Brazil Apart

Leading English-language account of the fall of Lula’s Workers’ Party and rise of Bolsonaro and the New Right What does Brazil’s lurch to the hard right under Jair Bolsonaro portend for Latin America’s largest country, and how has it come about? Always something of a world unto itself, Brazil became, under the Workers’ Party from 2003 to 2016, “the theatre of a socio-political drama without equivalent in any other major state.” Bucking the global trend towards a tighter neoliberalism, former steelworker Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva swept aside the broken promises of previous years to invest in social transfers, defying vituperations in the Brazilian media to become the most popular ruler of the age. But in a second spectacular reversal, a parliamentary coup d’état against Lula’s successor—backed by forces in the judiciary and a youthful New Right—has been consolidated by Bolsonaro’s 2018 capture of the Planalto. With the PT’s lodestar now behind bars, a weighing up of his legacy, and of the contrasting Bolsonaro regime, is urgently needed. Brazil Apart is the sharp-edged, comprehensive analytic account required.

Leading English-language account of the fall of Lula’s Workers’ Party and rise of Bolsonaro and the New Right What does Brazil’s lurch to the hard right under Jair Bolsonaro portend for Latin America’s largest country, and how has it come about? Always something of a world unto itself, Brazil became, under the Workers’ Party from 2003 to 2016, “the theatre of a socio-political drama without equivalent in any other major state.” Bucking the global trend towards a tighter neoliberalism, former steelworker Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva swept aside the broken promises of previous years to invest in social transfers, defying vituperations in the Brazilian media to become the most popular ruler of the age. But in a second spectacular reversal, a parliamentary coup d’état against Lula’s successor—backed by forces in the judiciary and a youthful New Right—has been consolidated by Bolsonaro’s 2018 capture of the Planalto. With the PT’s lodestar now behind bars, a weighing up of his legacy, and of the contrasting Bolsonaro regime, is urgently needed. Brazil Apart is the sharp-edged, comprehensive analytic account required.

In this hugely praised narrative, New York Times reporter Larry Rohter takes the reader on a lively trip through Brazil's history, culture, and booming economy. Going beyond the popular stereotypes of samba, supermodels, and soccer, he shows us a stunning and varied landscape--from breathtaking tropical beaches to the lush and dangerous Amazon rainforest--and how a complex and vibrant people defy definition. He charts Brazil's amazing jump from a debtor nation to one of the world's fastest growing economies, unravels the myth of Brazil's sexually charged culture, and portrays in vivid color the underbelly of impoverished favelas. With Brazil leading the charge of the Latin American decade, this critically acclaimed history is the authoritative guide to understanding its meteoric rise.

Brazil is a country of extreme inequalities, one of the most important of which is the acute concentration of rural land ownership. In recent decades, however, poor landless workers have mounted a major challenge to this state of affairs. A broad grassroots social movement led by the Movement of Landless Rural Workers (MST) has mobilized hundreds of thousands of families to pressure authorities for land reform through mass protest. This book explores the evolution of the landless movement from its birth during the twilight years of Brazil&’s military dictatorship through the first government of Luiz In&ácio Lula da Silva. It uses this case to test a number of major theoretical perspectives on social movements and engages in a critical dialogue with both contemporary political opportunity theory and Mancur Olson&’s classic economic theory of collective action. Ondetti seeks to explain the major moments of change in the landless movement's growth trajectory: its initial emergence in the late 1970s and early 80s, its rapid takeoff in the mid-1990s, its acute but ultimately temporary crisis in the early 2000s, and its resurgence during Lula's first term in office. He finds strong support for the influential, but much-criticized political opportunity perspective. At the same time, however, he underscores some of the problems with how political opportunity has been conceptualized in the past. The book also seeks to shed light on the anomalous fact that the landless movement continued to expand in the decade following the restoration of Brazilian democracy in 1985 despite the general trend toward social-movement decline. His argument, which highlights the unusual structure of incentives involved in the struggle for land in Brazil, casts doubt on a key assumption underlying Olson's theory.

This book analyzes Brazil's foreign relations, politics, domestic economy, international economic relations, and relations with multinational corporations. It identifies the balance-of-payments crisis in the late 1970s as the key to Brazil's economic and political future.

Kimberly Cleveland highlights the work of five Brazilian artists from all over the country who work in a wide range of media, including photography, sculpture, and installation art. She shows how each conveys “blackness” through his or her unique visual vocabulary and points out the ways this reflects their lived experiences.

In recent years, the far right has done everything in its power to accelerate the heating: an American president who believes it is a hoax has removed limits on fossil fuel production. The Brazilian president has opened the Amazon and watched it burn. In Europe, parties denying the crisis and insisting on maximum combustion have stormed into office, from Sweden to Spain. On the brink of breakdown, the forces most aggressively promoting business-as-usual have surged - always in defense of white privilege, against supposed threats from non-white others. Where have they come from? The first study of the far right in the climate crisis, White Skin, Black Fuel: On the Danger of Fossil Fascism presents an eye-opening sweep of a novel political constellation, and reveals its deep historical roots. Fossil-fueled technologies were born steeped in racism. None loved them more passionately than the classical fascists. As such forces rise to the surface, some profess to have the solution - closing borders to save the climate. Epic and riveting, White Skin, Black Fuel traces a future of political fronts that can only heat up.