An interview with Christian Campos reveals the position of Brazil's famous Landless Workers'Movement (MST) on everything from the structural adjustment of agriculture to the FTAA to 'mad cows'...

Brazil is a country steeped in contradiction. Mired by one of the world’s worst levels of wealth disparity, Brazil is also a global leader in grassroots mobilization. A clear outgrowth of this mixture of abject poverty and a politicized civil society is The Movimento dos Trabalhadores Sem Terra (MST), or the Landless Workers Movement. The MST is a response to the overly skewed land distribution of Brazil where less than 3% of the population controls two-thirds of Brazil’s arable land. Since its first actions in 1984, more than 250,000 families have won titles to over 15 million acres of unused land as a result of MST occupations. With over a million activists the MST is the largest social movement in the hemishpere and the largest agrarian reform movement in the world.

On Saturday, February 17, 2001, at Alternative’s General Assembly, journalist and economist, Christian Campos, a representative of the MST, participated in a panel presentation to discuss current activities and priorities of the movement. The following interview is an elaboration on her presentation.

Q: On Saturday, you gave the impression that government repression of the MST was increasing. Tactics you mentioned included outright violence and imprisonment, as well as subsidy and credit cuts. Why do you think the MST is coming under increasing scrutiny?

A: MST isn’t just a movement fighting for land. We are also fighting for people’s right to a productive and dignified life which includes access to education and health as well as the control of our production. As we fight for these things we are often pitted against not only landowners but powerful economic groups as well. Without adequate access to the most basic education and health mechanisms, landless workers are actually fighting against the political policies of the Brazilian government which favour economic groups over social policies. As such, the MST is increasingly articulating a critique of the economic system in Brazil, and not just a critique against farmers and landowners. These landowners often wield much power in the media and with businesses as well as in the government. So when the MST fights for land and more just public policy it often comes into direct conflict with the interests of more powerful economic groups, allied with the government. As MST challenges the Brazilian governmental model which prioritizes a small and privileged portion of the population at the cost of the basic rights of many, we have incurred repression.

Q: For the past 2 years, Rio Grande do Sul, where you live, has been under the control of the Workers’ Party (PT). What has their position been on land reform and rural workers’ rights? Have things gotten better under their administration?

A: State governments, like the Paritidos dos Trabalhadores (PT) in Brazil, can do very little for land reform in Brazil since land laws fall under federal jurisdiction. State governments for example, cannot disappropriate land, only federal governments can. What state governments can do however is buy land. In 1999 for example, the PT helped settle a total of 1300 MST families as well as many poor indigenous families in their own lands. The problem however, as viewed by the MST, is the system within the PT must work. A big problem for us is that the PT can only buy the land, whereas the MST has been fighting for the enforcement of the constitutional guarantee which provides governments with the right and the mandate to dissapropriate land which is sitting idle. By actually paying for the land, the PT is rewarding large landowners who have for centuries violently profited from the enslavement of indigenous, black and landless peasant labour. I think that while the PT is preoccupied with the issue of agrarian reform, they cannot really contribute much to our struggle within the current system. Where they can help however is in public policy guarantees for health and education. The PT has done much more to help improve social conditions in our camps than other state governments allied with the federal government.

Q: What happened at the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre? What role did MST play and how valuable was the experience?

A: Neither the MST nor the organizers of the World Social Forum were prepared for the large numbers of people present. We were expecting a few thousand and were amazed to discover over 10,000 people involved in various activities. This offered a clear demonstration of just how many people are mobilizing against neoliberal policies. In effect the World Social Forum helped show both participants and the world the extent to which people oppose current political and economic trends. It provided an opportunity for consolidating global alliances and a long sought after affirmation that real change is in fact conceivable. Another positive aspect was the fact that we could move beyond simply criticizing current structures and propose alternatives. The MST did not have a lot of actual registered delegates but participated in many public actions during the Forum. The MST, along with other peasant groups also organized during this period a protest occupation of a large seed company. This protest signaled our objection to the increasing control of multi-nationals of local agricultural production, a process we refer to as the globalisation of food. Another important issue for the MST at the Forum was environmental protection. Understanding that “another world is possible