Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
The everyday realities of MST settlements are quite different from
those established through the World Bank's market-led agrarian reform
(Martins 2006). MST squatters do not incur debt because, while benefi -
ciaries of the market-led program must buy their land, these activists
demand and seize it. And while those acquiring land through the World
Bank have diffi culty obtaining the infrastructure necessary to manage a
farm, MST settlers can access credit or other agricultural services through
the National Confederation of Agrarian Reform Cooperatives. Some-
times described as the economic arm of the MST, this organization helps
maintain the economic solvency, and thus sustainability, of MST settle-
ments (Martins 2006). Moreover, while structural adjustment policies
dictate the application of expert knowledge from the global North, MST
settlers maintain local control over land management through a collec-
tive model of planning and farm production. They participate in frequent
assemblies in which they discuss problems and make proposals. All of
the settlements' major political and economic decisions are made demo-
cratically, including the reinvestment and distribution of profi ts.
Observers of the MST highlight its dedication to education, which it
posits as an essential link between agrarian reform and broader social
change. The movement operates six hundred elementary and twenty high
schools, as well as vocational and political training schools serving more
than 500,000 adults. Their pedagogy seeks to honor both youth and adult
students' lived experiences by incorporating the movement's lessons and
struggles into their curricula (Martins 2006). A study of recently settled
farmers in four regions of Brazil revealed that 87 percent did not attend
school past the fourth grade (Ondetti 2008). Although this study includes
only MST members living in settlements, it suggests that MST schools
must teach basic reading and writing skills alongside structural literacy.
Beyond land reform, the MST seeks to participate in the formation
of political alternatives to neoliberalism that emphasize employment,
education, housing, food, and health (Martins 2006). Supporters describe
the movement's Popular Project as a democratic and participatory space
in which networks of MST members engage in dialog with professors,
politicians, technicians, students, and priests. The MST then seeks to gain
publicity for their political vision through popular protest. For example,
in 1998, almost 6,000 workers marched across the country in protest
against then-president Cardoso's support for the market-led agrarian
reform advocated by the World Bank. And while they tend to view
President Luiz Ignacio Lula de Silva as an ally, a second march in 2005
was designed to pressure him into stronger support for the MST's goals.
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