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POLITICS UNDERSTANDING BRASIL

The Abducted Political System

Brasil Wire proudly announces its new partnership with Le Monde Diplomatique Brasil. Starting today, we will periodically translate and share their articles to advance our goal of providing the best English language news and analysis on Brazil from outside the echo chamber. Today, Silvio Caccia Bava, political scientist and Editor-in-Chief of Le Monde Diplomatique Brasil […]

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CITIES HOUSING SÃO PAULO SOCIAL MOVEMENTS

Fighting Speculation and Gentrification, one Building at a Time

The centre of São Paulo is mainly comprised of commercial, office and abandoned buildings. Most of those who work there cannot afford the rent of the flats downtown, so they must travel everyday from the outskirts, a trip that lasts about two hours. Remember that São Paulo is a city of 17 million inhabitants. Gentrification […]

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HOUSING POLITICS SOCIAL MOVEMENTS UNDERSTANDING BRASIL

A Brief Look at Brazilian Social Movements

Brazil currently has its most conservative Congress in decades. As violence against social movements increases and the criminalization of Brazilian social movements in the media and judiciary intensifies, it is a good time to take a closer look at who these movements are and what they are doing. How did they start, and what is […]

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ACADEMIC HISTORY UNDERSTANDING BRASIL

Transforming Brasil – A History of National Development in the Postwar Era

‘Transforming Brazil: a History of National Development in the Postwar Era’ critically revisits the context of the time in Brazil in order to reexamine traditional questions and notions pertaining to the nature of Latin America’s political culture and institutions. It was in this period that the region lived some of its most intense and successful […]

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64-85 DICTATORSHIP ACADEMIC FOREIGN POLICY HISTORY LONGFORM UNDERSTANDING BRASIL UNITED STATES

United States Penetration of Brasil – Epilogue

In her 1977 book “United States Penetration of Brazil“, former CIA researcher, Professor Jan K Black exposed the complex role the US had played in Brazil’s 1964 coup and its governance since. This extremely detailed forensic investigation should be a standard reference for anyone studying the 1964 coup, the dictatorship period and relations between the countries, both then, […]

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DATA MEDIA

Stats, Maps & Havaianas

You might have seen this odd map popping up in your timelines over the past few weeks, a map purporting to reveal the principal interests of each country, based on “Google data”. On this map “prostitute” leads the ranking in Brazil. Like many curious maps, it went viral & in multiple languages. Originally, it was produced by […]

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ACADEMIC HISTORY OPINION POLITICS UNDERSTANDING BRASIL

Sixty Years Later: What Have We Learned?

Successive demonstrations in its most important cities, brawls between militants of opposing ideological sides who see the other as an enemy rather than a political adversary, growing numbers of strikes, verbal and written attacks in the media, rising polarization in Congress. A good description of what has been taken place in the country of the […]

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EDITORIAL OPINION POLITICS

Paraná: The Story Behind a “Massacre”

On April 29 2015, the Military Police of Paraná attacked thousands of striking teachers in Curitiba with tear gas, pepper spray, dogs, and rubber bullets. Hundreds were wounded, and the governor has attempted to divert responsibility by blaming shadowy infiltrated anarchist “agitators.” This is the story behind the carnage, from a Paraná university professor who […]

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ENVIRONMENT FOREIGN POLICY UNDERSTANDING BRASIL UNITED KINGDOM

When A British Government Minister Tried To Privatise The Brazilian Amazon

The legacy of colonialism is no more apparent than in the asymmetry between attitudes to sovereignty in the developing world and the developed. It would certainly be difficult to imagine a Brazilian Minister taking the international stage to propose the privatisation of the British Lake District, but this is analogous to what David Miliband put forward in […]

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DEMOCRACY POLITICS

Bigger Than Ever? Not So Fast

Sunday, April 12, was supposed to be bigger than ever before. The same groups that organized Brazil’s March 15 demonstrations against Dilma Rousseff’s government via social media had planned a new wave of protests across Brazil. Today they are undoubtedly privately disappointed. The early crowd estimates indicate a drop of at least 50% in every […]