Urbanismo Miliciano in Rio de Janeiro: mudanças entre as edições

= Illuminating Resistance =

<p style="text-align: justify;">Unlike other Brazilian cities, such as the case of Porto Alegre or São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro has not developed a tradition of partisan urban management in recent years. In the case of Rio, the Left’s relative weakness at the municipal and state levels has to do, among other reasons, with the history of brizolismo associated with Leonel Brizola and the lack of Workers’ Party (PT) roots within municipal policy. The 1982 election of Leonel Brizola of the Democratic Labor Party (PDT) as governor of the state of Rio de Janeiro deeply influenced Rio politics. A national politician, Brizola represented the labor legacy of varguismo—the ideology associated with nationalist president Getúlio Vargas—in the years after the return to democracy. As Gonçalves and Bryan McCann have shown, Brizola pioneered large-scale urban interventions in the favelas and reorganized public education in the state by democratizing access for all social sectors. At the same time, he openly questioned police violence and rejected&nbsp; mão dura or iron fist policies against crime, which garnered criticism from middle-class sectors, who withdrew their support. Among Brizola’s legacies are the strong influence he exerted on the Left in Rio and in the formation of a whole generation of local politicians who, after the breakup of the PDT, migrated to other parties. Unlike other left-wing parties, such as the PT or more recently the PSOL, whose social bases are predominantly middle-class, Brizola’s PDT represented the last left party with deep popular grassroots foundations in Rio de Janeiro. The issue of violence in Rio de Janeiro, especially as the drug trafficking boom dominated public debate in the city and the state’s political agenda, impeded the potential for a more reformist leftist movement of the masses. More recently, the protests that took to the streets in 2013 against rising transportation costs and the corruption associated with organizing the Olympic Games produced political disenchantment in an era of economic and institutional crisis that would help lead to the impeachment of former president Dilma Rousseff. New dramatic levels of violence against the poor, injustice, and impunity paled attempts to expand rights to the city. PT initiatives reduced social inequalities, but they did not question the ongoing neoliberal project. Like a house of cards, the government abandoned many of the historical struggles for urban reform, especially after extreme right-wing president Jair Bolsonaro came to power. Despite his neoliberal agenda and heavy military presence in popular neighborhoods, Bolsonaro achieved strong support in these spaces. Widespread fear of urban violence, anger against corruption in all political parties—including the PT—and a moral discourse from Evangelical churches and the more conservative sectors of the Catholic Church fed this dynamic. Despite the current profound political crisis putting Brazil’s very democracy at risk, a new generation of more combative politicians, particularly women of color, is emerging. Although she was elected with the traditional vote of the progressive middle class, Marielle Franco of the PSOL inaugurated a new way of performing as a city counselor by enacting grassroots policy in popular neighborhoods, including areas controlled by the milícia. The attempt to silence Marielle propelled new figures to enter the political scene, with many of her direct advisors winning office as state and federal legislators in the 2018 elections. Like Marielle, they are women, Black, and favela dwellers, and they carry the political practices of the city to many popular spaces. This year, the champion samba school Mangueira honored Marielle in its lyrics, placing her within a pantheon of popular heroes who resisted oppression—from the enslaved Muslims, known as malês, who revolted and their leader Luísa Mahin to all the common, invisible “Marias” of Brazil engaged in everyday struggles. They concluded by calling the country to listen to the minorities it has long silenced: “Brasil, chegou a vez / De ouvir as Marias, Mahins, Marielles, malês.”</p>