Brazilian Movement Research Articles

SOMOS POLITICAL MOVEMENT: FROM THE EMERGENCE TO THE FRACTIONATION OF THE LGBTQIA+ STRUGGLE

This study aims to understand the emergence and consolidation of the LGBTQIA+ political movement in Brazil, focusing on the 1970s and 1980s. The study was guided by the question of how and why the LGBTQIA+ political movement originated in Brazil. The investigation followed a bibliographical and documentary research, anchored in the materialist-dialectical method. The theoretical support was provided by the works of Cruz (2018), Green (2018), Mott (2018), Quinallha (2022), Trevisan (2018) among other authors dedicated to the theoretical unveiling of the problem. The historical moment that gave rise to the movement, the importance of the mass communication process through the press, the internal political-ideological struggles for the conception of the LGBTQIA+ social and political movement and the reconfiguration of the homosexual movement in Brazil in the 1990s are highlighted. In the conclusion phase, the period is identified as fundamental for the organization of the initial struggles against homophobia and for the affirmation of the movement as instruments of collective struggles for rights.

Social Movements and Policy Entrenchment

A vast scholarship shows that social movements can play pivotal roles in bringing about policies that benefit marginalized groups. However, the role of social movements in entrenching those policies—ensuring they take root—remains insufficiently studied. We set a research agenda for the study of how social movements shape policy entrenchment by calling attention to three commonly used strategies—occupying state bureaucracies, engaging in pressure and persuasion tactics, and building alliances with political parties—and analyzing the relationships among them. We illustrate these strategies through short case studies of social movements that achieved significant change benefitting marginalized groups in Latin America: the health movement in Brazil, the unemployed workers’ movements in Argentina, and peasant and indigenous movements in Bolivia.

Black Feminist Activism in Times of Digital Technology Immersion and Surveillance Capitalism

This article delves into the possibilities and challenges of digital media for the Black feminist movement in Brazil in an era of data colonialism and the rise of the far right. Barros asks: how does communicating through social media and the web alter how we relate to each other, the way we organize and perform political acts, and defend our rights, including the right to communicate and to inform? In response, Barros shares a vision and explores the conditions of possibility for a diverse and nonextractive digital sphere to emerge.

Correction to: Autism Activism Movement in Brazil: Contingency Analysis and the Pacto pela Neurodiversidade (Pledge for Neurodiversity)

Correction to: Autism Activism Movement in Brazil: Contingency Analysis and the Pacto pela Neurodiversidade (Pledge for Neurodiversity)

CONJUNCTURES OF DEMOCRACY EROSION

The paper aims to examine and understand the recent developments in Brazilian democracy in a sociological perspective. It offers an analysis of the conjunctural preconditions for the recent rise of authoritarian populism, presenting ways in which Brazil can be viewed as paradigm of democratic erosion and/or resilience. The article describes the foundational premises that made the development of contemporary democracies possible, and it proceeds from this description to explain how features common to authoritarian populist movements in Brazil and elsewhere are detrimental to these premises. It is argued that democracies are likely to thrive when welfare provisions and access to human rights are open to increasing sectors of the population, generating an inclusionary citizenship effect. The political polarization regarding the Brazilian welfare system and the discourse against international human rights, culminated in the weakening of the Brazilian welfare net and setbacks in the recognition of human rights by courts. These processes preceded, and were aggravated by, the rise of authoritarian populism in Brazil, generating an exclusionary view of citizenship that tended to intensify social conflict, with increasing militarization at both governmental and social levels. Arguably, the absence of warfare or an imminent warfare threat in the most recent democratic transition in Brazil reduced the capacity of welfare and constitutional human rights provisions to limit the influence of the military on democracy. While the efforts to build up the welfare system and protect human rights are still ongoing, the militarization element remains latent, posing a constant threat to democratic consolidation in Brazil.

Бразильский интегрализм: праворадикальная утопия в эпоху фашизма

The 20s-30s of the 20th century have gone down in history as "the time of fascism", which is quite true for European countries. A unique phenomenon for the countries of the "South" was the emergence of a mass fascist movement in Brazil - Integralism, which proposed a new model of state-hood and economic system based on nationalism, authoritari-anism, and corporatism common to all fascist movements. Meanwhile, this movement had a number of striking differ-ences from its European counterparts: multiculturalism, non-ethnic and non-racial nationalism, and anti-imperialism. Inte-gralism was Brazil's first truly mass nationwide political movement in its history, whose main difference was the regionalization of politics and the disunity of the elites of the different provinces of the country, thus presenting a model of integration and nationwide modernization of the country. This article analyzes the ideological, political and programmatic foundations of Integralism, its political aspirations and practices.

Why the Brazilian Jewish Left Is Not Anti-Zionist

Abstract This paper explores the praxis of the Zionist Left in Brazil, particularly during the 2010s. It argues that the Zionist Left, which claims to be a progressive grouping that stands in solidarity with the oppressed people in Palestine and in Brazil, functions in fact as a colonial counterrevolutionary actor against radical-left emancipatory politics. Indeed, the Zionist Left functions as a gatekeeper, blocking sectors of the Jewish community and the Brazilian Left from joining the growing anti-Zionist decolonial movement in Brazil. This paper aims to show how various Zionist Left groups have historically worked with the Zionist elite and the Brazilian state to undermine anti-Zionist communist Jewish alternatives by resorting to fraudulent discourse and even force in order to build support for the Zionist settler-colonial project in Palestine. This paper utilises a Marxist, anti-Zionist and anti-colonial framework in order to provide a counter-hegemonic critique for an emancipatory praxis that rejects colonialism.

Development Paths in a Settler Society: The Challenges of the Communist Movement in Brazil

This article addresses the challenges faced by the Communist movement in Brazil by revisiting the contradictions inherited from a colonial mode of accumulation. This was originally a class system based on slavery and composed of the metropolitan colonizer, the settler, and the colonized class. After independence in 1822, which entailed a settler rebellion against the metropolitan colonizer and the continuing exploitation of the colonized, the settlers reproduced the colonial mode of accumulation internally and oversaw the transition to a capitalist mode of production. An interclass, bourgeois–labor alliance occurred in the mid-twentieth century but was limited to the ranks of the settlers and underpinned by the myth of “racial democracy.” It included a degree of confrontation with imperialism coupled with industrial development but reproduced the colonial mode of accumulation internally. This article sheds light on the contradictions that followed, including the military regime installed in 1964 and the neo-colonial transition in the 1990s, under finance capital. In light of the bourgeoisie’s shifting alliances at the expense of the sovereign aspirations of the working people, an interclass alliance has become impossible. Only a truly popular political project is capable of liberating the nation and that is the only one the Communists should espouse.

Liberating Minds: The Intellectual Legacy of Angela Davis and Its Images in Film

We propose thinking of Angela Davis's intellectual legacy from a decolonial perspective. We point out that just as the fight for civil rights and the end of racial segregation in the United States helped to consolidate the Black movement in Brazil, the circulation of anti-colonial ideas during the struggles for the decolonization of African countries in the 1950s and 60s was crucial to the circulation of abolitionist ideas and anti-racist movements in the United States and abroad. We will analyze interchanges capable of pointing out "the recognition of multiple and heterogeneous colonial differences, as well as the multiple and heterogeneous reactions of populations and subjects subordinated to the coloniality of power" (Bernardino-Costa & Grosfoguel, 2016, p. 21). Our contribution seeks to analyze Davis as a public and militant intellectual through her images in film. Beyond considering Angela Davis's image in cinema as representation, we also analyze how her intellectual and political activities were involved with the flourishing of a new Black cinema in the United States. This paper analyzes films such as Child of Resistance (1973), Free Angela and All Political Prisoners (2015), and 13th (2016).

Why don’t people care about women? Women’s sport on the decision-making agenda in Brazil based on stakeholder’s perspective

ABSTRACT This study aimed at assessing why women’s sport is not included in the Brazilian decision-making agenda, in addition to show some alternatives to overcome this condition. Six female sport stakeholders were interviewed. The interviews were carried out in 2022, transcribed and analysed by using Bardin’s Content Analysis (2011). It was concluded that women’s sport does not enter the decision-making agenda due to the fact that it is not considered a political problem and because there are no women’s political movements in Brazil. As alternatives, it is essential to have representativeness of women in sport, especially in leadership positions, visibility on the topic, and to create policies, plans and projects aimed at women’s sport.

Broadening the Climate Movement: The Marcha das Margaridas’ Agenda for the Climate (and Other) Crises

AbstractClimate movements led by students and the youth worldwide (and in particular, those in richer economies) have been recognized as having a formidable voice and making important contributions towards a more radical societal transformation to face the climate crisis. However, little is said about the contribution of popular sectors, who have been mobilizing for decades and demanding broader structural transformations—with proposals that tackle environmental issues more broadly and the climate crisis in particular—but who are not directly involved in climate politics arenas, such as the United Nations Climate Change conferences. Usually portrayed as vulnerable, as those most affected by climate events, as victims and receivers of adaptation strategies, or, as resilient, rarely do popular sectors appear as agents of transformation. Critical scholars have advocated for understanding the climate crisis as part of multiple crises, including the biodiversity crisis, a crisis of care, and a crisis of democracy. Situating our article within this scholarship, we argue that the scholarly and societal debate on climate change will further benefit from broadening the scope of which social subjects are considered as part of the climate movement. Based on our research with rural popular feminist movements in Brazil, and in particular, the coalition Marcha das Margaridas, we address the following questions: how are their diagnostics of, and proposals to, overcome the climate crisis embedded in their broader project of transformation? Additionally, how does their political identity within class, gender, and rural categories of inequality inform their positions?

Workers and generals: military-controlled transitions and labor movements in Brazil and Egypt

ABSTRACT Under which conditions can combative labor in the Global South negotiate state and society relations and constrain the encroachment of their respective militaries on politics? This article argues that the domestic and international legitimacy these militaries enjoy during the transition away from authoritarianism is a key factor shaping labor movements’ organizational and mobilizational capacity, labor alliances with other social classes, and labor’s capacity to negotiate democratic citizenship. The argument is investigated by examining Egypt and Brazil, where labor strikes delegitimized authoritarian capitalism and inspired the rise of independent and anti-corporatist unions and federations. In Brazil, the military lost its legitimacy domestically and internationally, providing opportunities for labor’s democratizing role. Conversely, the Egyptian military held power locally and internationally, thwarting prospects for independent unions to maintain their autonomy from the military and to forge alliances. The research combines historical and archival research with qualitative methods, including interviewing and fieldwork in Egypt and Brazil.

Affirmative actions in education: paths of black movements in Brazil and Colombia

Affirmative actions in education: paths of black movements in Brazil and Colombia

생태시민성 개념 정립을 위한 브라질 전환마을운동과 생태교육학의 공유 가치 분석

The accelerating ecological crisis affecting all human beings around the world has made existing social problems such as inequality, marginalization and violence more visible, and there is now a shared understanding that ecological and social crises are fundamentally one problem that requires a unified effort. This study aims to establish the foundation to systematize the characteristics of ecocitizenship of the 21st century by examining the Transition Town Movement in Brazil as an example of ecological transition and analyzing the values shared by ecopedagogy, which seeks a new educational paradigm, and the Transition Town Movement. The fundamental purpose of this study is to explore what philosophical and practical orientations ecocitizenship have and how it differs from existing approaches to addressing inequality. To this end, this article analyzed the Transition Network website, the global umbrella organization for the Transition Town movement, the Transition Brazil website, and further related literature. It then focused on identifying the goals and main characteristics of ecopedagogy, focusing on the Pedagogia da Terra of Moacir Gadotti, a pioneer of ecological pedagogy in Brazil. The results of the study revealed a set of shared values at the intersection of the Transition Town Movement and ecopedagogy. Meanwhile, while the Transition Movement in the U.K. was centered in middle-class neighborhoods, in Brazil it started in the favelas of São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. And it was found that Transition Town Movement and ecopedagogy do not specifically target the poor, but presuppose their active participation as the same as other citizens, and consequently practice a more constructive approach to inequality.

Popular knowledge as popular power: struggle and strategy of the Emancipa popular education movement in Brazil

ABSTRACT This paper is a written dialogue among four activists from the Emancipa Popular Education Movement in Brazil, following the principles of Freirean pedagogy as a ‘circle of culture’. It delves into how popular knowledge can be experienced as popular power, narrating the history, struggles, and strategies employed by the Emancipa movement in their pursuit of democratizing Brazilian universities. The discussion is set within the context of Latin American structural inequalities and the issue of educational exclusion in Brazil. It emphasizes the vital role of contesting culture and knowledge as part of the movement’s fight against social injustices perpetuated by peripheral capitalism, including racist violence and gender oppression. The paper adopts emancipatory pedagogy as the method to empower and mobilize grassroots efforts in this transformative endeavour.

Book Review: Jörg Nowak Mass Strikes and Social Movements in Brazil and India: Popular Mobilisation in the Long Depression

Book Review: Jörg Nowak <i>Mass Strikes and Social Movements in Brazil and India: Popular Mobilisation in the Long Depression</i>

Participation On and Beyond the Boundaries: Brazilian Youth Activism in Radical Right Movements

Abstract Drawing on the analysis of biographical interviews with Brazilian activists, this article explores youth activism in radical right movements as a challenge to and indicator of 21st-century democratic transformation through the lens of youth participation studies. In recognition of the symbolic boundaries that institutionalized discourses of democratic youth participation produce, participation in radical right movements is analysed as a case of ‘liminal participation’. The article begins with a brief overview of the literature on youth participation in radical right movements in Brazil and Europe, with a focus on how the concept of ‘liminal participation’ can be used to analyse it. We then reconstruct four biographies and discuss how liminality emerges as a strategy and a negotiation status, related to processes of youth politicization. Finally, the findings are related to a broader reflection on democracy and participation in a society of risks in which conflict and antagonism play a central role.

Rights-Based Climate Litigation in Brazil: An Assessment of Constitutional Cases Before the Brazilian Supreme Court

Abstract This article presents a systematic analysis of climate litigation in the Brazilian Supreme Court. It argues that climate litigation in Brazil is centred on the protection of human rights and the court is ready (and eager) to draw a closer connection between climate and human rights. The climate litigation movement in Brazil follows in the wake of more than 40 years of a rich environmental legal framework and jurisprudence. This long trajectory includes adopting a chapter in the 1988 Brazilian Constitution dedicated to the right to an ecologically balanced environment. The Constitution determines this is a fundamental human right, encompassing the present and future generations. Building on this context, recent climate litigation cases question how climate stability fits within this constitutional framework. As the country’s constitutional tribunal, the Supreme Court recently received important climate cases addressing Brazil’s climate policy implementation. This article proceeds in three parts. First, the article contextualizes the climate litigation movement in Brazil’s broader environmental legal framework. Second, the article describes the Supreme Court climate docket of concentrated control cases. It focuses on the human right to an ecologically balanced environment and its connections with other constitutionally protected human rights. Third, the article examines the cases’ judicial reasoning, considering how the Supreme Court addressed climate change in the decisions (interlocutory or on the merits) available thus far. The ultimate goal of this article is to deepen the understanding of how the Supreme Court approaches climate as a human right through the methodical examination of the court’s pronouncements.

To tweet, or not to tweet, that is the question: the Ayrton Senna Institute and education policy movement in Brazil

ABSTRACT In a context of global educational policy, several actors are emerging in the negotiations around educational policies that promote the policies that they consider appropriate. In this way, many education systems follow globally structured educational agendas, albeit in different ways. These agendas can be seen as comprising three key policy dimensions: education management, educational provision, and curriculum. Taking this into consideration we examine the role of the Ayrton Senna Institute (ASI) in the transnational policy-making landscape in Brazil. We examine whose knowledge, politics, or worldview ASI is advancing in Brazil. This paper is based both on a content analysis of the retrieved tweets from ASI’s official Twitter account from May 2013 to December 2020 as well as previous research from the authors on ASI’s trajectory and its role in the diffusion and mobility of policies in Brazil. The paper argues that the ASI is facilitating policy movement, particularly the ‘economics of education’ movement and ‘techno-solutionist’ strand currently promoted by international organisations. It also shows that ASI uses research for policy and reference societies as a discursive strategic tool to make the arguments more persuasive for their audience.

Identity, difference, and recognition: a look at the indigenous women's movements in Brazil and the agenda for the fight against gender-based violence

Resumo A partir de aportes teóricos sobre identidade, diferença, reconhecimento e movimentos sociais, o presente artigo objetiva investigar como estão articulados os movimentos de mulheres indígenas no Brasil, bem como as formas que são debatidas a questão do enfrentamento da violência de gênero no seio desses movimentos. Inicialmente, a pesquisa aponta a dificuldade no campo do reconhecimento identitário das indígenas, após enfatiza a mudança paradigmática representada Constituição Federal de 1988 no campo do reconhecimento social e jurídico e, por fim, ressalta a importância de os movimentos de mulheres indígenas empunharem a pauta do reconhecimento identitário e da violência de gênero, denunciando e buscando alternativas contra as violências sofridas. A pesquisa valeu-se da técnica bibliográfica, a partir modo de raciocínio dedutivo e dos métodos de abordagem hermenêutico e crítico-dialético.