Social Movements In Brazil Research Articles

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>

&lt;i&gt;Mulheres pela Primatologia&lt;/i&gt;: a Brazilian social movement promoting women in science and primate conservation

&#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; Mulheres pela Primatologia (Women for Primatology) is a Brazilian social movement in support of women in science and the conservation of non-human primates. Activities occur through collaborative and interdisciplinary communication of women scientists of different ages, regions and origins. The objectives of the movement are to discuss gender equity, encourage representation in science, emphasize the importance of women’s role in primatology, and inspire other women to enter into scientific careers. The movement’s activities began in June 2021 with the creation of an Instagram profile that published information about women in science, primates, the representation of women, the history of women in primatology, interviews with distinguished primatologists, and events, among others. The activities presented here were developed between June 2021 and August 2022. As of August 2022, the profile @mulherespelaprimatologia had 2,349 followers, 126 publications and 2,044 comments, reaching 8,645 accounts, with 5,479 interactions recorded. Mulheres pela Primatologia is linked to the Jane Goodall Institute’s Roots &amp; Shoots’ international network. In March 2022, the Youtube channel was created to broadcast three online events, with both young and established primatologists. The Guia Primatólogas do Brasil (Guide to Brazilian Women Primatologists) was created to democratize access to contact with women primatologists working in Brazil as advisors in graduate programs. The first edition of the guide featured 25 primatologists whose areas of expertise are behavior, ecology, conservation, physiology, ethnozoology, genetics, and environmental education. The performance and actions of Mulheres pela Primatologia have resulted in diverse products that range from scientific dissemination to support and encouragement for young primatologists, reinforcing women’s empowerment in primatology.&#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D;

Comparative study on digital inclusion among socially vulnerable activists and leaderships of organized social movements in Brazil

This article analyses the challenges experienced by activists with social vulnerabilities who continued their activism online or face-to-face during the pandemic, focusing especially on Black and Indigenous women. I have also studied the types of resistance found in the period between March 2020 and July 2021. On the other hand, I will analyse leaders of organized social movements – or those in the process of formalization – to understand how these leaders organized themselves in the digital world. This qualitative and quantitative research was carried out through online questionnaires and online focus groups composed by activists with social vulnerabilities and leaders of organized social movements in different parts of Brazil. Due to a long period of turmoil, social division, self-isolation and perpetual stress have become the daily norm in our country. As we faced various political conflicts and social trials, the strength of our relationships and associations allowed us to endure. This research will also follow the digital difficulties in Brazil, finding levels of partial and total digital exclusion among the analysed groups. Despite the difficulties of navigating the digital world, activists and leaders of Brazilian social movements sought alternatives through resistance and solidarity, including sharing access to the internet via cell phones. This reflection is based on the research New Forms of Representation While Facing Digital Transformation finished in December 2021 for the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung Foundation.

On the Matter of Black Lives across the Americas: Historical, Transnational, and Educational Perspectives on Antiracist Struggles in Brazil and the United States

This article examines the relationship between Black social movements in Brazil and the United States through over a century of formations of struggle. Drawing from a review of Black periodicals in three time periods ranging from twentieth-century print press to contemporary digital social media, this article affirms the significance of the transnational Black struggle; demonstrates the ways in which knowledge and language about Black struggle has been circulated, exchanged, and produced within a dynamic and shifting relationship; and analyzes ways that US and Brazilian Black movements have served as educators for one another and their own societies. We argue that understanding the contemporary moment of antiracist struggles requires examining the longer and nuanced relationship between US and Brazilian Black activism. This deepening, critical relationship fortified the Black movement as educator of society and reframes how we understand the global Movement for Black Lives as a historical and transnational phenomenon.

Social Movements in Brazil: From the 1970’s to the Present Day the Influence of Social Movements and their Relationship with Democracy and Party Organizations in the Last Fifty Years

This article discusses the relationship between social movements and democracy in the last fifty years in Brazil. This research aims to analyze the influence of demonstrations and street protests, which took place between 1970 and 2020, on the Brazilian democratic process and party institutions. The analysis starts from the social struggles against the dictatorship and Catholic Church through the CEBs (Base Ecclesiastical Communities) at the end of the 1970s. The struggles for redemocratization and for popular participation in the 1980s are also analyzed. The networked social movements and the new social movements, according to Alain Touraine, are also objects of this research. It is observed that social movements influence not only institutions and the democratic process but also individual and collective identities that share their ideologies, which expressively altered the political game and institutions’ functioning.

Science as a tool for struggle?

In this paper, starting from thoughts on the relationship of geography and social movements in Brazil, I would like to present approaches to action research in Latin America and discuss if and how it can be possible methodologically to not only study social movements, but to support them through research. To this end, I will reflect on some own research experiences at the interface of science-social movement and university-urban periphery, which I gathered in Rio de Janeiro in the context of a territorially contested continent Latin America. Based on this I then outline contours of a geography in (social) movement(s).

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

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

Bangladesh: An Analysis of BRAC’s Shift from Freire’s Critical «Conscientization» to a Neoliberal Self-Optimization Approach of Development

This article provides a critical analysis of a Bangladeshi development-NGO BRAC’s shift from Paulo Freire’s «conscientizing» education to a neoliberal self-optimization approach of development. Focusing on BRAC’s founder Fazle Hasan Abed’s intentionality and BRAC’s adult literacy programs, I examine why BRAC abandoned Freire’s conscientizing education rooted in Catholic-Marxist social movements in Brazil, and embraced a market-driven development strategy based on market capitalism. In the analysis I place BRAC at the intersection of the international context of the early 1980s, examine BRAC’s relationship with the Bangladeshi regimes, and investigate the ramifications for BRAC and the people to whom this institution offered programs. My findings suggest that, although Freirean philosophy was foundational to BRAC’s organizing principles and the design of its adult education curriculum (Smillie, 2009; BRAC, 1977), BRAC deserted Freirean philosophy to submit to the local power structure and hegemony of the international aid industry. At the dawn of neoliberalism (1980–1995), BRAC adopted microfinance, microfinance literacy and profit-driven development initiatives to capitalize on the struggle of the poor in favour of its organizational growth and sustainability. In the process of evolving into the largest and most business-like NGO in the world (Economist, 2010), BRAC modified and depoliticized Freire’s radical conscientization in its curriculum and development strategy to align itself with the local power structure, the Bangladesh state, and international donors.

Lectio praecursoria

In this lectio praecursoria, which I presented as part of my doctoral defense at the University of Eastern Finland on 5 November 2021, I delve deep into the Brazilian anti-mining movement to understand the context in which activism take place, their main strategies and course of actions, and their ability to influence the overall mining debate in Brazil in the 2010s. It sheds light on the key challenges faced by groups fighting for more environmental and social justice in mining conflictual situations. More specific, the research covers the 2013–2017 time frame, when discussions on the mining framework and a severe tailings dam failure happened. These two cases are analyzed and their effects on anti-mining activism are explored through a twofold focus on social movements and environmental justice studies. The study contributes to scientific discussions on mining and society by seeking conceptual bridges across political-ecologically oriented studies on social movements against mineral extraction. It also expands, significantly, analyses of social movements in Brazil by contributing to the international comparative literature on the social and environmental impacts of mining, Brazilian and Latin American studies, studies on mining history, sociology of mining, and mining policy.

Mass Strikes and Social Movements in Brazil and India: Popular Mobilisation in the Long Depression

This review of Jörg Nowak’s Mass Strikes and Social Movements in Brazil and India highlights the book’s ambition and hopefulness. It ambitiously explores an area of labor- and social-movement theory in which powerful minds have offered insights but important leaps forward are necessary to make sense of the current moment. The book is additionally ambitious because it tackles recent phenomena in two disparate, enormously complex, and influential countries: Brazil and India. The book is hopeful in its identification of patterns and openings, seen through the lens of mass strikes in these countries, by which working classes might lead a transition from the current “long depression” into a more socially just and equitable socialist future.

Women and leisure on the agendas of Brazilian social movements

ABSTRACT This paper results from an investigation aiming to map possible relations between women and leisure on the agendas defending Brazilian women's rights inside Brazilian social movements. Using Deleuze and Guattari's terms, we establish connections between literature review, document analysis, and narratives provided by Brazilian social movements’ leaders, which pointed to macro and micropolitical aspects that generate difficulties and possibilities for women's leisure to be part of the Brazilian social movements’ agendas. Some of those difficulties are the place and the role of women in society, the breadth of women's identity markers, women's working hours, public spaces not equally perceived between men and women, subjectivity surrounding the definition of leisure, and commercialization of leisure, interfering in the possibilities of access and the non-recognition of leisure as a right. The findings also provide lines of escape as directions about the future of feminist leisure.

The millionaire friend-to-friend fundraising

The case portrays a real dilemma experienced by Alexandre, founder of the fourth largest Brazilian social mobilisation movement for health called VemPraGuerra He joined efforts with his brother and a friend (both resident doctors) to structure a project during the first half of 2020. Amid the COVID-19 medical supplies shortage, they were able to gather R$6 million (about US$1.2 million at that time). This funding was summoned to assist Hospital das Clinicas de Sao Paulo, the largest Brazilian health complex. The case study contributes to the currently scarce body of knowledge devoted to teaching stakeholder theory. It is an applied example of social entrepreneurship, the promotion of social change, and the contemporaneity of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Activism, justice and the centrality of care: Brazilian’s ‘mother’s against police violence’ movements

ABSTRACT The article investigates the Brazilian social movement of mothers whose children were killed by State’s security agents between 2003 and 2017. Its purpose is to understand how these women define their claims for justice, as they struggle to see those responsible for the assassination of their children properly judged. Our hypothesis is that their activism politicizes motherhood and makes it a public matter. To investigate that, we conducted in-depth interviews with twelve activists on the mothers’ movements against police violence. The interviews were conducted between June and August of 2017, in two metropolitan areas in the Southeast of Brazil, the city of Rio de Janeiro (RJ) and Santos (SP). They confirmed the politicization of motherhood, redefining care as resistance and a matter of justice.

Para além do eurocentrismo: reconstruindo a teoria das greves

Resenha: NOWAK, Jörg. Mass Strikes and Social Movements in Brazil and India: Popular Mobilisation in the Long Depression. New York: Springer, 2019.

Recruitment and disengagement: two sides of the same coin or different phenomena?

We investigate the disengagement of four former activists of the Landless Rural Workers Movement (Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra—MST) in Brazil. The MST is the largest Brazilian social movement and has mobilized activists for over 30 years. The trajectories of recruitment, participation and disengagement of its activists serve as emblematic cases for the study of disengagement in social movements in general. This research contributes to the understanding of the activists’ disengagement from a social movement, a phenomenon that has been little studied. It sheds new light on the study of disengagement in two ways. First, some characteristics of the MST, in particular that many activists live in tight-knit communities, children participation and the activists’ long-lasting participation, open up new possibilities for the analysis of factors that influence disengagement pointed out in previous studies. In addition, the analysis of former activists’ whole trajectories of recruitment-participation-disengagement allows us show that considering disengagement as the analogous process as recruitment cannot explain all of its aspects. Given that the reasons that make someone leave a movement are, not always, the same that made someone join it. A multiple-case study design was used. The semi-structured interviews encompassing the engagement trajectories of the former activists served very well to the purpose of evidencing the multi-level character of the disengagement decision-making. Our analysis reveals how the social context, the movement and the activists’ personal characteristics in conjunction play a pivotal role.

The subversive practice of counting bodies: Documenting violence and conflict in rural Brazil

AbstractThis paper appraises Pastoral Land Commission's (CPT) practice of documenting the violence and conflict that has taken place in the Brazilian countryside since 1975. Based on 10 interviews with CPT National members and other primary sources, the paper conceptually explores the organisations' subversive practice of compiling and publishing data on this type of violence, hence producing emancipatory knowledge that supports progressive agrarian change. Although the state benefits from having such knowledge obscured, CPT's efforts shine a light on conflicts in the countryside and frame them as such. Documenting as a technology of resistance has been crucial for Brazilian social movements and scholar‐activists and has significant potential for reproduction elsewhere.

HIV prevention among gay and other men who have sex with men: public policy and social movements in Brazil, 1983-2019

This article revisits the history of HIV prevention for gay and other men who have sex with men in relation to public health policy and the role of LGBT and AIDS-related social movements in Brazil. An interpretive study was undertaken informed by philosophical and phenomenological hermeneutics. It included interviews with policymakers, researchers and activists involved in HIV and AIDS, especially HIV prevention among gay and other men who have sex with men. Prevention initiatives were analysed with a focus on the social and programmatic aspects of vulnerability to HIV, and advances and setbacks in the Brazilian response to the epidemic. The recent crisis in HIV prevention triggered by a growing conservatism in Brazilian politics and the current government’s LGBT-phobia pose barriers that compromise issues of profound importance with regards to policy on HIV and AIDS: namely, engagement with human rights and social participation.

Movimentos Sociais e Poder Judiciário: A Judicialização das Lutas do Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra

A garantia de direitos políticos e sociais pela Constituição Federal de 1988 alterou substancialmente as estratégias políticas dos movimentos sociais no Brasil que passaram a articular suas demandas predominantemente através das instituições jurídicas. Diante desse contexto de judicialização das lutas sociais, o presente trabalho analisa, mediante pesquisa bibliográfica, a atuação do Poder Judiciário nos processos do Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra. As conclusões apontam que a desigualdade material existente na sociedade se reproduz na esfera judicial, de modo que a interpretação judicial tende ideologicamente a descumprir os mandamentos constitucionais de acesso à justiça e de efetivação da função social da propriedade, constituindo um processo camuflado de criminalização dos movimentos sociais.

ENGAGEMENT IN SOCIAL MOVEMENTS AND THE FIGHT FOR JUSTICE: A STUDY ON THE NARRATIVES OF BLACK MOTHERS

ABSTRACT This article discusses the narrative practices of a Brazilian social movement whose members are the mothers and relatives of young people victimized by police raids into Rio de Janeiro’s favelas. By analysing the narratives produced by activists, we explore how grief is converted into political fight. As we look into how mothers intertwine their individual pain with political activism, we examine (i) how emotions and suffering are organized in their narratives; and (ii) what discursive strategies are used in the process. Data was generated during public demonstrations, and the analysis suggests that it is by turning the pain of a losing a child into political insurgence that mothers narratively organize their emotions. As stories get told, events surrounding the murders are recontextualized and experiences are collectivized. Mothers’ stories become narratives of resistance, which oppose institutional racism, but also narratives of re-existence (SOUZA, 2009), which recast the deaths of their children as an effect of a necropolitical logic of state organization.

Connecting Public Policies for Family Farmers and Women’s Empowerment: The Case of the Brazilian Semi-Arid

The role played by women in worldwide food production and food security has reinvigorated debates about the recognition of women’s rights in the rural sector regarding better working conditions and the reduction of gender inequalities. In the 1980s, the social movement in Brazil restructured the politics in the agrarian sector by integrating farmers’ rights and women’s demands. Against this background, the objective of this study is to analyze, through the actors’ perspectives, whether and how the combination of public policies for family farmers affected the socio-economic and political empowerment of women. Our case study covers family farmers from traditional communities located in the Brazilian semi-arid. The results show that women achieved economic stability by participating in public food procurement programmes. In addition, access to cisterns released women from the daily work of collecting water. Women became more involved with political issues, increasing participation in institutions such as NGOs, associations and cooperatives. Among the negative aspects, the study found that the sexual division of labor increased within the household context, and, despite being fundamental for ensuring household food security, women still struggle to have access to the means of production.