A momentous week in Brasil was also one where the dominant international narrative shifted from widespread depiction of a “Heroic Impartial Anti-Corruption Campaign” (If you question the method you’re defending thieves) & “Spontaneous, Popular, Patriotic Anti-Government Uprising” (If you question mass media incitement & foreign funding you’re denying agency) to one which described that what […]
The situation in Brasil at the time of publication is extremely complicated & fluid but to better understand it, it needs to be broken down into its related component parts. This article will be updated with significant developments. 1. Elections At the core of this unrest is that the losing side never properly accepted defeat at […]
At the March 13 Anti-Government protest, PSDB Opposition Politicians, São Paulo State Governor Geraldo Alckmin & defeated 2014 Presidential Candidate Aécio Neves, can surely only have expected a heroes welcome on Avenida Paulista. Their actually hostile reception from some demonstrators is a sign that the popular anti-corruption movement their side helped create & sought to […]
The depiction of Operation Lava Jato as an apolitical moral crusade, a new essentialist myth and a natural phase in the country’s development, is a divisive one in Brazil but nevertheless a narrative that Anglo media commentators have been almost unanimous in echoing. It is however becoming an increasingly difficult position to defend. The assertion that […]
“Só uma crise, real ou percebida, produz uma mudança real.” – Milton Friedman. (Originalmente publicado em Inglês 22/6/15) O ano de 2015 está sendo terrível para o Brasil: uma conjuntura econômica mundial desfavorável, uma série de políticas equivocadas do início do primeiro mandato de Dilma Rousseff, e os escândalos que se seguiram à eleição de […]
American exceptionalism is a myth. Superpowers do not promote democracy, not at home and certainly not abroad. Democracy requires popular sovereignty – power to govern without external control – the antithesis of empire. – Jan K. Black PhD. In the recently released ‘The WikiLeaks Files: The World According to US Empire’ (Verso Books), the first […]
Brasil’s streets have been filled with protests in the last few weeks, evoking similar events taking place earlier in the year. Most of the demonstrators are supporters of the defeated presidential candidate Aécio Neves who have collectively paraded across several parts of the country chanting for the removal of Dilma Rousseff, the sitting president who […]
Back in October 2014, a thirty-something, upper-middle class couple carry a large red flag towards a demonstration a few kilometres away, having walked the length of São Paulo’s leafy Rua Oscar Freire – an affluent area lined with boutiques & international chains. By the time the pair reach main artery Avenida Reboucas they are visibly shaken from what […]
“Only a crisis, real or perceived, produces real change.” – Milton Friedman. Brasil is having a horrible 2015; a far less favourable global economic situation, a number of policy misjudgements made early in President Rousseff’s first mandate and rolling scandals that have followed 2014’s election have resulted in flurry of headlines both at home and abroad decrying “Brasil in Crisis” or “On […]
During the approach to Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff’s re-scheduled visit to the United States there has been much talk about what Brasil can do to improve relations between two of the Western Hemisphere’s largest countries. The majority of reporting focuses on Brazilian failures but most of the problem lies in Washington. Decades of weak engagement by […]