CSR and social conflict in the Brazilian extractive sector

ABSTRACT

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is an important means to address conflicts, support local development and build trust between businesses and civil society. Yet CSR often fails to live up to its ambitions and can even exacerbate conflicts between companies and communities. In this article we consider how changing CSR strategies over the past four decades between Brazilian company Vale to Norwegian company Hydro have fomented or mitigated company–community conflicts in Northern Brazil. We find that paternalistic and philanthropic approaches of Vale over time led to deep resentment and mistrust due to underdevelopment and environmental damages. Moreover, while Hydro’s more modern CSR strategies sought to deepen community engagement and build legitimacy, the company has struggled in addressing the legacies inherited from Vale and past and current civil society grievances. The case suggests that even forward-thinking CSR approaches are vulnerable to failure where they prioritise business risk over community engagement, neglect to account for past legacies in areas of operation, and fail to create a shared vision of future development. It suggests that EI companies should both understand and engage with their social and environmental impacts in the past, present, and future and create shared economic benefits in the short and long term in order to address social conflicts.     

Women Sustaining Community: The Politics of Agro-Ecology in Quilombo Tourism in Southern Brazil

This article analyses how a gendered perspective on community-based tourism (CBT) contributes to the realisation of identity and sovereignty of quilombos. It examines the potential sustainability of CBT coupled with agro-ecological practices within the context of gendered identity politics. Drawing from in-depth ethnographic and archival research conducted between February and July 2015 at Campinho da Independência (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil), the article discusses how female leaders integrate sustainable agro-ecological practices and CBT with environmental education in what they call ‘ethno-ecological tourism’. This approach to CBT strengthens a proudly defiant version of Afro-Brazilian ethnic identity vis-à-vis the state.     

'Diacuí Killed Iracema': Indigenism, Nationalism and the Struggle for Brazilianness

If categories of 'race' and nationality are social and historical constructions laden with irrefutable meaning and consequences, then ethnic identities, like any other forms of identity, are means to other ends that may or may not be particular. Twentieth‐century indigenist history in Brazil reveals how the cultural politics of indigenism and nationalism can coalesce in a tautological politics of identity that undermines individual liberty and democratic heterogeneity. The concepts 'post‐indigenism,'post‐nationalism' and 'post‐identity' point to the strategic suspension of the infinite heterogeneity of the political subject as a means to widen the ground of shared experience and common interests beyond the realm of hollow and oppressive essentialisms.     

Disciplining Society through the City: The Genesis of City Planning in Brazil and Argentina (1894–1945)

This paper looks at the genesis of a discourse on urbanismo (city planning) in Brazil and Argentina between 1894 and 1945 using the ideas of Michel Foucault on discipline and his concept of bio–power. The demographic pattern of the major cities in both countries from 1890 onwards and the renewals of the centres of these cities are also discussed. Other sections are dedicated to the plans proposed for the same cities in the 1920s and to urban representations, such as ideas about social reform, the role of hygiene as a point of departure for planning, and the relationship of ideas on Taylorism (scientific management) and the city. The paper also discusses the planners opposition to elections, when they claimed that they were the only ones qualified to deal with urban problems and therefore they should be employed in the state apparatus.
Other concerns of the paper are the use of planning as an element of nation building and ideas defining eugenics (race 'betterment') as an important aspect of city planning. I conclude by arguing that, if implemented, city planning was a way of creating an industrial culture, disciplining society through the city, although the industrial proletariat has never made up the majority of the population in Brazil or Argentina. Even if many aspects of the plans proposed for both countries were not implemented, the discourse of planners can be seen as a will to discipline society through the city. This discipline would affect the freedom of movement of human bodies, and is therefore approached through Foucault's concepts of bio–power and discipline     

Book Reviews

Books reviewed in this article:
Robert Barros, Constitutionalism and Dictatorship: Pinochet, the Junta and the 1980 Constitution
Barry Ames, The Deadlock of Democracy in Brazil
Christina Biebesheimer and Francisco Mejia (eds), Justice beyond our borders: judicial reforms for Latin America and the Caribbean
Jacobo Timerman, Prisoner without a Name, Cell without a Number
Rafael Hernández and John H. Coatsworth, Culturas Encontradas: Cuba y los Estados Unidos
Terence N. D'Altroy, The Incas
Anibal González, Killer Books: Writing, Violence and Ethics in Modern Spanish American Narrative
Efrain Kristal, Invisible Work: Borges and Translation
Beatriz Sarlo, Scenes from Postmodern Life     

Unclogging Courts by Targeting Litigant Incentives: The Case of the Brazilian Labour Justice Reform

Overburdened courts hinder economic and social progress, yet successful court reforms are rare. Instead of boosting judicial resources or adapting procedure, Brazil tackled persistent backlogs and delays in its labour courts by replacing the pre-existing each-pays-their-own-costs (American) rule for allocation of litigation expenses with an alternative loser-pays-all (English) rule. Using a newly assembled court-level panel dataset and difference-in-differences approach, we show that the reform alleviated the courts' demand pressures and, most importantly, increased court efficacy in both adjudication and enforcement. The Brazilian experience offers valuable policy lessons about viable court reforms for other jurisdictions.     

也谈南海断续线的法律性质

南海断续线的法律性质对于澄清南海问题的实质及问题的解决具有重要意义。综合各种因素考虑,其作为岛屿(礁)归属线的性质可以确证,而海上国界线、历史性水域线及历史性权利线等表述均存在瑕疵,为巩固我国对线内水域的权利主张,除岛屿(礁)归属线外,将其同时界定为可管辖水域线较为可取。     

德国反洗钱刑事立法述评与启示

为了遏制和打击洗钱活动，德国通过在刑法典中新增洗钱罪和多次的修订，将洗钱行为犯罪化，逐步建立起反洗钱和恐怖融资的刑事法律体系，并在一定程度上具有自己的独特之处。在国际社会共同打击洗钱活动和我国面临严峻洗钱形势的背景下，有必要介绍德国反洗钱刑事立法的成功经验，这对于完善我国的反洗钱法律制度具有借鉴意义。     

Understanding rural resistance: contemporary mobilization in the Brazilian countryside

Contradictions between impressive levels of economic growth and the persistence of poverty and inequality are perhaps nowhere more evident than in rural Brazil. While Brazil might appear to be an example of the potential harmony between large-scale, export-oriented agribusiness and small-scale family farming, high levels of rural resistance contradict this vision. In this introductory paper, we synthesize the literature on agrarian resistance in Brazil and situate recent struggles in Brazil within the Latin American context more broadly. We highlight seven key characteristics of contemporary Latin American resistance, which include: the growth of international networks, the changing structure of state–society collaboration, the deepening of territorial claims, the importance of autonomy, the development of alternative economies, continued opposition to dispossession, and struggles over the meaning of nature. We argue that by analyzing rural mobilization in Brazil, this collection offers a range of insights relevant to rural contention globally. Each contribution in this collection increases our understanding of alternative agricultural production, large-scale development projects, education, race and political parties in the contemporary agrarian context.     

Cinema’s Milieu: Negotiating the movies’ public and popular dimensions in early twentieth-century Brazil

Drawing on extensive archival research, this paper examines the controversies over the place and the role of cinema in early twentieth-century Brazil. It situates these debates in the context of Brazil’s struggle to come to terms with the powerful forces of modernity, in particular with issues of race, immigration, class formation and conflict, and changing gender roles. Tracing the discourses of Brazil’s cultural elites and also the practical responses of film entrepreneurs and exhibitors, the paper discusses how these interactions overlapped with changes taking place in Brazil’s cinematic landscape and illustrates how they had profound effects on film content, its function, and exhibition practices.