A-Infos (en) Brazil, OSL: Embat - interview with the OSL, explaining our proposal for organization and the construction of libertarian socialism (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

"It is clear that there is no possibility of betting on spontaneity" 
---- Embat - Libertarian Organization of Catalonia - conducted an 
interview with the OSL, in which we were able to better explain our 
proposal for organization and the construction of libertarian socialism. 
We are now publishing the translation into Portuguese of the second part 
of the interview, in which we bring elements of the current situation, 
history and the struggles in Brazil. We will also soon publish the third 
and final part. The first part can be read here.
PART 2: BRAZILIAN CONTEXT, HISTORY AND STRUGGLES
Between the protests of 2013 and the first year of the PT's return to 
government, after the coup and Bolsonaro, at the same time that the CAB 
grew until the split, how do you evaluate these last 10 years? What has 
changed in Brazilian politics and society?

The last 10 years have resulted in a major change in terms of the 
political and social situation in Brazil. In general terms, there have 
been, on the one hand, some attempts to move towards a more radical 
left, to the left of the Workers' Party (PT), and also the loss of 
support and growing moderation of the PT and petismo (a political and 
social force linked to the PT). On the other hand, there has been a 
considerable radicalization of the right, forming a new extreme right - 
Bolsonarismo (a political and social force linked to Jair Bolsonaro).

This process began with the deterioration of the years of the PT 
government (2003-2013), characterized by class conciliation, when it 
became economically and socially impossible to continue what was called 
the "win-win game" (maintaining the profits of those at the top and 
providing some improvements for those at the bottom). This exhaustion 
has its roots in the international economy, when the effects of the 2008 
crisis spread globally and the commodities boom in Brazil began to 
weaken. And also in the way the PT government dealt with these effects: 
economic policies, political articulations, the press, etc.

The fact is that the period between 2013 and 2016 was marked by great 
popular dissatisfaction and, at the same time, by important popular 
mobilizations. There was a record number of strikes, a greater 
organization of the youth, as well as street protests, occupations, etc. 
In many cases, this meant a more radicalized rise of struggles, which 
were to the left of the PT and petismo, and managed to maintain a 
certain independence in relation to them.

The most important of these mobilizations was in June 2013, when the 
Movimento Passe Livre (MPL) in São Paulo, with an autonomist/libertarian 
ideological orientation, held protests against the increase in bus, 
subway and train fares. The movement was fueled by a growing context of 
struggles over transportation, which had been promoted in other 
locations (notably in the cities of Porto Alegre, Goiânia, Natal and Rio 
de Janeiro). It became widespread and nationalized; it gained great 
popular appeal and, in different circumstances, assumed a certain 
radical nature.

In different regions, these demonstrations began to be strongly 
contested by often opposing political forces. It is true that there was 
a presence of various left-wing forces, both the more moderate and the 
more radical. But there was also a presence of the right, which at that 
time began to frequent the streets (something that had been rare until 
then) and which progressively became more radical. A certain spirit of 
anti-politics was growing, and also contested by the forces at play on 
the left and the right.

This struggle ended victoriously and opened the doors to a new situation 
in the country. On the one hand, the years 2014 and 2016, as we have 
said, saw significant struggles, such as the protests against the World 
Cup (2014), the occupations of high schools and universities 
(2015-2016), and countless strikes and mobilizations. But, on the other 
hand, this was a fundamental period of stimulus for the right: the coup 
against President Dilma Rousseff advanced and became a reality; 
Operation Lava Jato, through a process of lawfare , stimulated this 
anti-political sentiment in an anti-PT and anti-left sense; a more open 
and aggressively neoliberal national policy was promoted by the Michel 
Temer government.

In the context of this confrontation, the right wing largely moved 
towards the extreme right, in a process of fascist radicalization that 
culminated in the election of Bolsonaro in 2018; the left wing saw its 
most radicalized projects weakened and, hegemonically, responded by 
moving towards the center, (re)grouping around PT and proposing ways of 
dialoguing with the center and the center-right.

During the years of Bolsonaro's government (2019-2022), we went through 
the COVID-19 pandemic with a denialist government that refused to buy 
vaccines and ended up being responsible for a considerable part of the 
700,000 deaths we had in Brazil. Furthermore, in economic terms, this 
government made significant progress in liberalizing projects, which led 
to an increase in poverty and a worsening of workers' living conditions; 
in political terms, it encouraged the strengthening of the military's 
presence in politics and advanced authoritarian projects, flirting with 
coups and exceptional measures; in ideological and moral terms, with 
extensive help from evangelical churches (mainly neo-Pentecostal), it 
contributed to normalizing neo-fascist absurdities in Brazilian society.

Lula's narrow victory in 2022, the result of a broad front that united 
the left and the moderate right, did not change this situation much. At 
the moment, the Lula government is trying unsuccessfully to return to 
the conciliatory formulas of the early 2000s; it is constantly cornered 
by the extreme right and the traditional right ("centrão"), which is 
very strong in the national legislature. In social terms, the great 
dispute currently taking place is between Bolsonarism (extreme right) 
and PTism (center-left, increasingly centered). There is no prospect of 
significant changes in economic, political, or cultural terms.

What did you learn from all of this?

In the last 10 years, speaking more specifically about Brazilian 
anarchism, there have been moments of ebb and flow. We had some 
influence in these processes of struggle (depending on the region, 
greater or lesser), but we were nowhere near able to be decisive at the 
national level. And much less have a more significant impact on this 
Brazilian situation. We can point out some lessons we learned during 
this period.

First, it became clear that discontent and popular mobilization do not 
necessarily move to the left, much less in a revolutionary and 
libertarian direction. In other words, as history also teaches us, in 
processes of radicalization of struggle, all forces come into conflict, 
including the extreme right. Once again, it is clear that there is no 
possibility of betting on spontaneity. The masses will not take to the 
streets and automatically build left-wing, revolutionary, libertarian 
projects, even if they are encouraged to do so by collectives with these 
positions.

Second, the radical, revolutionary left (understanding anarchism as part 
of it) needs to have real conditions not only to stimulate popular 
mobilizations and revolts, but to give them a precise direction. These 
struggles need to be built on a daily basis, and the production of a 
libertarian political culture seems to be fundamental to this. When we 
talk about anarchism, what happened in Brazil also reinforces our 
understanding that, for this construction and this direction in a 
libertarian sense, and for the movements and mobilizations that 
constantly emerge to be able to point towards a socialist and 
libertarian project of transformation, there is no way to give up a 
political organization.

For us, this means a united and coherent anarchist party/organization, 
with the capacity to influence reality effectively and to concretely 
dispute the course of struggles, mobilizations and situations of this 
type. An anarchist political organization that is capable of lasting 
over time, recording and discussing the accumulated knowledge, and 
incorporating it into a coherent and influential political practice. We 
maintain that it is this organization that can provide the necessary 
responses, not only to situations of this type, but also advance towards 
structural transformations of society. It is the anarchist 
party/organization - to the extent that it has an influential presence 
in the most dynamic sectors of the oppressed classes, as well as an 
adequate program and strategic-tactical line - that is able to stimulate 
and contribute to the construction of a project of self-managed popular 
power.

Third, the risks of the Brazilian left remaining restricted to the 
confines of the Workers' Party (PT) have become clear. For decades, the 
PT has had broad hegemony on the left in our country, both in political 
and social terms. When we look at the historical trajectory of this 
party, we see a progressive movement towards bureaucratization, 
distancing itself from its bases and a shift towards the center. The PT 
emerged in 1980 with a left-wing position, mostly linked to classical 
social democracy, although it had the presence of more radical sectors 
and a considerable mass popular base (unions, social movements, etc.). 
What occurred throughout the 1980s and 1990s, and which became much more 
pronounced in the 2000s, was the split of the more left-wing sectors and 
a growing movement towards the center. This process involved not only 
distancing itself from its bases, but an active effort to undermine old 
and new initiatives to articulate and mobilize these bases, in favor of 
a bureaucratic and centralized project of power.

Fourth, the need to work on building a new radical left, to the left of 
PT, and, as part of it, to challenge its direction in a libertarian 
sense. 2013 revealed widespread dissatisfaction among the population 
with the situation in Brazil. Note that the response that was 
"anti-system", "against everything that is going on" (a phrase often 
used by Bolsonaro), was the far right, mobilizing the fascist notion of 
"revolution in order". In our assessment, there was (and still is) room 
for a radical left to challenge this widespread dissatisfaction. And it 
does not seem reasonable to us to combat the neo-fascist far right with 
moderation and class conciliation.

Fifth, we have seen progress in this process in the debate on issues of 
race, ethnicity, gender and sexuality, and we consider this to be very 
positive. However, we have also noticed that, alongside this process, 
there has been a huge growth in the influence of postmodernism and 
identity in Brazil, both on the right and on the left, something that we 
find deeply problematic.

On the left (and even in anarchism), this postmodern identity movement - 
which is heavily influenced by US and European liberalism - has promoted 
individualism, fragmentation and the dispersion of struggles (each 
person/sector fights only for "their" cause); it has harmed collective 
debates and disconnected the important issues mentioned (gender, 
sexuality, race, ethnicity, etc.) from a class basis and a class-based 
and revolutionary perspective of struggle. This has led to confusion 
about who are allies, potential allies, adversaries and enemies; to 
treating those who are different as enemies; and to dealing with 
difference in an authoritarian manner.

Let us be clear about our position on this fifth point. Nationality, 
gender-sexuality, race-ethnicity are extremely important issues. What we 
are criticizing is the postmodern and liberal influence in their 
treatment, which we believe must be combated by strengthening a 
socialist, libertarian, class-based, internationalist and revolutionary 
perspective. And more. Reality cannot be understood in a completely 
subjective way (like the notion that there is no material, objective 
reality, but only different perspectives, experiences and narratives). 
And identities cannot be separated from the material reality 
(structural, conjunctural, etc.) in which they are produced.

In Europe, the growth of evangelical churches in Brazil and their 
penetration into the working classes, leading them to deeply reactionary 
positions, is striking. How can a revolutionary organization confront 
this situation?

Recently, research has come out showing that 17 evangelical churches are 
being opened every day in Brazil; there are now more churches in the 
country than hospitals and schools combined. These churches have been 
occupying space in areas where the State only reaches with repression, 
and also in spaces that, decades ago, were occupied by the left and 
popular movements. Today, any political force that operates in the 
outskirts of large cities has to deal with evangelical churches, as is 
the case with our community activism.

The left-wing expressions of evangelicals - such as, for example, the 
theology of integral mission (which fulfills a role analogous to that 
which liberation theology fulfilled/fulfills among Catholics) - are very 
weakened. Morally conservative and economically liberal positions are 
increasingly predominant among this public.

In matters of morality and customs, evangelicals tend to be conservative 
or even reactionary, for example, by being completely opposed to the 
right to abortion. In matters of economics, given the so-called 
evangelical neo-Pentecostalism, linked to the so-called "prosperity 
theology" (the fastest-growing sector among evangelicals), there is a 
strong neoliberal indoctrination. This is because there are values that 
have been propagated by these churches that strengthen this worldview, 
such as, for example, the encouragement of enrichment in life and the 
defense of individual entrepreneurship as a path to salvation.

However, these positions are not completely hegemonic. There are still 
sectors that support social welfare policies and economic agendas more 
closely linked to social democracy; for example, they voted for Lula in 
the last elections. However, with the strengthening of the far right in 
Brazil, evangelical churches have been progressively moving to the right 
and have become, albeit without much homogeneity, a prominent pillar of 
support for Bolsonarism. The PT government believed that it would be 
possible to attract this sector by offering benefits and political 
support, but it has become increasingly clear that this is not a 
possible solution. Sooner or later, most of this sector will have to be 
severely confronted.

Obviously, among the bishops and pastors of the large evangelical 
churches, there are countless "merchants of faith" who take advantage of 
this growth to exploit the faithful, enrich themselves personally and 
expand their economic and political power. Now, this growth of 
evangelicals also draws attention to a role that churches have been 
fulfilling, especially in peripheral urban areas: responding to certain 
needs that contemporary capitalism has been producing, and which revolve 
around work, acceptance, sociability, overcoming daily difficulties, 
etc. For example, when these evangelicals explain why they go to church, 
they talk about issues such as: getting a job, accessing people who will 
listen to them, making friends, having leisure spaces (education, 
sports, etc.) for the family, building hope for a better tomorrow, 
strengthening networks of mutual support (listening, lending money, drug 
abuse, etc.), establishing rules in life (drinking, work, crime, etc.).

A social democrat could say that these are functions that should be 
performed by the State, and to the extent that the State only accesses 
these regions for repression, evangelical churches have occupied this 
space. But when observing Brazilian history and society, there is 
another possible answer. There have been different moments in our 
history when popular movements have responded to these needs, as in the 
case of revolutionary unionism at the beginning of the 20th century or 
the Base Ecclesial Communities (CEBs), linked to liberation theology, in 
the 1970s and 1980s. Regarding the latter case, it is interesting to 
note that the aforementioned bureaucratization of the PT caused the 
abandoned spaces in the outskirts to be occupied by evangelical churches 
and other institutions.

See how these same needs can have contradictory responses. Today, a 
worker who attends an evangelical church to alleviate his daily 
suffering and nurture hope for improvement will be encouraged to think 
that he can soon become rich like the believer next to him. At the 
beginning of the century, a worker who sought revolutionary union 
initiatives to do so would be encouraged to build this subjectivity 
around the possibility of a social revolution and socialism. This is 
true for all issues.

We are saying this because it seems essential to us to understand why 
these churches are growing and to find alternatives capable of 
responding to these needs, but with a profoundly different content. In 
other words, we need to have the capacity to build a class-based 
political culture, through popular movements, that rebuilds the social 
fabric in these peripheries through solidarity, and that gives this 
process a class-based and transformative content - this must be a 
central aspect of a popular power project. This issue will not be 
resolved simply by criticizing evangelical churches, because it is 
essential to respond to these needs of contemporary capitalism. This is 
one of the great challenges of our community project for the urban 
peripheries.

Could you give us a historical and contemporary overview of trade 
unionism in Brazil? Is the movement controlled by post-Stalinist and 
Trotskyist currents?

To understand the Brazilian trade union movement, it is important to go 
back to the origins of trade unionism in Brazil, which began in the 
early 20th century. At that time, anarchists played a leading role 
through revolutionary trade unionism, which guaranteed class 
independence and organizational autonomy to workers.

During the 1930s, during the Getúlio Vargas government, there was a 
process of tying unions to the State. In short, what happened was the 
following. On the one hand, after strong pressure, the government gave 
in to certain historical demands of the Brazilian working class 
regarding labor rights (among others: minimum wage, eight-hour workday, 
paid vacations, weekly rest). But it publicly stated that this was an 
initiative of the government itself. On the other hand, it implemented a 
union structure (union unity, compulsory union tax and investiture) that 
made unions state organizations that could be controlled by the State. 
In other words, the Vargas government severely limited union possibilities.

Other factors - such as the Communist Party's Stalinist international 
line, which promoted a reformist trade unionism based on class 
conciliation - contributed to the establishment of a consensus in the 
country that the union, in organizational terms, was a structure tied to 
the State and that it served only to deal with economic issues, through 
negotiations aimed at conciliation between capital and labor. This union 
structure, inherited from the 1930s, continues to largely guide the way 
in which unions are organized in Brazil today.

Currently, broadly speaking, it is possible to say that there are two 
major sectors in the trade union movement in the country. One, which 
defends the union as being tied to the State and whose function is to 
reconcile (often even defend) the demands of employers and workers. And 
the other, which defends class independence and sees the union as an 
instrument for workers to expose and foment class conflict. Obviously, 
within these two broad sectors, there are different positions, ranging 
from trade unions that defend neoliberal policies to those that defend 
socialist revolution.

To understand the main currents that are currently operating in the 
labor movement, it is essential to understand the issue of union unity, 
established back in the 1930s. Union unity establishes that each 
category has (and can have) only one union, which is authorized by the 
State to represent the workers in that category. It is not like in 
Spain, where any worker can choose the union or union center that will 
represent him/her. In Brazil, workers are required to join the only 
union that is authorized to represent their category. This leads to a 
dispute, union by union and in each category, with only the elected 
leadership later approving which union center the union will join.

To give a practical example, a teacher in a state school cannot choose 
to join the CSP-Conlutas union (which advocates class independence), in 
the same way that a Spanish teacher can choose to join the CGT or 
Solidaridad Obrera. In Brazil - if they are from São Paulo, for example 
- this teacher can only join APEOESP, which is the teachers' union of 
the state of São Paulo. From there, this teacher can dispute the 
day-to-day running of the union so that he or she can assume certain 
positions and join a union. In the case of APEOESP, the largest union in 
Latin America, it is affiliated with the Central Única dos Trabalhadores 
(CUT), which is mostly led by an internal faction of the PT.

This leaves Brazilian unionists with only two options. One is to 
participate in single unions and invest in internal disputes. Or, to 
invest in the creation of a parallel union structure. There have been 
and are some initiatives in this second direction, but they have proven 
to be extremely limited in terms of the number of workers involved and, 
especially, in terms of the ability to demand something in the 
workplace. In our analysis, the option of creating a parallel union, at 
least at this historical moment, would distance us from the real base of 
workers and would only bring together a few dozen workers through overly 
ideological criteria, since the unions would not have the capacity to 
deal with the concrete reality of ordinary workers.

For example, in this context of decline in the labor movement, it is 
unlikely that a subway worker will join a parallel union that is 
incapable of negotiating wages, working conditions, etc., and that does 
not provide political and legal support against dismissal. This is even 
worse when we talk about precarious workers, whose more fragile 
stability means that, even if they want to, they face enormous 
difficulties in joining a parallel union. For example, an outsourced 
cleaning worker, after a long work day, often marked by repression by 
the employer, if he or she takes time off work to do an activity with 
this parallel union, may lose the basic food basket or a day's work, may 
be transferred to more unhealthy places or even be fired.

Today, the camp that defends class independence (Trotskyists, some 
anarchist sectors, autonomist Marxists, etc.) is quite a minority. The 
largest Brazilian trade unions are the CUT - which has a 
social-democratic/social-liberal line, led mostly by the PT - and the 
Força Sindical - which is controlled by sectors of the right and the 
employers' union bureaucracy. Intermediate unions are the União Geral 
dos Trabalhadores (UGT) - which defends neoliberal policies - and the 
Central de Trabalhadores e Trabalhadoras do Brasil (CTB) - which is 
controlled mostly by the Partido Comunista do Brasil (PCdoB), a split 
from the Partido Comunista Brasileiro (PCB) and which follows the line 
of the PC Albanês. There are also other smaller organizations. Among 
them, the only trade union that defends class independence, and which is 
led mostly by Trotskyists, is the Central Sindical e Popular Conlutas 
(CSP-Conlutas). Another organization along these lines, which is not a 
central and has far fewer unions/members, is the "Red" Intersindical 
(Instrument of Struggle...).

Post-Stalinists, in general, have little presence in the Brazilian trade 
union movement. Due to their ethical and strategic flexibility, they 
tend to be close to the categories in a more pragmatic way, often 
linking themselves to the CUT, but without almost any social force 
capable of influencing the policies of the central, much less the 
Brazilian trade union movement as a whole.

What do you think about anarcho-syndicalism and revolutionary 
syndicalism? Would it be possible to move towards an autonomous tendency 
in syndicalism?

Within this complex union framework, our bet, trying to adapt elements 
of revolutionary unionism, has been to build the struggles in these 
existing unions and to fight within them. In all the unions we are part 
of, we have tried to convince workers that the model of unionism based 
on independence and class conflict is the one that leads to concrete 
victories, and that allows us to accumulate social strength to, later 
on, break with state unionism and promote larger-scale transformations.

We understand that it is necessary to create a real structure, with a 
strong base that can respond to the current situation, support 
affiliated workers against the bosses and compete for hegemony with the 
union centers and tendencies that defend the union bureaucracy. Of 
course, this does not depend solely on our will, it does not happen 
overnight, and it is only possible with medium and long-term strategic 
planning that is capable of establishing, step by step, the necessary tasks.

When we look at the history of anarchism, anarcho-syndicalism and 
revolutionary syndicalism, we find many references to what we are doing. 
We know that, depending on the country and region, the distinction 
between anarcho-syndicalism and revolutionary syndicalism changes a lot 
and is a source of controversy.

For us, when, in terms of mass strategy, we give preference to 
revolutionary syndicalism over anarcho-syndicalism, it is because, for 
example, we understand that the revolutionary syndical model of the 
Brazilian Workers' Confederation (COB), founded in 1908 - based on the 
proposal of a syndicalism that would encompass all workers willing to 
fight, without an explicit and programmatic link to an ideology or 
doctrine - is more interesting than the anarcho-syndicalist model of the 
Federación Obrera Regional Argentina (FORA), from 1905 onwards - based 
on the proposal of a syndicalism ideologically and programmatically 
linked to anarchism. For us, anarchism must be within the union 
movement, and not the other way around.

The revolutionary unionism that we defend becomes clear with the mass 
line that we explained earlier. We do not want unions or anarchist 
movements, but rather workers' movements that can have anarchism as an 
influential reference, through certain practices that are capable of 
pointing to a social transformation along the lines that we support. 
However, we know that there is a long way to go before this strategy has 
concrete conditions to be implemented on a large scale in Brazil. But to 
the extent that we believe that the means must be coherent with the 
ends, and lead to them, we seek to build this strategic perspective from 
now on, in the unions where we have a presence.

Can you talk a little about the rural situation in Brazil?

First of all, it is important to mention the importance that the issue 
of land concentration has had on the social formation of Brazil, in the 
countryside and in the city. Currently, Brazil has 453 million hectares 
under private use, which corresponds to 53% of the national territory. 
Since the colonial period, the country's ruling classes have been trying 
to create the conditions for the maintenance of private property in this 
land concentration.

In 1850, when the abolitionist movement was gaining momentum and before 
the Abolition of Slavery Act was passed, the Land Law was established to 
regulate private property in the country. This prevented, among other 
things, the black population from owning land to live and work on, and 
contributed to the social exclusion of this population. In other words, 
part of the social inequalities, relations of domination and structural 
racism in Brazil are related to the historical process of land 
concentration in the country.

Historically, there have been several processes of revolt and 
mobilization in rural Brazil, just as there are currently different 
rural movements, from the most organized at a national level to smaller, 
local groups. Throughout the country's history, the rural population has 
been systematically expelled to the big cities due to land 
concentration, land grabbing, violence, and the lack of policies that 
guarantee that small farmers and rural workers can remain in their 
place. This has led to an ever-increasing population concentration in 
the big cities.

To a large extent, this historical context also explains why Brazil 
continues to be an agrarian country that exports grains, meats, minerals 
and other primary products. 45% of Brazil's productive area is 
concentrated in properties larger than 1,000 hectares - just 0.9% of all 
rural properties. And a large part of Brazil's production of 
agricultural commodities is linked to vertically structured 
conglomerates that control the entire process, from planting to 
marketing. These are companies that exploit the land market, both for 
the production of commodities and for financial speculation. Despite 
this, more than 70% of the food consumed by the Brazilian population is 
produced by family farms and small farmers, but they occupy the smallest 
amount of arable land in the country.

This model has deepened and advanced under neoliberal and far-right 
governments, such as those of Temer and Bolsonaro, but it has also been 
maintained under the governments of Lula and Dilma. The agribusiness 
lobby in Brazil is institutionalized and strong; it operates in Congress 
through the Frente Parlamentar da Agropecuária (FPA, formalized under 
this name in 2008). More recently, ruralists have organized themselves 
into the Invasão Zero movement, a type of paramilitary initiative 
supported by public security sectors, repressing land occupations and 
repossessions of indigenous communities, mainly in the states of Pará 
and Bahia. Conflicts and murders in the countryside and forests continue 
under the Lula government, mainly in areas where the agricultural 
frontier is advancing, in the north and northeast regions of the country.

In 2021, the Bolsonaro government created the Titula Brasil program, 
with the aim of privatizing settlements and ending Agrarian Reform 
policies. It also aimed to promote the dismantling of the National 
Institute of Colonization and Agrarian Reform (INCRA), encourage 
increased violence in the countryside and the destruction of the 
environment. Despite encompassing the entire country, Titula Brasil was 
specifically designed with the purpose of speeding up the process of 
regularizing properties in the Legal Amazon, the main focus of the 
expansive land policy defended by Bolsonaro.

In addition to encouraging the expansion of the agricultural frontier, 
especially in the North and Northeast, this policy also served the 
interests of the industrial livestock sector, part of Bolsonaro's 
support base and the most backward sector of agribusiness. There is also 
the agribusiness sector of large mechanized and technological estates, 
of monoculture of grains sold as agricultural commodities to be 
transformed into feed for livestock in countries like China.

On the other hand, the Lula government's Plano Safra (agricultural 
sector incentive program) in 2023 allocated only 20% of the total budget 
to family farming, while most of the federal resources go to finance 
agribusiness and large landowners, who still have tax exemptions. The 
release of pesticides, many of which are banned in Europe, also 
continues under the Lula government. The total number of pesticide 
registrations in 2023 was 555, below the total registered in 2022 (652) 
and 2021 (562), but still at the same level as the Temer and Bolsonaro 
governments.

And what is the situation of the landless peasant movement at the moment?

Initially, it is important to characterize here, in general terms, two 
of the largest rural movements in Brazil, the Landless Workers' Movement 
(MST) and the Small Farmers' Movement (MPA). Due to their size, they end 
up setting the agenda for this issue in the country, and that is why 
today we cannot understand the peasant movement without talking about them.

The MST was founded in 1984, and the MPA in 1996. Both are part of the 
so-called "popular democratic project," according to the terminology of 
the 1980s and 1990s. This project currently largely directs other large 
organizations, such as the Central Única dos Trabalhadores (CUT), in the 
union sector, and the União Nacional dos Estudantes (UNE), in the 
student sector. And it has the PT as its major political and 
institutional representative. In other words, it is a field that 
directly composes the PT or that has great influence from it.

It is important to remember that the MST and the MPA also make up the 
Latin American Coordinator of Rural Organizations (CLOC) and Via 
Campesina, together with the Movement of People Affected by Dams (MAB), 
the Peasant Women's Movement (MMC), the Artisanal Fishermen's and 
Fisherwomen's Movement (MPP), the Rural Youth Pastoral (PJR), the 
National Coordination of Quilombola Communities (CONAQ), the Movement 
for Popular Sovereignty in Mining (MAM), the Federation of Agronomy 
Students of Brazil (FEAB), the Pastoral Land Commission (CPT), the 
Association of Forestry Engineering Students (ABEEF) and the Indigenous 
Missionary Council (CIMI).

The MST's main programmatic line is Popular Agrarian Reform, based on 
the brutal concentration of land in Brazil. In this sense, it has 
developed a program that considers both agrarian issues (democratizing 
access to land for those who live and work on it) and agricultural 
issues (conditions, techniques and ways of producing in the 
agroecological matrix). Currently, this involves several themes and 
agendas such as gender, rural education, health, LGBT, training, 
production, marketing, housing, culture, among others.

The MPA emerged in the 1990s, due to the understanding that rural 
unionism was insufficient to meet the survival demands of small farmers 
at that time. It defends and supports agrarian reform, but organizes 
peasant families and small farmers who already have their own land. And 
they do so based on the understanding that policies are needed to ensure 
that these families remain in the countryside and prevent people from 
having to leave their land to try to survive in the big cities. In other 
words, policies for housing, support for production, credit, marketing, 
culture, leisure, health, infrastructure, rural education, among others. 
The Peasant Plan is the program that systematizes the movement's main 
proposals for these issues.

Speaking about the struggle in this sector in the current situation, at 
the beginning of the current Lula government, occupations took place in 
more than 10 cities, led by another movement, the Frente Nacional de 
Luta Campo e Cidade (FLN) in the southeast and south of the country. The 
FLN was founded in 2014, and one of its main references is a former 
historic MST activist, Zé Rainha. During this period, there were also 
temporary occupations of Incra by the MST in the south of Bahia. Despite 
this beginning of the year, let us remember that the movements linked to 
Via Campesina and the popular democratic camp opted for a retreat from 
the first PT government (2003 onwards), and do not indicate any 
significant changes, especially in the new Lula government.

For example, during the first PT government (2003-2006), the MST adopted 
the line of not moving forward with land occupations, but rather of 
improving the existing settlements. It focused on the release of credit 
and production incentive policies that would help structure the 
processing and marketing cooperatives in the states, such as those for 
credit, dairy products, rice, and dairy products. While on the one hand, 
organizing economic tools is important as a way of adding value to 
production and generating income for settled families, training in 
cooperative and collective work methodologies, developing knowledge and 
technology, and organizing the territory, on the other hand, this can 
generate a great deal of dependence on public policies, credit, and 
government programs. This contributes to a line that seeks to negotiate 
first and avoid putting pressure on the government, and that, over time, 
builds a political culture of adaptation to the system to the detriment 
of a combative policy.

The fact is that little changed in the agrarian reform and family 
farming policies during the first Lula and Dilma governments 
(2003-2016). And things got even worse under the Temer and Bolsonaro 
governments. Despite this, the movements of the popular democratic camp 
were limited to a few specific demonstrations and occupations of a more 
political nature and of short duration. Either because they were losing 
the capacity to mobilize their bases, or because they preferred to let 
the Bolsonaro government wear itself out, betting on a change in the 
situation through elections rather than through social pressure from the 
struggles and the streets.

In the meantime, the MST and the MPA have made progress in different 
forms of dialogue and propaganda with society. This includes gender and 
LGBT issues, food donation campaigns for communities and favelas 
(especially during the pandemic). In addition, there have been trainings 
for grassroots health agents, state and national agrarian reform fairs, 
and organic rice production. Examples of this are spaces such as 
Armazéns do Campo (MST) and Raízes do Brasil (MPA) in large capitals, 
where the agro-industrialized production of cooperatives is sold and 
political and cultural activities are held. These were advances, despite 
the fact that much of this dialogue was mainly with the urban middle 
classes. This ended up giving the movement a more palatable and 
sanitized face, and erasing the old image of peasants with their scythes 
in large marches and occupations.

In the 2022 presidential elections, the MST and other movements, such as 
the indigenous movements, also supported their own candidacies for state 
deputy. Others, such as the oil workers, supported candidates from 
neighboring sectors. This was done to try to advance certain policies 
and agendas at the institutional level, but it ended up contributing 
even more to the distancing of these movements from direct action 
policies. While this demands a significant part of the movements' 
energy, it is also related to the fact that, even with a PT government 
and from the same political camp, agrarian reform agendas continue to 
fail to advance. Just as there was no significant progress in agrarian 
reform and family farming policies in the first Lula and Dilma 
governments. Currently, there are around 90,000 families still camped 
out in Brazil, awaiting the progress of agrarian reform.

Our perspective is that, given the government's stagnation in meeting 
rural demands, land occupations and mass mobilizations, at different 
levels, will resume. In addition to the Lula government increasingly 
giving in to the so-called "centrão" (as it is called, the traditional 
right wing of Congress), the far-right Bolsonaro supporters are also 
continuing to mobilize. Meanwhile, a series of social rights are under 
threat or urgently need to advance. And this can only happen with 
popular pressure.

Mobilization processes to pressure the government to address social 
issues, as well as processes of occupying public offices and land and 
housing occupations, are also important tactics due to their formative 
nature and their ability to help renew militancy. Retreating is harmful 
to social movements, as it leads to an increasing demobilization of 
their bases and a reduced capacity to generate social force. As a 
result, it produces less influence in society and less construction of a 
reference point on the left, as the MST and other movements did in a 
significant way until the end of the 1990s.

https://socialismolibertario.net/2024/09/13/fica-evidente-que-nao-ha-qualquer-possibilidade-de-apostar-no-espontaneismo/
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