Stedile experienced reinvention of the MST after disillusionment with PT – 01/21/2024 – Power

The trajectories of João Pedro Stedile, 70, and the MST (Landless Rural Workers Movement), which turns 40 this January, are inseparably intertwined. “I don’t have an individual story,” Stedile tells Sheet at the movement’s national headquarters, located in the central region of São Paulo.

The townhouse was purchased with funds from the sale of the 1997 book “Terra”, in which Sebastião Salgado portrayed the lives of the country’s landless people. The most shocking photographs were taken in the days following the Eldorado do Carajás massacre, in Pará, in 1996, when 19 landless people were murdered by military police.

The photographer traveled to the North after Stedile gave him his seat on a plane chartered by the PT. “It’s more important for you to photograph the massacre than for me to go there as a leader”, reproduces Stedile, remembering what he said to Salgado, who would give the book’s copyright to the movement.

The passage is illustrative of the way in which Stedile has exercised his leadership in the MST: a presence at all decisive moments, but without fanfare. Not for nothing, he is often called “president of the MST”, a position that does not exist in the structure. In 2015, Lula (PT) referred to the movement as “Stedile’s army”. He is, in fact, one of the group’s national coordinators.

The prominent position he occupies, however, places him at the center of a conflict with the Lula government.

In December, he classified 2023 as the worst in the number of families settled in 40 years, repeating accusations he made in other PT administrations, and was refuted by Minister Paulo Teixeira (PT), of Agrarian Development. It thus stars another chapter in relations that are sometimes confrontational and sometimes close with PT politicians.

João Paulo Rodrigues, national leader of the MST, describes Stedile as a Franciscan: he doesn’t have his own house, car or cell phone. He has a desktop computer, which he uses to send emails, and avoids events with many people.

Under this stance, Rodrigues and several others see in the figure of Stedile the confluence of the MST’s guidelines, such as autonomy (without submission to parties), caution (against uncertain invasions) and the prioritization of the bases (settlements are linked to state and national directorates, but are independent). When it got off track, the MST got into trouble, they say.

In books, articles and interviews, Stedile systematized a historical reading of the MST inspired by Marxist theory and Liberation Theology, a progressive current of the Catholic Church, whose traces are recognizable in the movement’s flags and practices.

The emphasis on the family (to the detriment of individuals) as the basis of mobilization, the understanding of settlements as spaces of discipline and sociability (where members are obliged to follow strict rules and study) add to criticism of the bourgeoisie and capitalism.

The son of small farmers, Stedile was born in December 1953 in Lagoa Vermelha, Rio Grande do Sul. He graduated in economics at PUC-RS and, during college, passed a competition to work at the state’s Department of Agriculture.

In 1978 and 1979, he played a decisive role in the invasions (called occupations by the landless people) of the Macali and Brilhante farms, recognized as the embryos of the MST.

On that occasion, Kaingang indigenous people expelled farmers from the Nonoai reserve, in the north of Rio Grande do Sul. Stedile then convinced the peasants not to attack the indigenous people, but to occupy the farms that were on public lands that had been illegally leased to local landowners – he knew this from his work in the state government.

The action marked the resumption of peasant mobilization in the country after the interruption imposed by the 1964 military coup and laid the foundations of the MST, which would be founded in Cascavel (PR) in January 1984. At that time, says Stedile, the vision of the movement was still it was narrow.

“We thought that land was enough for those who work on it to escape poverty.”

Over time, the diagnosis gained density, and he argues that the solutions in the following years were the greatest successes in four decades: the organization of production for the market, schools in settlements and the defense of agroecology.

Stedile became the main political articulator and spokesperson for the MST and was entrusted with the task of taking the landless people’s agenda to parliamentarians and heads of executive.

In the case of the PT governments, seen as allies, the relationship became a source of tension. At times, the proximity generates criticism of the MST’s supposed leniency. In others, the protests are seen by PT members as betrayals. Outside the progressive camp, the PT is criticized when it appeals to the landless.

In the Lula 1st and 2nd governments (2003-2010), the campaign promise of agrarian reform was abandoned. The PT set the goal of settling 500,000 families (in 1994, there were 800,000; in 1998, 1 million), but later removed it from the government program.

In 2007, Stedile even said that the MST had been deceived by Lula. Two years later, the landless invaded the Ministry of Finance and chanted: “Lula, what happened? Where is the agrarian reform you promised us?”

Even so, the Lula governments had 20% fewer invasions than those of Fernando Henrique Cardoso (PSDB). The toucans attributed this to an alleged white-plate stance between the MST and the PT.

With Dilma Rousseff (2011-2016), settlements plummeted to levels lower than those under the PSDB administration. The disenchantment promoted by the allied PT mandates crystallized a change in the conceptions of Stedile and the MST itself.

The dream of classic agrarian reform, based on an alliance with the most progressive industrial sectors to overcome backwardness in the countryside, had died. Its space, then, should be taken over by a popular agrarian reform program, based on agroecological development and a struggle against large estates and transnational companies.

“Popular agrarian reform is in the sense that it is no longer just a demand of poor farmers. It has to be a program that serves the entire Brazilian people, and not just those involved in working the land. We include the defense of nature, water, reforestation”, he states.

They also added agroindustry, which supported the MST following the Michel Temer (MDB) and Jair Bolsonaro (PL) governments, faced with the emptying of agrarian reform and family farming projects. Faced with the fear of violence, with Bolsonaro’s speeches encouraging the use of weapons in the countryside, the MST recommended that landless people avoid occupations with potential for conflict.

By turning inwards, the MST organized its production chains, reached 185 cooperatives and established itself as a reference in the production of organic rice, milk and grape juice.

In 2015, he held the first National Agrarian Reform Fair, in São Paulo; in 2023, 300 thousand people passed through it. In 2016, it created the first Armazém do Campo unit, also in the capital of São Paulo, where it sells its products. Today, there are already 34 physical stores.

During the period in which it retreated from the invasions, it underwent a “rebranding” and sold thousands of caps, t-shirts and flags.

Still, the occupation policy cannot be abandoned, says the MST leader. The pressure on government officials must be constant. “In the history of agrarian reform in the world, there is no process of correcting land distortions without the population mobilizing. In no country in the world has the government decided ‘ah, where are the landless people? I’m going to give you land ‘”.

In the context in which social movements found themselves trapped under Bolsonaro, embracing Lula again in 2022 was a natural decision, says Stedile. But without the illusions of the past.

“It was a question of saving democracy. We never got involved in Lula’s campaign imagining ‘now the agrarian reform is going'”, he states. Even though expectations were low, disagreements soon resurfaced.

In April last year, the occupation of Embrapa land in Pernambuco angered the Lula government. The action contradicted the movement’s discourse that it only occupies unproductive land. On the MST side, criticism is mounting regarding the slowness of the settlement policy and the purchase of family farming products.

By 2024, invasions are expected to increase, Stedile predicts. And it will not be because of a decision by the movement, but because of the difficulties of the landless. “If the government does not take the initiative, the capitalist crisis will continue to deepen. Human beings are not like a frog, which an ox steps on and dies without saying anything. There will be much more social struggle”, she adds.

For the next cycle, Stedile outlines a challenge for the MST to face: “the new generation of young activists is taking time to establish itself with temper, with desire.”

“When I was young, the group that was going to organize the occupation was in that spirit of will, of courage. They didn’t gain anything from others. It was about helping the poor to free themselves. The new militancy is more comfortable. It can now enter university. Landless or settled young people are slower to engage in militant activities. More influenced by social media”, he concludes.