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Stephan Lanz
How the Favela Triumphed
A short political story of the favelas in Rio
de Janeiro
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New actors
However, the decline of its traditional political subjects does
not mean that the favela is becoming de-politicized. The
political vacuum that the residents associations crushed between
the second wave of clientelism and violence left behind has generated
new kinds of actors that completely dispose of their clientelistic
heritage and often merge cultural production, social work and political
activism. They act within a network of civil-societal organizations
that has become quite tight since the 1980s. Today the inhabitants
of the favelas are more strongly engaged in associations
than average cariocas (Happe 2002: 220). There are a large
number of cultural societies, community centres, autonomous radio
and television stations, self-help groups, social organizations,
and even Web sites operated by large favelas (e.g. www.rocinha.com.br).
While non-governmental organizations from outside, which in the
1990s became significant social actors, initiated these groups,
NGOs are today founded in the favelas themselves. Within
the context of a government policy that increasingly implements
its social programmes via local NGOs, their foundation is a new
source of attaining public resources - while at the same time creating
new competition (Pandolfi / Grynszpan 2003a).
Individual networks such as CCAP, "Afro Reggae"
or CUFA link the social and cultural practice of NGOs with a political
agenda of civil rights, social justice and the social representation
of the favelados. They primarily address youths who are the
first to succumb to violence and the promises of prestige, power
and money made by the drug economy. Cool musical subcultures such
as hip-hop, rap or funk are meant to break this attraction. As long
as they act in the field of culture and do not pose a direct threat
to the gangs, these projects balance on the precarious line of a
peaceful coexistence without submitting.
CCAP, a network in the favela complex of
Manguinhos, includes local television, a dance workshop, legal advice,
micro-financing and participation in local planning processes (REDECCAP
2003); "Afro Reggae" started off with music workshops
for youths in Vigário Geral (Junior 2003) and today comprises
several bands, theatre and circus projects with professional standards
(see Vejmelka, Junior, Martins in this volume). CUFA ("Central
Unica das Favelas") is an institution originating in
the hip-hop movement with its own label that trains youths, organizes
cultural events and citizenship-building projects, and maintains
community centres and libraries. Its aim is to raise the political
awareness of the disadvantaged and "transform the favelas,
or rather the talents and potentials that remain non-valorised due
to social and racial prejudices" (www.cufa.com.br).
CUFA seeks its members among young hip-hoppers - including several
pop stars - as well as among experienced activists and ordinary
residents. In 2001, CUFA activists, including rap star MV Bill,
founded a party as a political arm, the "PPPomar" (6).
The central aims of the "PPPomar" defined in a manifest
and a programme are the fight against racism and the social and
economic integration of the declassed Afro-Brazilian population
as citizens with equal rights (http://pppomar.tripod.com).
They were mentioned in the national media for the first time on
the occasion of a campaign calling for the boycott of beer and cigarette
brands whose manufacturers make no social investments in the
favelas. "Radicalism and nonconformity are on the rise
in the favelas", even the conservative o globo comments
rather benevolently, "community movements [...] exert pressure
on the public sector and private initiatives to enforce a better
distribution of income. These groups are not only concerned with
the deficiencies of the infrastructure but also with the lack of
social maintenance work that would stimulate education and culture
in the favelas." (12/23/12.2001)
Such new actors do not only radically detach themselves
from patronizing clientelism, they aggressively demand their civil
rights, define development objectives for their places of residence
and resist the force of both state organs and drug clans. In addition,
they successfully fight against the heteronomous social representation
of the favela and replace it with voices and images of their
own. In the form of the Lula administration, whose Minister for
Social Affairs, Benedita da Silva, comes from the favela,
they for the first time encounter a federal government that supports
such activities.
The favela has triumphed, and the historically
limited, hierarchized and fragmented form of citizenship of the
favelados is at least heavily shaken. The central difference
between the morros and the asfalto today lies less
in the gradually vanishing illegality of the morros than
in the regime of violence that prevails there. Formal legality by
no means implies the factual rule of law. What is today simultaneously
replacing the "disorderly" informal situation, in which
the favelas evolved, is an "orderly informalization"
(Altvater / Mahnkopf 2002) in which state institutions withdraw
from providing services of general interest, leaving this to private
initiatives. Neoliberalism destroyed "the Brazilian caricature
of the welfare state" (<.> Souza), socially polarized
the city even more and massively aggravated the material living
conditions of the favelados (Ribeiro / Telles 2000). Many
instruments of its political building kit, e.g. "help to self-help"
meant to incite people's initiative, were already anticipated and
tested by the favela policies. For a hundred years the favelas
have taken care of their affairs on their own - now, at a point
in time when their political and civil rights appear to be attested
for the first time, the neoliberal state apparatus is restricting
social rights in general. A person forced to struggle to survive
will hardly possess free resources for emancipative activities,
something which is a feature of politically mature citizens. In
order to end the factual exclusion of the favelas, a redistribution
of society's resources is therefore necessary. The struggle for
these resources is likely to characterize the political conflicts
between the city, the state and the favelas in the future.
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Literature
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6
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Notes
- A recent documentation of
earlier settlements places this foundation narrative in the realm
of legends (Fessler Vaz / Berenstein Jaques 2003).
- Cabo eleitoral means "leader
of elections".
- Cavalcanti, who until today
defends the expulsion policy that followed (Calvalcanti 2002),
is an enigmatic figure in Rio de Janeiro's political scene. At
the onset of the military dictatorship she was president of the
national housing bank, in the early 1980s she was surprisingly
defeated by the leftist-populist Brizola in the elections for
governor, not least because she was connected with the scandals
in the wake of the favela expulsions, and in the 1990s, as associate
senator in Rio's local government, she again dealt with favela
programmes.
- "Companhia do Desenvolvimento
de Comunidades". The Brazilian term comunidade, often serves
as a synonym for favela.
- The demanded "moral
purity" has little to do with the reality of the Evangelist
sects (see Martins in this volume).
- "Partido Popular Poder
Para Maioria" (People's Party Power for the Majority)
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