By Abby Sewell

In the Jan. 2004 issue of The Portland Alliance I wrote about the lessons of the Free Trade Area of the Americas summit in Miami for the anti-corporate globalization movement in the U.S. Later on in that same month, I got the opportunity to travel to Brazil to do some research on the anti-FTAA movement there (thank you, Reed College). Although it may not directly relate to our local struggles in Portland, Oregon, what I saw in Brazil did give me some new perspectives on the problems faced by activists in the U.S.

In Brazil, there is a highly active anti-FTAA movement, particularly in São Paulo. The majority of people I talked to, whether they were active in the movement or not, felt that the FTAA would end up hurting Brazil, because many of its industries are not ready to compete with U.S. industry, while the sectors in which Brazil has an advantage are highly protected in the U.S. — especially through its subsidies to agri-business. Others are concerned that by increasing Brazil’s economic dependence on the United States, the FTAA will give the U.S. still more power over the Brazilian government. As in the U.S., many activists in the Brazilian movement are also worried about the increase in corporate power brought about by free trade agreements in general.

The first public protests against the FTAA in Brazil, beginning in 2000 and 2001, were led by radicals: small groups of anarchists, students, and environmentalists. The tone of these protests was more confrontational than those that came later, and this was reflected in incidents of police/protester violence and mass arrests.

In late 2001 and 2002, some of the more mainstream leftist organizations began to become more involved in the campaign, with the most important of these being the central labor union (Central Únicados Trabalhadores [CUT]); the landless peasants’ movement (Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra [MST]); and the Brazilian Catholic Church. It was the involvement of the church that really changed the face of the movement. In Brazil, as in most of Latin America, the Church is a very powerful institution; so when it threw its weight behind the anti-FTAA movement, it brought thousands of new activists along with it. On the other hand, it also changed the tone of the movement, taking it down a more institutional route. One example of this was an unofficial referendum taken by the anti-FTAA campaign in 2002, in which nearly 10 million Brazilians (98 percent of those who participated) voted against continuing to negotiate with the U.S. on the FTAA. Meanwhile, demonstrations in the streets drew larger numbers, but without the element of confrontation seen in the 2001 protests.

Perhaps the most important event for the movement — for better or worse — was the Oct. 2002 election of Luiz Inacio “Lula” da Silva as president of Brazil. Lula, a former union leader with ties to most of the major leftist groups in the country, had criticized the FTAA during his campaign, calling it a U.S. attempt to “annex” Brazil and declaring that “Brazil is not going to return to being a colony, neither of the financial system nor of any country in the world.”

However, upon his election, Lula made no move to withdraw from the negotiations. Even if he had wanted to, it would have been very difficult for him to do so, since Brazil can hardly afford to lose the U.S. as a trading partner. The upshot was that Lula and Bush finally agreed to an “FTAA-lite,” a stripped down version of the accord that left out nearly all of the clauses that had been points of contention between the two countries. Some in the anti-FTAA movement saw this as a hopeful sign, because Brazil forced the U.S. to drop many of its demands; but many others saw it as a defeat, since the basic essence of the free trade agreement remains intact.

When I talked to people and read materials published by the more mainstream groups within the anti-FTAA campaign, they generally saw Lula’s election as a good thing for the movement. They said that his ties to the unions and political movements within the country would mean more popular participation in the negotiation process. But people from the more radical groups saw Lula’s election as a setback for the anti-FTAA movement. As one activist from a small collective in São Paulo told me, the CUT, the MST and the church are too tied into the power structure of Lula’s government to be willing to jeopardize their favored position by taking a strong stand against Lula’s policies on the FTAA. He said it’s true that Lula’s government will at least meet with organizers from the political movements and listen to their demands. “But it’s for the purpose of subverting them and bringing them into the government,” he added.

On the one hand, I could wish that the U.S. had a government that would sit down and talk to political activists, even for the purpose of co-opting them, rather than sending Homeland Security after them. On the other hand, the situation in Brazil also reminds me that if, by some miracle, we get rid of Bush in 2004, there is a very real danger that liberals will breathe a sigh of relief and ease up their pressure on the government. In reality, no matter who is sitting in the White House, there remain huge flaws in our political system, and in our position in the world system. Would a Democrat back out of the FTAA negotiations? Would he agree to an FTAA that would protect labor rights, not just in the U.S. but also in Latin America? Would he stop subsidizing U.S. agriculture for the sake of small farmers in Brazil? Would he open our borders to immigration so that workers as well as corporations could relocate at will? Even if he wanted to, would he be able to take away the power that multinational corporations wield over our lives?

Abby Sewell is a Portland Alliance intern and a student at Reed College.