 2016). Brazilian NGO and global professionals engaging in sustainability efforts, find that they must manage tensions in their political positions, social practices, and daily activities (Fátima do Carmo Guerra, dos Santos de Sousa Teodosio, & Mswaka, 2016; Mackin, 2016; see Mitra & Buzzanell, 2017). These tensions are symbolic as they enact work that they perceive to be meaningful but frustrating, and material as they seek impact through short-term deliverables but struggle with long-term solutions within complex interdependent human and material systems (Fátima do Carmo Guerra et al, 2016; Mitra & Buzzanell, 2017). Communicative labor and associated discourses are moral and political insofar as the calling to such work is perceived and enacted as greater than oneself and the processes through which work is accomplished are strategic, political, and material as well as discursive (i.e., “how nonprofits mobilize discourses, and how these discourses themselves carry their own sets of politics and forms of power,” Dempsey, 2012, p. 149; see Mitra & Buzzanell, 2017)
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