Today in Brazil there is a calling into question of Brazilian democracy, a sort of
societal "midlife crisis". Our democracy provides, in theory, equality of rights and
economic conditions (equality of citizens before the law) for everyone. Therefore, the
logic of alternation in power would be accompanied by an amount of sales desirable to the
leadership with the goal of aerating the representatives and agents, as well as making an
effort to deconstruct the legitimacy of the party oligarchies. Notably, we do not consider
it inevitable that the political elites control their directorates with an iron fist. ----
In Porto Alegre, south of Brazil, the protests are being organized by a strong ultra-left
coalition. ---- To attain some income distribution, albeit shyly, the leadership of the
Workers' Party (PT) believed it was necessary to ally with a part of the oligarchy.
This created a vacuum of representation and ten years of political paralysis in terms of
social pressure. Today, we live better and more disorganized. When the PT began to
resemble their former adversaries, there wasn?t ? and there still is ? any major
disappointment among the Brazilian population. This may be one of the causes of the
explosions in 2013, in addition to two absurdities: the perception that hosting the World
Cup would be a case of mistaken priorities and, no less importantly, the composition of
key posts in Congress under the control of two oligarchs of dubious reputation. But 2013
can be seen as the beginning of a new political impulse and a sign that something was
moving in the new Brazilian society.
In the 2013 manifestations we saw that the majority of events were driven by university
students, something which is not uncommon in Latin America. What is new is the
generalization of these protests and the visibility of sectors hitherto disorganized and
confused in the midst of the urban working population. Nowadays, to live in Brazil implies
a double or triple shift of work and study, to which is added the metropolitan chaos with
traffic jams and very low quality public transport. Those who live in the country suffer
the pressure of permanent education ? higher education with an emphasis by the labour
market on qualifications ? and, at the same time, we are a generation of between 18 and 25
years old that lives connected via the Internet. With the fragmentation of the lower
classes, these people ? night students, apprentices, technicians in training ? number
millions, are poorly paid and have quite a high level of information and ways to connect
with forms of protest on a global scale. However, it is important to note that the
protests in Brazil had two fundamental factors: one, the high price of bus tickets and the
perception that the state, at all three levels of government, operates as a guarantor of
profits for capital, even if it is a particular public service; the other fact is the
repudiation of the organization of the World Cup ? not against the spectacle of football
or of popular culture ? but against this way of doing shady business deals with public
money and the desires imposed by FIFA becoming laws in the country. As football is the
universe that Brazilians identify with and understand most, the volume of critical
information surpassed the propaganda action of the media and the silence of the big means
of communication in the face of the mass actions. This time it was not possible to silence
the millions of Brazilians in the streets.
Brazilian living conditions
In the last ten years, Brazilians' quality of life has changed a lot. As a whole, we live
better. Today, the official statistics of the Brazilian Geography and Statistics Institute
(IBGE) show that we have five social classes, whose measurement is given by the factor of
revenue and income. It is not a sociological concept of social class, but rather
marketological, linked to the use and possession of material goods. It is also noticed
that the improvement of living conditions ? from misery to poverty with a bit of dignity,
and from poverty to lower middle class bosses (your own home, a car, university degree,
credit card, travel vacations) ? did not imply an improvement in public services. The
stable middle class has health plans, pays for private schools and has houses with private
security or cleaning services. It is doubly taxed and does not see the upper class as
being taxed, experiencing loss of profit margins or having their immense fortunes taxed.
But still, at the base of the social pyramid we will need more than two decades to have a
less unjust country and, at least, decent material conditions for all.
Among the biggest challenges (social, political and economic) that Brazil has to face, we
highlight:
? Another form of state funding, stabilizing our public finances with the refinancing of
public debt based on the increase of basic interest rates. Besides this we need domestic
savings and a better distribution of taxes, where the three levels of government (federal,
state and municipal) have an equivalent tax distribution;
? An immediate review of the refinancing of states' and municipalities' debt for the
Union, and also of the federal debt to pay with other parameters. Today, this offset
consumes nearly half of the federal funds, and therefore our average capacity for direct
investment is 18%, whereas in most BRIC countries it is 25%;
? Political reform in which the voter may present bills for which they have the
possibility of collecting signatures to call a referendum and where private funding of
political campaigns is prohibited . We can make progress with electronic democracy and in
experimenting with direct participation;
? Endless basic sanitation works, ensuring the compliance of the budget allocated by the
1988 Constitution for health and education;
? A regulatory framework for the media which divides the spectrum into three destinations:
public, state and private media;
? Complete agrarian reform and the immediate recognition of the indigenous reserves and
Quilombo [1] lands;
? Socially, we have a lot to learn but we highlight two fundamental problems: the
improvement of functional illiteracy and revising the country's history. We have to talk
about the cursed legacy of colonialism, since Brazil was built by genocide and slavery.
The 2013 protests and the presidential elections
The 2013 protests were not directed exclusively against President Dilma and much less
against Lula-ist heritage. Lula remains the most popular leader in the country's history
and he is very pleasing to the dominant class since he promotes a class pact whereby
neither the top floor loses privileges nor does the bottom floor feel itself immobile or
unassisted. The challenge will be overcoming the reelection, in the second round, against
the candidacy of Eduardo Campos y Marina Silva (Socialist Party of Brazil, PSDB ?
unregistered REDE party [2]). These candidates come from inside the government and don't
have the brand management of Fernando Henrique Cardoso (privatization and unemployment,
despite economic stability). Hence the pressuring of the media by the specter of
inflation. The struggle against inflation is a trauma in Brazilian society and in its name
it is possible to promote a squeeze on salaries and compress the real economy in favor of
bankers and speculators. Another problem of the protests is that the hosting of the World
Cup is the work of the "Lula era" and fighting against the realization of this event ends
up being attributed to fighting against the Dilma government. The stage is open although
Dilma remains the favorite for reelection.
This year is not going to be a quiet one for the country although we may not have the mass
protests of 2013. If we had more deaths throughout the year ? something which is always
likely in terms of Brazil ? and political repression we could have national commotion.
2014 is already hot, both in terms of allegations of corruption at the highest levels of
government ? which for us is trivial ? like for the murder of a cameraman in the protests
in Rio de Janeiro in February 2014; and in terms of the intensification of popular revolt
in Rio against the "pacification" police in the slums who have no due respect for the
civil rights of the people living on the hills [where the slims are situated]. Until the
end of the World Cup, Brazil will not yet go into full election campaign mode and we will
always have the possibility for the intensification of popular struggle.
Bruno Lima Rocha, e-mail and Facebook: blimarocha@gmail.com, website:
www.estrategiaeanalise.com.br
J?lia Klein, juliaklek@gmail.com
Bar?metro Publication 12-05-14
Translated by Jonathan Payn: pain.jonathan@gmail.com
Notes:
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quilombo
2. The REDE party (NET) is a green network that was not allowed to run for elections,
which is why it was fused with the PSB (Brazilian Socialist Party). It has the former
Environmental Minister and Senator Marina Silva as its presidential candidate.
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