Digital Commons Network^™

Camponeses: Brazil’S Peasant Movement In Historical Perspective (1946–2004), Cliff Welch

Peer Reviewed Articles

Comparison of the histories of three leading peasant organizations in the Pontal do Paranapanema region of Brazil—the Partido Comunista do Brasil (PCB) from 1945 to 1964, the Confederação Nacional de Trabalhadores na Agricultura (CONTAG) from 1964 to 1984, and the Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem-Terra (MST) from 1984 to 2004—suggests that continuity is as important as change in understanding Brazilian peasant movements. The MST has been considered a “new social movement” in that it has eschewed partisan politics, incorporated families as members rather than just male heads of household, had a national scope and a participatory decision-making structure, and been …