Convicted teacher: ‘June 2013 is history in progress’ – 06/14/2023 – Power

Convicted in the first instance on charges of planning violent demonstrations in the wake of the Jornadas de Junho, Camila Jourdan, 43, claims that the 2013 protests are part of “a story that is still ongoing” and refutes comparisons with attacks by Bolsonaristas on the headquarters of the three Powers on January 8 of this year.

Professor at the Department of Philosophy at Uerj (State University of Rio de Janeiro), with a master’s and doctorate from PUC-RJ and a period of study in Sorbonne, France, Camila is awaiting trial on appeal and was acquitted in another case on the charge of keep explosive devices at home.

She was imprisoned for 13 days in the Bangu penitentiary complex, in the west zone of Rio, in 2014, when protests against the World Cup exploded, driven by those of the previous year, when the black blocs gained visibility.

In an email interview with SheetCamila inserts the acts of June 2013 in a context of revolts that gather from the demonstrations in Seattle, during a meeting of the WTO (World Trade Organization) in 1999, to the Black Lives Matter movement, started in 2020 in the United States.

“I listed these revolts to remind you that this is a story that is still ongoing. It is a historical event of refusal to represent.”

The Uerj professor claims that the criminalization of protesters allowed the rise of the right, represented by former president Jair Bolsonaro (PL). She says the investigation for which she was convicted “committed a series of illegal actions” and defends the balance of the June Days. “In terms of legacy for generations to come, it’s better that 2013 existed than if it didn’t.”

Why did the June 2013 demonstrations take on such proportions? The interesting thing about revolts is that they do not respond to a simple causal relationship. They are unpredictable.

I try to read 2013 in terms of the political “event”. The “events” create their own conditions, as they create meanings, open fields of possibilities that were not given. The same is true of other recent countersystemic revolts such as the Seattle revolt (1999), Que se vayam todos, in Argentina (2001), Greece (2008), Occupy Wall Street (2011), Chile (2019/2020), Black Lives They import in the US (2020) and others.

All had as basic characteristics horizontal organization, rejection of traditional forms of political representation, search for direct political participation in assemblies and occupations, rejection of unions and political parties, revaluation of elements of anarchism and autonomism, etc.

I listed these revolts to remind you that this is a story that is still ongoing. It is a historical event of refusal to representation.

Although it does not respond to a simple causality, 2013 maintains conditions. A deepening of the exclusionary city project was underway, through the proximity of mega-events. The very agenda of the passages has this meaning, which concerns the right to the city. Police repression generated even more revolt on the part of the population.

How do you evaluate the multiplicity of guidelines? There are those who find a weakness in the countersystemic movements, as they would not have a focus. I consider it its main strength. They express the multiplicity of an unrepresentable multitude, and its inability to receive a simple answer, to be co-optable. It was all this lifeless life of capital that was being refused.

It was never for 20 cents, we never get tired of repeating it. But even though they were multiple, they were historically associated with the left.

There were posters talking against corruption, which can be said to be an ideologically empty agenda, or even calling for military intervention. But, in the period 2013/2014, these people were very few and lost the dispute for the movement.

The rise of the right was only possible after the criminalization of the left in the streets, notably anarchists and self-defense tactics. Only in 2015/2016 did we see a very diverse profile of protesters calling for Dilma’s impeachment.

Some analysts believe that the right obtained more political benefits from the demonstrations. It was necessary first that what was not co-optable, usable in the electoral dispute, was pursued, removed from the scene.

The right could not profit from those demonstrations because they were contrary to its interests. For the right to obtain some benefit, it was necessary, first, that they were criminalized.

Only after that, with the help of the institutional left and media powers, was it possible for the right to take advantage, starting to occupy the place of what I call the “fake of the anti-systemic”, which the so-called alt-right adopts to grow in the crisis of representation.

If we think only in immediate terms, certainly the institutional reaction, those at the top, came out on top. But if we think of an extended notion of politics, we suffer attacks because we strengthen ourselves.

Life is short, and the struggle is long. What we learned from 2013, the teachings and experiments it bequeathed us are still alive. It was a movement that managed to extract a series of claims from the governments: Aldeia Maracanã was still not removed, high school students spread communes around the schools three years later and prevented their closure, a series of autonomous spaces were created and tactics of self-defense were propagated.

In terms of legacy for the next generations, it was better that 2013 existed than if it didn’t.

Are there links between June 2013 and the impeachment of Dilma Rousseff? It’s certainly not a direct link. To the extent that the government at the time criminalized and persecuted the mostly left-wing elements that occupied the streets at that time, it left the space open for the right-wing forces that helped to overthrow it.

It is to this extent that the Dilma government “digs its own grave”, which it had already been digging through the alliances it made and through the introduction of exceptional measures that later turned against themselves. On the other hand, it blames those it has criminalized.

Those who benefit from an approach like this are precisely those who want to prevent any popular uprising in the future. To think like this is to say: “It is better not to revolt, otherwise it will get worse”, a perfect argument against the possibility of any rebellion. Reading 2013 in this key does not primarily attack our past. It commits to any new possible future.

And with the rise of Jair Bolsonaro? I want to look at the uprising for itself, not from the point of view of disputes over institutionality. Whoever won the Presidency in France after May 1968 cannot be compared to the phenomenon of May 68. Would anyone say, therefore, that May 68 in France should not have existed? Or that later election is its deeper meaning?

This is obviously nonsense. In a certain sense, it is not this exchange of positions that interests me. The meaning of the insurrections does not die with each one of them, as it is a long story, which extends over time, crosses borders and goes far beyond electoral disputes.

Bolsonarism is a right-wing movement that goes beyond Jair, precisely because it is the incarnation of this preventive counter-rebellion, which clearly follows after 2013. It plays a role in silencing the oppressed, insofar as it serves as the “guard dog” of the powers that be. constituted.

One of the hallmarks of the demonstrations were the so-called “direct actions”, considered vandalism by Justice. How do you see the use of this tactic in the acts? Direct action has nothing to do with “acts of vandalism”, as has been repeated over and over by the media. Every time you don’t wait for the State to promote a political action, you take a direct action: occupying an abandoned house to make private property have a social purpose, occupying a factory and self-managing this workplace.

It has always been direct actions and civil disobedience that have promoted social change. They are the historical engines of popular conquests. It is dangerous to transform the power of social movements into a symbol of their weakness through criminalization.

And that’s exactly what the dominant narrative about 2013 operates when it says “people left the streets because of vandalism”.

What vandalism? Since when is breaking a window in a political act vandalism? Since when is burning a symbol of oppression not an action of active dismissal of what is invested as the eternalization of a victory in a war?

The coup movement on January 8 of this year used tactics similar to those seen in June 2013, such as the use of camps (in this case, in front of barracks) and attacking public buildings. What are the parallels and differences? Far-right tactics are far from direct action. What do they ask? Coup, more State, nationalism, militarism, military intervention. In a word: fascism.

And what do they do? They attack national symbols and state symbols?! Does that make any sense? This is not direct action at all. It is a “countersystemic fake”. It is a spectacularization of revolt, an inversion of signs. What they want has nothing to do with what they do, it is a sign detached from their meaning.

One way to point this out is through the police support they received. The security forces not only facilitated the actions, they were accomplices. Compare with the repression we suffered in 2013 and other similar uprisings.

Mrs. she was convicted of allegedly planning violent acts. What is her assessment of the process?He has a series of fabricated accusations, some of which are already legally disqualified, since the investigation itself committed a series of illegal actions. I was recently acquitted of part of the accusations I was responding to. Another part of the process is still awaiting judgment in the second instance, where, I believe, it will finally be dismantled.

But it has already fulfilled the function of preventive punishment, clearing the streets, and keeping people in fear, which was its main purpose.

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CAMILA JOURDAN, 43

Professor at the Department of Philosophy at Uerj (University of the State of Rio de Janeiro). She has a doctorate (2009) and a master’s degree (2005) in Philosophy from PUC-Rio, with a sandwich period at Paris I University, Sorbonne. She wrote the book “2013: Memories and Resistances” (Circuito, 2018). She was sentenced in the first instance, along with 22 other activists, to seven years in prison on charges of criminal association and corruption of minors by allegedly planning violent acts at demonstrations. She appeals the sentence in freedom, after being imprisoned for 13 days.