Discussion of All Things Political

RIO DE JANEIRO, Aug 25, 2011 (IPS) - Brazil is making progress in cracking down on homophobia and upholding the rights of homosexuals. The latest step was the introduction in Congress of a bill on sexual diversity, sponsored by the bar association in consultation with civil society.

The 109-article bill, which would reform 132 legal provisions, was drafted by a special commission of experts set up by the Federal Council of the national bar association (OAB), who received some 200 suggestions and contributions from activists and social movements over the last four months.

The chief aim is to guarantee the rights of the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transsexual) population, protect freedom of sexual orientation, gender identity and gender equality, as well as the right to form a family, and fight discrimination, lawyer Maria Berenice Dias, who presides over the OAB's Special Commission on Sexual Diversity, told IPS.

"So far there is no law recognising LGBT rights. I have been working in the area of gay rights for 10 years," said Dias, who set up the OAB commission on Apr. 15.

"We saw the need for broad legislation on this question in Brazil, which has laws protecting children, people with special needs and others, but not homosexuals," she said.

But she noted the historic unanimous ruling handed down by the Supreme Court on May 5, recognising same-sex civil unions.

The verdict helped paved the way for homosexual couples to gain access to rights like a pension, inheritance, and the adoption of children. "It took a decade to achieve that legal recognition by the courts," said Dias.MORE

By appointing women to two key ministries this month, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff has nearly met her goal of having a cabinet comprising at least 30 per cent women, with women in predominant roles at the Planalto Palace, the seat of government.

Rose Marie Muraro, a writer and pioneer of Brazil's feminist movement in the 1970s who, like Rousseff herself, inspired many of the women in politics today, is enthusiastic.

"The hard core of power is in the hands of women, and that is very important," said Muraro, who was declared by law a "National Patron of Feminism" by former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (2003-2010).

Muraro is also a role model for women such as Gleisi Hoffmann, who was appointed chief of staff on June 7.

A lawyer and former senator, Hoffmann is nicknamed "the tractor" in the capital's political circles because of her hard work and ability to get things done. She replaced Antonio Palocci, forced to resign over questions about the sudden 20-fold expansion of his personal fortune.

Although there is no proof of illicit enrichment, Palocci's position as Rousseff's "right-hand man" became politically untenable for the governing Workers' Party (PT) and its allied political forces.

The president, who on July 1 will complete her first six months at the head of a moderate left-wing government, surprised politicians again on June 10 by transferring Ideli Salvatti, one of the most combative PT leaders, from the Fisheries Ministry to the key Institutional Relations Ministry where she will serve as Rousseff's chief liaison with Congress.

Brazil's first woman president now has ten women in her cabinet of 38 ministers, so she needs two more to meet her self-imposed target of 30 per cent. MORE

For the last three consecutive years, Brazil, an agricultural giant, has occupied first place worldwide in the consumption of agricultural herbicides, fungicides and insecticides. It had risen to second place behind the United States in 2006, but took over the top spot in 2008 after a record soybean harvest.

A study by the German market research firm Kleffmann Group, commissioned by the National Association for Plant Protection, which represents agrochemical manufacturers, confirmed that Brazil is the world’s leading market for agrochemicals.

Over seven billion dollars were spent on these products in 2008, while the area of cultivated land decreased by two percent.

Nevertheless, the amount of chemical products used per farmer in Brazil is relatively small compared to other countries. In 2007, an average of 87.8 dollars per hectare were spent on agrochemicals in Brazil, compared to 196.7 dollars in France and 851 dollars in Japan.

The five biggest transnationals in this sector - BASF, Bayer, Syngenta, DuPont and Monsanto - all have manufacturing plants in Brazil.

This situation has led the MST to broaden its focus beyond its original purpose of pushing for the effective implementation of agrarian reform. The organisation currently represents some 20,000 members throughout Brazil, and works alongside 60,000 rural families in pressuring the government to distribute idle farmland and improve the conditions on those areas already settled by small family farmers. Stédile spoke with Tierramérica about the movement’s current concerns.MORE

RIO DE JANEIRO, Apr 27, 2011 (IPS) - A process of "agrarian counter-reform" is taking place in Brazil, according to activist João Pedro Stédile, a leader of the Landless Rural Workers Movement (MST).

Stédile said Brazil's land reform efforts faltered in the last few years of the government of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (2003-2011), while land ownership became more concentrated.

In the final stretch of President Lula's second term, many legal expropriations of idle land on large estates were blocked in court.

In addition, the international financial crisis "had the opposite effect in Brazil, because in order to protect their funds, international capitalists ran to Brazil to invest in land and energy projects," the activist said.

That led to a "perverse logic" in agriculture, in which purchases of unproductive land by the government were disputed and ownership became more concentrated, as part of "an agrarian counter-reform process," he said.

The most recent official figures are from 2006. The Agricultural Census of that year, published in 2009 by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE), shows that the concentration of rural land has remained virtually unaltered in the last two decades.

In Brazil, one of the countries in the world with the most uneven distributions of land, around 3.5 percent of landowners hold 56 percent of the arable land while the poorest 40 percent own barely one percent.

According to the IBGE, properties larger than 1,000 hectares cover 46 percent of Brazil's farmland, while properties smaller than 10 hectares occupy barely 2.7 percent.

"The concentration is worse now than in 1920, when we were just getting over slavery (which was abolished in 1888)," Stédile told IPS. "We hope the government of Dilma (Rousseff) will change the agrarian policy, starting with INCRA," Brazil's National Institute for Colonisation and Agrarian Reform. MORE

Fifty thousand residents of Porto Alegre—poor and middle class, women and men, leftist and centrist—now take part in the participatory budgeting process for this city of a million and a half people, and the numbers involved have grown each year since its start in 1989. Then, only 75 percent of homes had running water.

Today 99 percent have treated water and 85 percent have piped sewage. In seven years, housing assistance jumped from 1,700 families to 29,000. In 12 years, the number of public schools increased from 29 to 86, and literacy has reached 98 percent. Each year the bulk of new street-paving projects has gone to the poorer, outlying districts. In addition to these achievements, corruption, which before was the rule, has virtually disappeared.

( Read more... )

Wikipedia article:Social Movements practicing Partiscipatory Democracy

The Six Nations:Oldest Living Participatory Democracy on Earth

The people of the Six Nations, also known by the French term, Iroquois [1] Confederacy, call themselves the Hau de no sau nee (ho dee noe sho nee) meaning People Building a Long House. Located in the northeastern region of North America, originally the Six Nations was five and included the Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecas. The sixth nation, the Tuscaroras, migrated into Iroquois country in the early eighteenth century. Together these peoples comprise the oldest living participatory democracy on earth. Their story, and governance truly based on the consent of the governed, contains a great deal of life-promoting intelligence for those of us not familiar with this area of American history. The original United States representative democracy, fashioned by such central authors as Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson, drew much inspiration from this confederacy of nations. In our present day, we can benefit immensely, in our quest to establish anew a government truly dedicated to all life's liberty and happiness much as has been practiced by the Six Nations for over 800 hundred years. [2] MORE

Wikipedia links to Criticism

Reviewing the experience in Brazil and Porto Alegre a World Bank paper points out that lack of representation of extremely poor people in participatory budgeting can be a shortcoming. Participation of the very poor and of the young is highlighted as a challenge.^[6] Participatory budgeting may also struggle to overcome existing clientelism. Other observations include that particular groups are less likely to participate once their demands have been met and that slow progress of public works can frustrate participants.^[6]
MORE

From this World Bank paper: PARTICIPATORY BUDGETING IN BRAZIL* Quick and easy read btw



Liberty Tree's 2004 Prospects for Participatory Democracy in the USA


The Participatory Budgeting Project


In light of the ongoing lets gut the poor to feed the rich trends happening around the world, what do you guys think of this alternative?

Mobility International USA (MIUSA) is a non-profit organization whose mission is to empower people with disabilities around the world to achieve their human rights through international exchange and international development. As part of their 30^th anniversary celebration, they created this "Loud, Proud and Passionate!" video. They filmed it during their 5^th International Women's Institute on Leadership and Disability (WILD) - here's how they describe it:Signing and singing with passion in Arabic, Spanish and English, 54 disabled women activists from 43 countries celebrate the achievements, pride and solidarity of women with disabilities around the world. These leaders are revolutionizing the status of women and girls worldwide. MORE

The Haitian government says it is ready to issue former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide with a passport, opening the way for his possible return.

Mr Aristide was ousted seven years ago, and has been living in exile.

The news comes at a critical time, with the final results of the disputed first round of the presidential election due on Wednesday.

He would be the second ousted president to return, after the surprise arrival two weeks ago of Jean-Claude Duvalier.

General Secretary for the Haitian Presidency Fritz Longchamp told the Reuters news agency that "the Council of Ministers, under the leadership of President Rene Preval, decided that a diplomatic passport be issued to President Aristide, if he asks for it."MORE

Back in May, @viewfromthecave tweeted that The Kristof was taking questions from readers to be answered via YouTube. This is the question I asked:

Your columns about Africa almost always feature black Africans as victims, and white foreigners as their saviors.

There was more to it than that, but I can't find the original post. At any rate, the gist of the question was, "Why not feature more of the work that Africans are doing to solve their countries' problems?"


And, lo and behold, Kristof answered. NYT Picker thankfully has the transcript for those of us on dial-up connections:
This is a really important issue for a journalist. And it's one I've thought a lot about.

I should, first of all, from my defensive crouch, say that I think you're a little bit exaggerating the way I have reported. Indeed, recently, for example, among the Africans who I have emphasized, the people who are doing fantastic work are the extraordinary Dr. Dennis Mukwege in the Congo, Edna Adan in Somaliland, Valentino Deng in Sudan, Manute Bol in Sudan, and there are a lot of others.


But I do take your point. That very often I do go to developing countries where local people are doing extraordinary work, and instead I tend to focus on some foreigner, often some American, who’s doing something there.


And let me tell you why I do that. The problem that I face -- my challenge as a writer -- in trying to get readers to care about something like Eastern Congo, is that frankly, the moment a reader sees that I'm writing about Central Africa, for an awful lot of them, that's the moment to turn the page. It's very hard to get people to care about distant crises like that.


One way of getting people to read at least a few grafs in is to have some kind of a foreign protagonist, some American who they can identify with as a bridge character.


And so if this is a way I can get people to care about foreign countries, to read about them, ideally, to get a little bit more involved, then I plead guilty.

As NYT Picker aptly notes, the persons to whom Kristof refers have either not been mentioned in his print columns or are typically only mentioned briefly.Texas in Africa proceeds to fisk this white liberal racist BS as it deserves

PORT-LOUIS , Jul 14, 2010 (IPS) - "Instead of moaning all the time, why don’t you create your own (political) party?" some men asked Brigitte Rabemanantsoa Rasamoelina, a female politician from Madagascar. She accepted the challenge and in February formed Ampela Mano Politika, a political party which started with only 22 female members and now has over 5,000 female members ... and 10 men.


With female political representation standing at only 3.75 percent in Madagascar, a women’s lot is very precarious, says Rasamoelina.


And so too is the situation for many women in most of the Indian Ocean Islands. Female political representation is a mere three percent in Comoros, 18 percent in Mauritius and 23.5 percent in the Seychelles.


It is one of the reasons why Rasamoelina and 30 other women from the Indian Ocean Islands, gathered recently in Mauritius to identify ways to attain parity among men and women in politics in an event organised by the Indian Ocean Commission and Women in Politics (WIP).MORE

The request by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to the United Nations Human Rights Council last year to postpone the vote on the Goldstone report followed a particularly tense meeting with the head of the Shin Bet security service, Haaretz has learned. At the October meeting in Ramallah, Shin Bet chief Yuval Diskin told Abbas that if he did not ask for a deferral of the vote on the critical report on last year's military operation, Israel would turn the West Bank into a "second Gaza."MORE

The recently signed agreements between Brazil and France are about much more than the purchase of armaments. They indicate the creation of a military industrial complex, a goal which forms part of the National Defense Strategy of Brazil. This new industrial superpower, owner of the seventh largest oil reserves of the world and the world's largest area of natural biodiversity in the Amazon, is now seeking to protect its riches and assert itself as a new military power.

Sometimes it seems the modus operandi of the large modern warfare businesses closely resembles the intrigues of a television soap opera. It took President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's announcement that he was leaning toward purchasing 35 fifth generation fighter planes from the French company Dassault, for the Swedish Saab and the American Boeing to fall over themselves to profess their unrequited love for all things Brazilian.
The companies are responding to the announcement that Brazil is renovating its aging fleet and also planning to create the largest military industrial complex in the southern hemisphere. On Sept. 7, Brazil's Independence Day, Lula and the French President Nicolas Sarkozy signed off on the purchase of five submarines, four of them conventional and one nuclear, and 50 military transport helicopters, all for a total of USD$12 billion. At the same time, Lula announced Brazil's intention to purchase 36 Rafale fighter jets, which would increase the financial transaction to USD$20 billion.

The fighter jet story goes back to 1998. The Brazilian Air Force has 110 jets which were built in the 1970s and 80s and which are now too old and outdated for a country whose needs include patrolling 8 million square kilometers of territory, 17 million kilometers of national borders, and vast offshore oil platforms. The newest aircraft are 12 Mirage 2000s, which were bought second-hand and are well past their retirement date. By contrast, Chile has 28 F-16s, and Venezuela has 24 Sukhoi 30s, both the most advanced models available.

In the running for the contract are the French Rafale, the Swedish Gripen, and Boeing's F-18 Super Hornet. There is not much of a difference between them on a technical basis, but their prices do vary dramatically: each Gripen costs USD$50 million, and the Rafales are priced at USD$80 million. The advantage that the F-18 has is that it is the most tried and tested fighter plane on offer. The French, however, have from the start guaranteed to give the Brazilians the source codes—the digital heart—of the aircraft, something Boeing is unable to do without the authorization of the U.S. Congress.
MORE

RÍO DE JANEIRO, Jun 8 (IPS) - While their protest marches and occupations of government and business offices recall the struggles of landless campesinos, this group of Brazilian farmers are drawing attention to a distinct facet of agrarian reform. These workers have mobilised to hold onto the land they own and build a more just and environmentally sound society.

The Small Farmers Movement (MPA) has incorporated many new organisational ways of fighting economic and social injustice.

The activists stepped up their protests this year, "with very positive results," Aurio Scherer, an MPA coordinator, based in the southern state of Rio Grande do Sul, told IPS.

Following the most recent protests, held May 23 and 24, the government granted payment deferrals for investment loans and reduced debts taken on to pay for production expenses. Weather problems and falling prices have triggered several bankruptcies, and Minister of Agrarian Development Guilherme Cassel has acknowledged that there is a farm price crisis.

Another "major step forward" was, according to Scherer, the government's promise to make the temporary social security provisions for rural communities a permanent law, consolidating one of Brazil's main income-redistribution policies, by allowing campesinos to retire at the age of 60 for men and 55 for women and draw a pension equivalent to the minimum wage of 155 dollars a month. MORE

PENANG, Malaysia, Oct 9 (IPS/IFEJ) - When organisers of an international conference on climate change and the food crisis first scheduled the event here for late September, little did they realise the event would be sandwiched by two typhoons buffeting the region. Ironically, the first typhoon, ‘Ketsana’, delayed the arrival of conference delegates from the Philippines.

A week after Ketsana struck the Philippines on Sep. 26 and then Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos, it was the turn of Typhoon Parma to wreak havoc in the Philippines on Oct. 3. Now downgraded to a tropical storm, ‘Parma’ is still lingering over the region and initially entangled with another Pacific super typhoon, ‘Melor’, which then headed towards Japan.

Ketsana left a devastating trail after it dumped the equivalent of one month's rainfall over Manila within six hours. Although Parma largely spared the country, it flooded large tracts of rice fields in northern Philippines and destroyed crops ready for harvest.

The typhoons in the region brought into sharp relief the issue of climate change as farmers struggle to cope with changing weather patterns. It is not just the sudden storms and heavy rainfalls that are disrupting farming but also the blurring of the seasons. MORE

On many fronts, however, the president is likely to discover that his real obstacles to progress south of the border lie uncomfortably close to home.
In preparation for the summit, the Obama administration has made some overtures to Cuba, responding to demands by nearly every Latin American country that Washington end its cold war against Havana. The need to keep Democratic senators from Florida and New Jersey (states with large Cuban-American populations) in the fold means that the general travel ban and trade embargo will, however, stay in place, at least for now. (In 1933, Hull tried to prevent the Cuban envoy from speaking, fearing that he would give a fiery anti-American speech; Gruening appealed to the principle of free speech to reverse the ban.)
Obama will probably reiterate recent official statements by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, among others, that the United States bears real responsibility for Mexico's drug-war violence and perhaps bemoan the way an "inability to prevent weapons from being illegally smuggled across the border" fuels drug-related killings. Like every other administration, though, Obama's will have to answer to the National Rifle Association (NRA), which at this point carries out its own foreign policy.

In 2005, for example, when Brazil held a referendum to implement a stringent gun-control law, the NRA spent considerable money lobbying to successfully defeat it. So expect the NRA to fight any attempt to stem the flow of guns south of the border. In fact, Wyoming senator John Barrasso hopes to use the fear of Mexican drug violence to force a greater distribution of assault weapons. As he put the matter, "Why would you disarm someone when they potentially could get caught in the crossfire?... The United States will not surrender our Second Amendment rights for Mexico's border problem."

And so it goes: On nearly every issue that could either actually help relieve the suffering of Latin Americans or allow the US to win back strategic allies, domestic politics will hinder Obama's range of action, even if not his immediate popularity.MORE