Celebrating Women’s History Month

This week in North Philly Notes, we celebrate Women’s History Month with a selection of recent, forthcoming, and classic Women’s Studies titles. Take 20% off our Women’s Studies titles this month using the code TWHM23 at checkout! And view all of our Women’s Studies titles here.

New and recent titles

Gendered Places: The Landscape of Local Gender Norms across the United States, by William J. Scarborough

Every place has its quirky attributes, cultural reputation, and distinctive flair. But when we travel across America, do we also experience distinct gender norms and expectations? In his groundbreaking Gendered Places, William Scarborough examines metropolitan commuting zones to see how each region’s local culture reflects gender roles and gender equity.

Ethical Encounters: Transnational Feminism, Human Rights, and War Cinema in Bangladesh, by Elora Halim Chowdhury

Ethical Encounters is an exploration of the intersection of feminism, human rights, and memory to illuminate how visual practices of recollecting violent legacies in Bangladeshi cinema can conjure a global cinematic imagination for the advancement of humanity. By examining contemporary, women-centered Muktijuddho cinema—features and documentaries that focus on the Bangladesh Liberation War of 1971—Elora Chowdhury shows how these films imagine, disrupt, and reinscribe a gendered nationalist landscape of trauma, freedom, and agency.

Are You Two Sisters?: The Journey of a Lesbian Couple, by Susan Krieger

Are You Two Sisters? is Susan Krieger’s candid, revealing, and engrossing memoir about the intimacies of a lesbian couple. Krieger explores how she and her partner confront both the inner challenges of their relationship and the invisibility of lesbian identity in the larger world. Using a lively novelistic and autoethnographic approach that toggles back and forth in time, Krieger reflects on the evolution of her forty-year relationship.

Feminist Reflections on Childhood: A History and Call to Action, by Penny A. Weiss

In Feminist Reflections on Childhood, Penny Weiss rediscovers the radically feminist tradition of advocating for the liberatory treatment of youth. Weiss looks at both historical and contemporary feminists to understand what issues surrounding the inequality experienced by both women and children were important to the authors as feminist activists and thinkers. She uses the writings of Mary Wollstonecraft, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Simone de Beauvoir to show early feminist arguments for the improved status and treatment of youth. Weiss also shows how Charlotte Perkins Gilman, a socialist feminist, and Emma Goldman, an anarchist feminist, differently understood and re-visioned children’s lives, as well as how children continue to show up on feminist agendas and in manifestos that demand better conditions for children’s lives.

Women’s Empowerment and Disempowerment in Brazil The Rise and Fall of President Dilma Rousseff, by Pedro A. G. dos Santos and Farida Jalalzai

In 2010, Dilma Rousseff was the first woman to be elected President in Brazil. She was re-elected in 2014 before being impeached in 2016 for breaking budget laws. Her popularity and controversy both energized and polarized the country. In Women’s Empowerment and Disempowerment in Brazil, dos Santos and Jalalzai examine Rousseff’s presidency and what it means for a woman to hold (and lose) the country’s highest power. The authors examine the ways Rousseff exercised dominant authority and enhanced women’s political empowerment. They also investigate the extent her gender played a role in the events of her presidency, including the political and economic crises and her ensuing impeachment.

Motherlands: How States Push Mothers Out of Employment, by Leah Ruppanner

In the absence of federal legislation, each state in the United States has its own policies regarding family leave, job protection for women, and childcare. No wonder working mothers encounter such a significant disparity when it comes to childcare resources in America! Whereas conservative states like Nebraska offer affordable, readily available, and high quality childcare, progressive states that advocate for women’s economic and political power, like California, have expensive childcare, shorter school days, and mothers who are more likely to work part-time or drop out of the labor market altogether to be available for their children. In Motherlands, Leah Ruppanner cogently argues that states should look to each other to fill their policy voids. 

Good Reasons to Run: Women and Political Candidacy, edited by Shauna L. Shames, Rachel I. Bernhard, Mirya R. Holman, and Dawn Langan Teele

After the 2016 U.S. Presidential election, a large cohort of women emerged to run for office. Their efforts changed the landscape of candidates and representation. However, women are still far less likely than men to seek elective office, and face biases and obstacles in campaigns. (Women running for Congress make twice as many phone calls as men to raise the same contributions.) The editors and contributors to Good Reasons to Run, a mix of scholars and practitioners, examine the reasons why women run—and do not run—for political office. They focus on the opportunities, policies, and structures that promote women’s candidacies. How do nonprofits help recruit and finance women as candidates? And what role does money play in women’s campaigns?

Forthcoming this Spring

Political Black Girl Magic: The Elections and Governance of Black Female Mayors, edited by Sharon D. Wright Austin

Political Black Girl Magic explores black women’s experiences as mayors in American cities. The editor and contributors to this comprehensive volume examine black female mayoral campaigns and elections where race and gender are a factor—and where deracialized campaigns have garnered candidate support from white as well as Hispanic and Asian American voters. Chapters also consider how Black female mayors govern, from discussions of their pursuit of economic growth and how they use their power to enact positive reforms to the challenges they face that inhibit their abilities to cater to neglected communities.

Solidarity & Care: Domestic Worker Activism in New York City, by Alana Lee Glaser

The members of the Domestic Workers United (DWU) organization—immigrant women of color employed as nannies, caregivers, and housekeepers in New York City—formed to fight for dignity and respect and to “bring meaningful change” to their work. Alana Lee Glaser examines the process of how these domestic workers organized against precarity, isolation, and exploitation to help pass the 2010 New York State Domestic Worker Bill of Rights, the first labor law in the United States protecting in-home workers.

Classic Titles

Gross Misbehavior and Wickedness: A Notorious Divorce in Early Twentieth-Century America, by Jean Elson

The bitter and public court battle waged between Nina and James Walker of Newport, Rhode Island, from 1909 to 1916 created a sensation throughout the nation, with lurid accounts of their marital troubles fueling widespread gossip. The ordeal of this high-society couple, who wed as much for status as for love, is one of the prime examples of the growing trend of women seeking divorce during the early twentieth century. Gross Misbehavior and Wickedness—which takes its title from the charges Nina levied against James for his adultery (with the family governess) and extreme cruelty—recounts the protracted legal proceedings in juicy detail.

Fireweed: A Political Autobiography, by Gerda Lerner

In Fireweed, Gerda Lerner, a pioneer and leading scholar in women’s history, tells her story of moral courage and commitment to social change with a novelist’s skill and a historian’s command of context. Lerner’s memoir focuses on the formative experiences that made her an activist for social justice before her academic career began. Lerner insists that her decades of grassroots organizing largely account for the theoretical insights she was later able to bring to the development of women’s history.

Celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month

This week in North Philly Notes, we showcase titles for Hispanic Heritage Month. View our full list of Latino/a Studies and Latin American/Caribbean Studies titles. (Also of interest Studies in Latin American and Caribbean Music series)

Accessible Citizenships shows how disability provides a new perspective on our understanding of the nation and the citizen.

Afro-Caribbean Religions provides a comprehensive introduction to the Caribbean’s African-based religions.

Arsenio Rodríguez and the Transnational Flows of Latin Popular Music recounts the life and times of one of Cuba’s most important musicians.

The Brazilian Sound is an encyclopedic survey of Brazilian popular music—now updated and expanded.

Caribbean Currents is the classic introduction to the Caribbean’s popular music brought up to date.

Chilean New Song provides an examination of the Chilean New Song movement as an organic part of the struggles for progressive social change, deeper democracy, and social justice in Chile in the 1960s and early 1970s.

The Coolie Speaks offers a remarkable examination of bondage in Cuba that probes questions of slavery, freedom, and race.

Daily Labors examines the vulnerabilities, discrimination, and exploitation—as well as the sense of belonging and community—that day laborers experience on an NYC street corner.

Democratizing Urban Development shows how community organizations fight to prevent displacement and secure affordable housing across cities in the U.S. and Brazil.

Dominican Baseball, from the author of Sugarball, looks at the important and contested relationship between Major League Baseball and Dominican player development.

Fernando Ortiz on Music features selections from the influential Fernando Ortiz’s publications on Afro-diasporic music and dance—now available in English.

From Puerto Rico to Philadelphia is a history of Puerto Rican immigration to Philadelphia.

Globalizing the Caribbean, now in Paperback, illustrates how global capitalism finds new ways to mutate and grow in the Caribbean.

How Did You Get to Be Mexican? is a readable account of a life spent in the borderlands between racial identity.

The International Monetary Fund and Latin America chronicles the sometimes questionable relationship between the International Monetary Fund and Latin America from 1944 to the present.

Latino Mayors is the first book to examine the rise of Latino mayors in the United States.

Latinos and the U.S. Political System is an analysis of American politics from the vantage point of the Latino political condition.

Latinx Environmentalisms puts the environmental humanities into dialogue with Latinx literary and cultural studies.

Liberation Theology asks: How does the church function in Latin America on an everyday, practical, and political level?

Merengue, now available as an ebook, is a fascinating examination of the social history of merengue dance music and its importance as a social and cultural symbol.

Migration and Mortality documents and denounces the violent impacts of restrictive migration policies in the Americas, linking this institutional violence to broader forces of racial capitalism.

Música Norteña is the first history of the music that binds together Mexican immigrant communities.

New Immigrants, Old Unions provides a case study of a successful effort to unionize undocumented immigrant workers.

The New York Young Lords and the Struggle for Liberation is a landmark history of the New York Young Lords, and what their activism tells us about contemporary Latino/a politics.

Not from Here, Not from There/No Soy de Aquí ni de Allá is a lively autobiography by Nelson Díaz, a community activist, judge, and public advocate who blazed a trail for Latinos in Philadelphia.

Revolution Around the Corner is the first book-length story of the radical social movement, the Puerto Rican Socialist Party.

Selecting Women, Electing Women offers an analytic framework to show how the process of candidate selection often limits the participation of women in various Latin American countries.

The Sorcery of Color is an examination of how racial and gender hierarchies are intertwined in Brazil.

Sounding Salsa takes readers inside New York City’s vibrant salsa scene.

Terrorizing Latina/o Immigrants is a comprehensive analysis of changes in immigration policy, politics, and enforcement since 9/11.

Women’s Empowerment and Disempowerment in Brazil explains what the rise and fall of Brazil’s first and only female president can teach us about women’s empowerment.

Gender Politics in Brazil

This week in North Philly Notes, Pedro A. G. dos Santos and Farida Jalalzai, coauthors of Women’s Empowerment and Disempowerment in Brazil, address how the election of the first female president of Brazil triggered a gendered backlash culminating in her impeachment and ushered in a new era of male political dominance.  

Former Brazilian president Luiz Inácio “Lula” da Silva recently had several criminal cases against him dropped, positioning him to possibly run against President Jair Bolsonaro in 2022. Lula’s immense popularity and support helped Brazil elect its first female president in 2010, Dilma Rousseff. Rousseff’s presidency is noted for three years of high popularity and a strong economy followed by three years of economic and political chaos and eventual impeachment in 2016. While she was never found guilty of corruption in a criminal court, the political crisis ensnared several politicians: Lula was arrested in 2018, and President of the Chamber of Deputies Eduardo Cunha was impeached and arrested. Since Rousseff’s impeachment, the country is facing its worst economic recession, elected far-right populist Bolsonaro, and has been recognized as one of the countries hit hardest by the pandemic.

Bolsonaro’s election and Lula’s possible presidential run are the latest developments in Brazil’s male-dominated presidential history. Women’s Empowerment and Disempowerment in Brazil: The Rise and Fall of President Dilma Rousseff, examines the six years a woman led the country. Based on a decade of fieldwork and over 150 original interviews with politicians and political experts in Brazil, findings suggest that the ascension of a woman to a powerful and historically masculine institution can affect women in various ways, including triggering vicious backlash against women’s empowerment.

Technically speaking, Rousseff was impeached over a common but questionable budgetary procedure used by previous presidents such as Lula (2003-2010) and Cardoso (1994-2002). Currently, Bolsonaro’s presidency has been riddled with political scandals and possibly impeachable offenses, including a disastrously incompetent response to COVID-19. And while Rousseff is now out of the political spotlight, Lula is being welcomed back to politics with open arms.

As we think about 2022 and the electoral fight between two “strong men,” we must remember the role gender played throughout Rousseff’s presidency. While misogyny was not the sole reason why President Rousseff was ousted, it was an important element in attempting to disempower the Presidenta and consequently disempower women seeking to enter masculine spaces in Brazilian society. 

The economic crisis that deepened significantly in 2013 was a consequence of falling commodity prices and questionable polices from both Lula’s and Rousseff’s administrations. Yet most blamed only Rousseff for the country’s current history-setting recession. As the institutional crisis intensified in 2014 and 2015, questions regarding Rousseff’s intelligence and leadership became a common thread. Many interviewees saw these intensifying at the height of the crisis and an “incompetence” narrative with an overtly gendered tone took hold. Some recalled Rousseff opponents argued that, as a woman, she needed to be removed from power and that this was a cautionary tale about what happens when women are in charge.

Misogyny was present in the impeachment process in both covert and overt ways. In the ten-hour long Chamber of Deputies session voting to start the impeachment process, very few references were made to the actual fiscal crime Rousseff allegedly committed; other reasons proved far more salient. Deputies said they cast their vote to impeach because they wanted to protect Brazil, their constituents, and their families or even to serve God. Many held green and yellow signs stamped with the expression Tchau Querida, which means “goodbye dear.” The condescending use of the word querida goes beyond mere political satire and into the world of misogynistic tropes against women in power.

Sexism and misogyny went beyond subtle jokes. One Deputy called Rousseff a jararaca, a venomous snake. In Brazil, this is a sexist term to describe women. Making no attempt to hide its misogyny, the speech met applause on the floor. The use of this derogatory expression, combined with the expression Tchau Querida shows that the deputy and his supporters were not just interested in Rousseff’s alleged impeachable offenses, but in degrading the President because of her gender.

Attempts to disempower Rousseff occurred long before the impeachment. The most infamous example was a car decal popularized the year the proceedings. It simulated sexual assault against the president. The decal was meant to protest another increase in gas prices. Such protests have happened before and after Rousseff’s presidency, with the difference being that male presidents such as Michel Temer or Jair Bolsonaro never saw their faces featured on a car decal simulating a sexual act.

The current conversation surrounding the 2022 presidential election feature as front-runners two men: one a former president who can still have his political rights stripped if the decision to drop charges against him is reversed; the other is the current president whose administration is marred by political scandals and a complete failure to protect the country from the pandemic. At least they can rest assure that their gender identity will not be used as a weapon against them.

Jair Bolsonaro, Brazil, and COVID-19

This week in North Philly Notes, Philip Evanson, coauthor of Living in the Crossfire, provides an interim report about Brazil during the pandemic.

Mexican President Andres Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) met with U.S. President Donald Trump at the White House on July 8. It marked López Obrador’s long overdue debut as a statesman in need of establishing international credentials. During nearly two years as president, his whereabouts did not include any trips, official or otherwise, outside of Mexico. He had consistently soft-pedaled Trump’s anti-immigrant insults and truculence, but there was an official agenda celebrating the United States-Mexico-Canada (USMCA) trade agreement that went into effect July 1. The meeting became an exchange of compliments, and a state dinner followed. There was no reference to common views held by the two chiefs of state on the COVID-19 pandemic. Had COVID-19 been on the agenda, Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro might well have been invited. The three presidents stand out as world leaders opting for “life must go on as usual” (López Obrador’s quietly expressed view) in spite of COVID-19.

JAIR BOLSONARO AND COVID-19

Jair Bolsonaro’s efforts to lead Brazil in the COVID-19 pandemic have shown mixed results. Numbers of deaths were high, but not everywhere in Brazil, and well below the U.S. as numbers per 100,000 (ca. 29 per 100,000 in Brazil [comparable to Brazil’s homicide rate] compared to ca. 39 per 100,000 in US). Then a new surge in numbers of deaths largely closed the gap with 44.7 deaths per 100,000 for Brazil, and 46.8 deaths per 100,000 for the US. These figures placed Brazil 5^th and the United States 4^th in COVID-19 mortality rates as calculated around the world with only Sweden (57.4), Italy (67.5), and the United Kingdom (69) showing higher rates. Eight state governors in Brazil have been or are ill with coronavirus. Governor Carlos Moises of Santa Catarina announced July 1 that he was ill. Santa Catarina had 26,341 cases but only 341 deaths. Official Brazilian statistics unlike in the U.S. give equal emphasis to number of cases, number of deaths, and number of people who become ill and recover. A Johns Hopkins study had Brazil with the largest number of people who recovered from COVID-19. In the U.S., preference is for a dichotomy: the number of new cases and number of deaths, and very little about the large number of people who recover.

Brazilians are very open about expressing fears of dying. The feeling seems shared equally by men and women. Summoning courage to face threats or problems, Brazilians will identify the enemy as in the expression: “Ou ele ou eu,” “It’s either him or me.” (Portuguese nouns are either masculine or feminine. Ending in a consonant, the Portuguese word virus is masculine.) Bolsonaro has made himself the face in identifying COVID-19 as a threat to Brazil, its people and economy. It has been an uncovered face when he appeared in large public gatherings without a mask. But the message was clear: “It’s the virus or us.” Bolsonaro brought an unusual personal history having been nearly fatally knifed at a presidential election campaign rally in 2018. Subsequently, he underwent three serious operations to resize his slashed intestines. The experience seems to have spiked an “I’m not afraid of anything” attitude with displays of over the top virility. Also reignited has been his presumed homophobia. He joked with a group of visitors that wearing a mask was “a thing for queers.”*

Bolsonaro’s aim is to move Brazil out of its erratically applied COVID-19 lockdown which he thinks further shrinks a national economy mired in recession since 2014. Even as recently as July 6th, he continued down this path and vetoed parts of a new law sent to him by Congress. Struck out were provisions that masks must be worn in prison, and that instructions for social distancing must be posted on churches or certain other places where people gather. In the vetoes, he remembered federalism: laws already exist that assign responsibility to the municipal and state in these matters, not the national government.

Bolsonaro’s bravura public appearances in mixing with his followers have not won universal approval. Critical and outspoken Brazilians may be found among groups with high and low incomes. The upper middle class and upper class elites voted for him for president in large numbers, but many have lost their enthusiasm, and some now despise him. Low income Brazilians living packed together in dense communities in large urban agglomerations such as Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo have been unable to practice social distancing, and have little good to say about the government, authorities in general, or presidential antics. The coronavirus is with them, and infection and illness are widespread. Reports in the large circulation daily A Folha de São Paulo (which low income Brazilian cannot afford to buy) record widespread, growing levels of infection in low income neighborhoods, but tend to provide little information about numbers of deaths.

PRESIDENT JAIR BOLSONARO HAS CORONAVIRUS

On July 7, a test confirmed that Brazilian President Bolsonaro had coronavirus. He took the test with symptoms of low fever and cough. Though insisting he felt “perfectly well,” people were instructed to keep a suitable distance from the president. A prominent Brazilian journalist welcomed the news in his column: “I’m cheering for his condition to worsen and that he may die.” His editors wrote to the contrary that they were cheering for recovery, and that the experience would change the president’s attitude about the “greatest public health crisis that Brazil has faced in many generations.” Eighteen days later on July 25, Bolsonaro announced that he had tested negative and was free of the virus. The president celebrated driving a motorbike to a store where he spoke with various people. He wore a mask and only removed it briefly to put on a biking helmet.

Despite being ill, Bolsonaro has not abandoned the positions he took at the beginning on the COVID-19 pandemic: that coronavirus is flu, that many people will be infected, some will become ill and recover, but very few will die. An exception are the elderly, the age group with a far higher incidence of mortality than any other who must do social distancing, wear masks, etc. A vaccine is not available, but several available drugs are that speed recovery. Bolsonaro himself announced he was taking repeated doses of the anti-malarial drug hydroxychloroquine as recommended by his doctor. While science had not verified that hydroxychloroquine works as a cure, “it’s a matter of observation” he declared, “that many people seem cured, and it works for me.”

Lockdowns are wrong because they stop or slow economic activity and can lead to more business failures, and to more unemployment in Brazil whose economy has been long stagnant and is still contracting. These have been Bolsonaro’s positions during the coronavirus pandemic—he hasn’t wavered, and it seems certain he will stand by them. As for masking, while Bolsonaro had appeared prominently in public without a mask as at mass rallies of his supporters, at other times was seen wearing a mask. Since the diagnosis of coronavirus, he has been using a mask.

Bolsonaro’s hard core supporters elevated him to mythic status, and like to chant “mito” (myth) at rallies. Their reasons include that he survived near death following knifing by a would be assassin, that he easily won the presidential election after having been completely discounted at the outset, and that he served 28 years as a federal deputy without enriching himself. Elected politicians in Brazil are widely seen as corrupt, but Bolsonaro apparently isn’t, an important fact for his supporters. That he is now apparently recovering from coronavirus can only strengthen the mythic status conferred by chanting followers. Masked and recovering, he is in a position to provide constructive leadership and policy making. Of course, he has never been able to act or speak in a manner that suggests attributes of a statesman.

Surgeons at a public hospital successfully sutured his slashed intestines and saved his life in a delicate emergency procedure following the knife attack. This might have prompted a statement strongly in support of Brazil’s often maligned SUS (United Health System) public health system, but did not. Articles 196-200 of the 1988 Constitution require the state to make health care available to all Brazilians, though a private system is allowed to complement SUS, and excellent private hospitals are available to serve the elite, usually paid for by high cost private health insurance. SUS meanwhile has been chronically underfunded and suffers from various shortages. A minister of health in the Michel Temer government (2016-2018) which immediately preceded Bolsonaro’s recognized the limitations with the dismal declaration that it might be necessary to forget about certain social rights guaranteed by the Constitution. Nevertheless, SUS has carried the burden assigned it, and treated 75% of Brazil’s COVID-19 patients. Bolsonaro himself only expressed gratitude to the members of the staff who saved his life, and later offered the hospital some left over campaign funds which it turned out was illegal. His entrenched positions on coronavirus, like other positions Bolsonaro has taken though often supported by his followers also allow numerous critics to continue to believe and assert that the president is something akin to a moronic know nothing, or a clown which leads them into name calling such as Bozo or Bozonaro.

*In November, 2019 before the arrival of COVID-19, Bolsonaro declared he was no longer homophobic. He met with Diego Hypolito, Brazil’s multi-medal winning gymnast shortly after Hypolito came out as gay. The meeting included a photo op with Bolsonaro’s arm around the athlete’s shoulder. According to São Paulo state deputy and Bolsonaro defender Douglas Garcia who is a gay, black, and hails from a favela, Bolsonaro’s homophobia is the result of spending half his life as a soldier—he retired with the rank of captain—in an environment of virility. Garcia added this didn’t mean Bolsonaro would go into the streets ready to shoot at all that’s gay. 

Sequestrada: A New Film by a Temple University Press author Sabrina McCormick

This week in North Philly Notes, Sabrina McCormick, author of Mobilizing Science, promotes the Sequestrada, the film she co-wrote and co-directed with Soopum Sohn, about the devastation of the Brazilian Amazon. Based in part on her research about the anti-dam movement in Brazil—the subject of Mobilizing Science—Sequestrada stars Tim Blake Nelson and Gretchen Mol. The film opens November 15 at the Village East Cinema in New York, followed by a VOD Release on Tuesday, December 17.

Synopsis:

Sequestrada follows Kamodjara and her father, Cristiano, members of the Arara, an Amazonian indigenous tribe. When they leave their reservation to protest a dam that will displace their people, Kamodjara is separated from her family and kidnapped by traffickers.

Roberto, an indigenous agency bureaucrat overseeing a report that could change everything, is under pressure to support the dam’s construction. Thomas, an American investor in the dam, makes his way to Brazil to sway Roberto’s opinion. The film tells the story of how these three lives intertwine against a backdrop of geopolitics and environmental disaster.

Sequestrada was shot on location in Brazil and is based on the real-life event of the construction of the Belo Monte Dam, which is displacing the Arara—who have lived along the Amazon River for countless generations. The film, which had its world premiere at the Beijing Film Festival last April, deftly incorporates the experiences of local non-professional actors to tell a gripping local story of global consequences.

Artist’s Statement:

Sabrina had been doing research in Brazil for fifteen years and had made her first documentary about people displaced by large dams. She had received funding to go to the Amazon where the world’s third largest dam was being built and contested by indigenous groups who were illegally affected. We mapped out a plot. Sabrina had worked with organizations contesting dams for a long time and we planned to meet with a few of them based near Belo Monte to find out more of what the past thirty years had been like, beginning with Sting protesting the dam and a Kayapo woman slashing a government official in 1984.

Then we left for Altamira, ourselves. The last plane to the Amazon was full of men. Sabrina and a flight attendant were the only women. The men were all workers going to the Belo Monte Dam. When it landed in Altamira and the doors opened, we felt the sauna of the Amazon.

Altamira is a small town where indigenous tribes visit to buy flip flops, t-shirts, and supermarket junk food. We approached a group that we learned were Arara. We spent about three days to see if they wanted to be on camera. Then the whole Arara tribe disappeared. They re-appeared with a huge bag of live turtles. They invited Sabrina to sit in the local indigenous housing and eat a turtle they had just cooked. Then they started to open up. We learned they have a system where a chief (cacique) decides everything, so we mainly tried to speak to him. He was a quiet, young man. Later, we found he had only been cacique for one year. There was another man with thick glasses, who had been watching us. We talked to him. It turned out that he had been the chief for many years before this young man.

When he decided we were not dangerous, he stopped being a quiet man. We created a character for him so he could speak about the Arara tribe and the Belo Monte dam. The last day of the shoot, he asked Soopum if he could try his hat. He wore Soopum’s hat and was silent for long time, smiling. He seemed proud and happy. But it was Soopum’s only hat and the Equator sun made Soopum’s black hair so hot, that he really needed the hat. Sabrina didn’t want to give up her hat, either. Soopum politely asked for the hat back. He and tribe members thanked us making this film. We hugged the Arara and parted ways.

Sabrina guided the storyline exploring how government corruption undergirded the illegal construction of massive infrastructure, damaging lives and releasing methane from the degradation of flora and fauna. Soopum added fictional plot lines with traditional film language under given location and situations. Together, they captured true moments with the actors when they were living normally. We wrote together based on footage and the tribe members writing with us such that each character’s life and the fictional plot became interwoven. We constructed scenes with them, explaining where we thought the storyline was going and recording their reactions, modifying the plot with their perspectives and lines from their personal experiences.

With that approach, we fused real and imagined worlds in multiple layers, the real effects the dam has on climate change and the lives of indigenous people who live nearby, along with a narrative of imagined characters who reflect the stories of how Belo Monte came to be what it is today.

About Sabrina McCormick’s book, Mobilizing Science: 

Mobilizing Science theoretically and empirically explores the rise of a new kind of social movement—one that attempts to empower citizens through the use of expert scientific research. Sabrina McCormick advances theories of social movements, development, and science and technology studies by examining how these fields intersect in cases around the globe.

McCormick grounds her argument in two very different case studies: the anti-dam movement in Brazil and the environmental breast cancer prevention movement in the U.S. These, and many other cases, show that the scientization of society, where expert knowledge is inculcated in multiple institutions and lay people are marginalized, give rise to these new types of movements. While activists who consequently engage in science often instigate new methods that result in new findings and scientific tools, these movements still often fail due to superficial participatory institutions and tightly knit corporate/government relationships.

When Brazil Hosted the FIFA World Cup in 2014

This week in North Philly Notes, Philip Evanson, co-author of Living in the Crossfire, provides his account of being in Rio de Janeiro during the 2014 FIFA World Cup match between Argentina and Germany.

In June and July 2014, Brazil hosted the twentieth edition of the FIFA World Cup. The championship match was played in Rio de Janeiro on July 13 when Germany defeated Argentina 1 to 0 in double overtime.

These recollections were written in Rio de Janeiro immediately following the German victory.

My wife Regina and I watched the game on TV, thought it a good one with both teams giving their all though showing signs of exhaustion by the second overtime period which was to be expected. The play by play announcers and expert commentators agreed that the game rose to the level of a World Cup championship game. Of course, we were cheering for Argentina, or los hermanos (the Argentine brothers) as they are called here. But it appeared a majority of Brazilians perversely preferred Germany. One local sports writer called this a variation of the Stockholm syndrome. That is, following the unprecedented 7 to 1 massacre of the Brazilian team by the pitiless Germans in the semi-finals, the Brazilians went over to the side of their executioners. They cheered for the German, not the Argentine team. I even heard this from a neighborhood street kid or menino da rua. He told me he was glad Germany won, and asked what I thought. I said to the contrary, I wanted Argentina to win. His response: “Mas eles [the Argentines] são muito bagunceiros!” Bagunceiro is a word used frequently meaning messy, or having a penchant for disorder, that can also mean ready to fight, quarrel. Dona Maria, my 99 year old mother-in-law, uses it when talking about someone who allows things to be out of place, as for example, a shirt, or pair of socks when you want the item. Even worse according to Dona Maria: Bagunceiros are not bothered by the disorder or mess. They need to be called out. Seems our street kid was calling out the Argentines on his street.

GAME DAY. I went to a Zona Sul supermarket Sunday morning to ask if it would reopen after the championship game. This supermarket and most commerce except for bars and restaurants closed during games played in Rio de Janeiro’s Maracanã stadium, and of course during all matches involving the Brazilian team no matter where they were played. The answer I got: “No, we’re not closing at all. Brazil lost. Nobody’s interested in today’s game. We’ll stay open.” Of course, it’s not true that Brazilians had no interest in the championship game Argentina vs. Germany. They had been watching all the games, and held definite opinions about the qualities of different national teams. They certainly watched this one. But that Argentina, not Brazil, was playing in the final game, with a chance to win it all in Rio de Janeiro’s almost mythical Maracanã stadium (though the original stadium had been more or less demolished and rebuilt for the World Cup) seemed to have struck a tribal nerve. It was hard to accept. Argentina had been the great soccer rival for so many years. And rivals not only in soccer, but in South American politics, economics, even cultural production, though leaders in both countries have striven to damp down rivalry since the creation of Mercosul, a common market bloc of South American countries including Brazil and Argentina created in 1991. There were a few fights after the game in Copacabana which police had to break up. The fights apparently were caused by Brazilians who couldn’t resist taunting Argentines after the their team lost the game, perhaps in retaliation for the way Argentines were coloring seven fingers on their hands for the seven German goals. Some Brazilians made a point of celebrating with Germans in the presence of Argentines.

THE FAN FEST ON COPACABANA BEACH. The media estimate on Saturday was that 100,000 Argentines would be in Rio for the Sunday game. Copacabana was crowded with these visitors. They drove through the streets blowing horns, waving and shouting. Copacabana was the destination for Argentine soccer fans and anyone else who didn’t have a ticket for the game at Maracanã stadium. They could now watch it on a big screen mounted in the Fan Fest “stadium,” an enclosed area on the Copacabana beach stretching the length of a couple of blocks with the giant screen at one end. From what I could see, the space seemed large enough to accommodate as many fans as Maracanã itself, which is 78,000. Admission was free. The game started at 4, but large crowds were already arriving on the underground metro 3 or 4 hours earlier. I know because I went to the Cardeal Arcoverde station to take the metro shortly after noon. To get into the station, I had to pass through a cordon of police checking all bags and backpacks—both for people like myself entering the station, and for anyone leaving and presumably on their way to the beach Fan Fest. The train platforms at this station are deep underground and reached by three sets of escalators and stairs. Getting to them requires a long descent below ground level and the mountains that tower up in the city, which are among its famous identifying features. I arrived at the platform just as a train arrived. An enormous crowd mostly of Argentines exited singing, shouting, and chanting. It was Olé, Olé, Olé, Va! Va! Va! and much more that I couldn’t hear above the roar, comparable to the noise in a packed stadium. The Argentines seemed overwhelmingly greater in number than the Germans, though planes full of Germans had arrived Friday, Saturday and even Sunday morning. The atmosphere struck me as altogether friendly. I even saw Argentines and German posing together for group pictures and photographing each other. Some donned the others national flag. Flags are part of World Cup costumes, often draped over the shoulders rather like capes. Enterprising Brazilians were on street corners hawking Argentine and German jerseys and flags.

PUBLIC SECURITY. There were reportedly 26,000 uniformed security workers on duty in Rio de Janeiro on championship game day. These included the heavily armed soldiers of the National Security Force, Rio state police, the Rio de Janeiro Guarda Municipal, the Metro police, and finally unarmed employees of private security companies. The ugliest confrontation was near the Maracanã stadium where manifestantes (protestors) were protesting the World Cup. Nationwide anti-World Cup protests in principal cities began months before the first game and continued into the last game, but they were small by the standards of the June 2013 mass protests in Brazilian cities that numbered millions. This protest counted only 300, but the anti-World Cup protests continually rattled authorities and almost always took place in an atmosphere of police intimidation and violence. Sunday’s championship game was no exception as the Rio state police including a cavalry unit moved against the protesters and journalists covering the protest. Police broke or destroyed some of their equipment. At least 10 people were injured with some taken to hospital. In one example of police overreaction, an entire middle class neighborhood was sealed off for a few hours when residents were not allowed to return to their homes.

AT THE END OF THE DAY. I took a final walk around my neighborhood in Copacabana around 9pm. The many Argentines I saw now made a subdued group. A large number were waiting on Avenida Princesa Isabel for buses and the return trip to Argentina. Like other Latin Americans who came for the games, many were duro or hard up. They couldn’t afford the hotels which in any event were fully booked. They camped wherever they could, many on the Copacabana beach, in tents, in vans or cars in parking areas made available to them. They surely spent less in Brazil than the estimated $2,500 average for visitors to the World Cup. Still they were valued visitors, and Eduardo Paes, the mayor of Rio, said his campaign for the coming 2016 Rio Olympics will aim first at attracting South Americans. The hotels have already made an agreement among themselves to hold down rates for the Olympics, though they likely will still be higher than anything poor Argentines, Chileans or other South Americans might be able to pay. And not only Latin Americans from South America. Thirty thousand Mexicans were reported having come for the games.

FINAL THOUGHTS. On Saturday afternoon a demoralized, lifeless Brazilian team played Holland in the third place consolation match and lost badly 3 to 0. Walking past my local newsstand, the jornaleiro (newsstand owner) gave a thumbs down gesture, and said: “Brasil já era. Temos que reformar tudo. Primeiro, saude e educação. Tambem tira os mendigos da rua, MAS PARA RECUPERAR. Depois futebol.” Translation: “Brazil is finished. We have to reform everything. First, health and education. Also, remove the homeless beggars from the streets, BUT IN ORDER TO REHABILITATE THEM. After this, soccer.” The phrase to remove homeless beggars and rehabilitate them stated so emphatically was perhaps in memory of poor, homeless Brazilians swept off the streets, and in the worst cases, disappeared by death squads largely comprised of police or former police officers. Significantly, soccer came last in the list of reforms.

POSTSCRIPT, JUNE, 2018. Brazil’s international soccer fortunes have risen dramatically since the historic 7 to 1 defeat. It was a matter of selecting the new coach Tite in June 2016. The national team won the 2016 Olympic gold medal in the Rio de Janeiro games defeating Germany 5 to 4 in a penalty shootout. There followed 8 consecutive victories over South American rivals as Brazil became the first nation to qualify for the 2018 World Cup. On the eve of the 2018 competition in Russia, Brazil occupies its usual place as one of the nations favored to win the Cup.

Brazil Heads Toward 2018: Originalities and Tendencies

This week in North Philly Notes, Philip Evanson, co-author of Living in the Crossfire, pens a dispatch on Brazil’s anti-corruption campaign and next election.

Brazil’s ongoing investigations into corruption have been discussed with a certain sense of national pride, that they may offer something in the way of originality. The targets are white collar criminals in high places of government and the economy. Everybody knows there will be more revelations, arrests and indictments of political and business leaders that will continue to scandalize voter citizens. The judiciary remains diligently engaged in uncovering and prosecuting the guilty within the framework of law and established democratic institutions. It’s an effort to discover crime and punish the guilty carried through WITHOUT THE USE of exceptional powers of which there are few examples in history, certainly none in Brazilian history.

Are there other Brazilian originalities? President Michel Temer heads a conservative government that responds to wishes of entrepreneurial much more than labor groups. The former want more flexibility in hiring and laying off workers, outsourcing, etc. With Temer’s encouragement, the Brazilian congress revised parts of the 1943 Consolidation of Labor Laws (CLT). The CLT had acquired an almost sacrosanct status. Some of it is imbedded in the 1988 constitution. It served workers, employers and Brazil well during periods of economic growth, and economic turmoil. However, the Temer government now argued that changes were necessary, that the CLT needed to be modernized in order to satisfy domestic and foreign investors. It was necessary to break away from the bondage of bureaucracy and labor courts where workers bring thousands of suits each year against employers. Changes to the CLT enacted in 2017 were hailed with government fanfare. But there is also resistance to applying them led by labor court judges, lawyers practicing labor law, and labor law intellectuals. Labor law is a major area of Brazilian jurisprudence. The labor courts or Justiça do Trabalho are organized in a national system with regional tribunals. Critics of the changes argue that important principles protecting workers present in the constitution, obviously inspired by the CLT, cannot be modified by simple legislation. A new collective bargain agreement cannot leave workers worse off in benefits, working conditions, and salaries. Courts will be deciding these issues. A young Brazilian lawyer said to me, “No country has the kind of labor law and labor courts that we have.”

Yet another originality, or at least unusual, is the system of election courts (tribuna eleitoral) which like labor courts are organized throughout the country in regional jurisdictions. There is a supreme court. In 2017, its members in sharply divided opinions voted 3 to 2 not to cancel the candidacy, and therefore of election of Michel Temer as Vice-President in 2014. Among the charges against him: Accepting illegal campaign contributions. While Temer survived, other executive branch office holders have not. In 2017, the judiciary has removed on average one mayor a week on charges of corruption.

Of corse, there are ways in which Brazil stands alone, or nearly alone in disrepute. Brazil has greater socio-economic inequality than any Latin American republic as measured in income distribution. The issue goes beyond Brazil’s standing in Latin America. Brazil belongs to a small group of countries that include Middle Eastern oil states, and the Union of S. Africa as examples of extreme inequality. New studies by both foreign and Brazilian researchers have focused on this issue, putting it in the spotlight of public discussion. One study compares bolsa familia or family grant program with investments in public education and asks how much each might reduce inequality. The conclusion: Both contribute, but investments in public education contribute more to reduce inequality. While the Temer government continues to proclaim its support for bolsa familia, it has cut support for education, and otherwise largely ignored mass anxieties. Another study by Irish economist Marc Morgan, a member of the Thomas Piketty, CAPITALISM IN THE 21^ST CENTURY research group, produced the conclusion that if the annual income of the top 1% of the richest 10% of Brazilians, a group of 140,000 people, was reduced to that of the top 1% in France and Japan, and the money transferred to the poorest 50% of Brazilians, their income would nearly double. This is a striking demonstration of how low is the income of the bottom 50% of the population. The income of poor Brazilians, and for that matter a large portion of the Brazilian middle class is in fact very low both by world and Latin American standards. The income of the 80% of the Brazilian population below the top 20% is comparable to the poorest 20% in contemporary France. Low income helps explain why people in Rio de Janeiro are not riding a new Metro subway line in expected numbers. A preference for riding busses continues though surely not because the trip takes longer, and can be far less comfortable than the Metro. However, bus fare is R$3.60 while the Metro charges R$4.10 a ride. The difference is 50 centavos or about 16 cents which nonetheless represents an all-important difference for low income riders. Moving up to the richest 10% of Brazilian households does not mean immediately moving from low to high income. Entry into this group begins at 4,500 reais per month or about US$1,500.

The issue of high cost and low quality bus transportation remains a source of intense public dissatisfaction in many large Brazilian cities. Some of the blame can surely be placed on corrupt ties between bus owners and local politicians. The facts and dimension of this corruption are not fully known. However, a Federal police investigation in Rio de Janeiro—Operation Final Stop—culminated in August, 2017 with the announcement that R$500 million reais (about US$175 million) in bribes had been paid by bus owners to former governor Sérgio Cabral (in office from 2007 to 2013, but now serving a lengthy jail term for corruption) in exchange for higher fares, and other favors such as suppressing freelance van competition. However, bus riders are finally getting some relief. This discovery of large bribes paid by bus owners to politicians led to a judge to lower fares. The Federal police, a zealous army of young federal prosecutors, and a growing group of determined, well prepared judges are acting against white collar crime in an ever widening gyre of investigations, arrests, indictments and punishments.

Meanwhile, public security continues in a state of crisis in many areas of Brazil. I can attest to this in my Rio de Janeiro neighborhood of Leme. A Sunday in October saw an invasion of the nearby hillside favela of Babilonia by drug traffickers with a noisy exchange of gunfire. A group of Sunday visitors walking up the winding road of the nearby Duque de Caxias army base heard a soldier explain how the clearly audible gunfire was coming from both automatic rifles and hand guns. He added the army could stop the wars in the favelas in a week—there are conflicts in several of them between different drug gang factions–but the politicians won’t allow it. Too much money “esta rolando” or turning over. These are declarations the public is ready to hear and endorse.

Public security budgets have been cut since the great Brazilian recession of 2015. Gangsters or bandidos as Brazilians call them have been emboldened, and the police less and less able to respond. The violence often seems unchecked, and receives ample media coverage.  Public security has always been a leading issue on any list in which the public is polled. Brazil leads the world in number of homicides. The official count was 61,619 in 2016, and includes people murdered by the police. The crisis in public security more than any other issue will test the mettle of presidential candidates in the 2018 election.

As Brazilians approach 2018, they are processing new information about democracy and the rule of law under the socially progressive Constitution of 1988. Thirty or forty years ago, the leading issue was how to pay the tremendous social debt defined as raising the poor out of destitution and poverty. Now it is confronting white collar crime. There is consensus that the investigation and punishment of corrupt actors will continue. Otherwise what should be done, and is likely to shape the coming 2018 election ferment can be best observed by following the broad range of public and media discussion, and the actions of groups throughout Brazil ranging from landless rural and homeless urban workers to wealthy investors creating funds such as Vox Capital, a new fund with social impact ambitions led by Antônio Ermírio Moraes Neto, an heir to the Votorantim group, Brazil’s (and Latin America’s) largest industrial conglomerate. An example of Vox Capital funding is for production of a low cost respirator with easy maintenance requirements for ambulances and hospitals.  The idea of investing with social impacts in mind is said to be new in Brazil. A Brazilian banker explained: “In my 20 years in banking, I never had clients disposed to link the social with the financial.  They want to make money.” But Brazilians are always open to new ideas, and the appeal of the ethical is in ascendance.

Rio de Janeiro’s Summer Olympics: Searching for Legacies

This week in North Philly Notes, Philip Evanson, co-author of Living in the Crossfire, writes about the aftermath of Rio’s summer Olympics.  

The Rio de Janeiro summer Olympic and Para Olympic games ended September l8. Most Brazilians, the media, and Olympic organizers concluded the city of Rio and consequently Brazil had done well by the six week marathon of games and individual competitions. The reputation of Cariocas, the name for residents of Rio, as hospitable, upbeat, generous people with a marked talent for improvisation was reinforced. Furthermore, the second act Para Olympics more than held their own. 2.1 million tickets to Para Olympics events were sold, the second largest number in the history of the games. Enthusiasm for Para Olympics athletes was obvious, a victory lap for greater social inclusion, for anyone with a physical disability.

The run up to the games included many efforts to forsee Olympic legacies. In Rio de Janeiro’s 2009 bid, the Olympics were presented as a spur that would set in motion or speed up completion of several large scale projects. Topping the list was master plan to improve the city’s public transportation and traffic flow. By the start of the games in 2016, there were new BRT corridors, completion of a long planned 4th metro line, and a light rail tram line in downtown Rio connecting the main bus station with the domestic Santos Dumont airport. They added high quality links between international and domestic airports, and Rio’s western and northern suburbs. They finally brought rapid public transit to upscale Barra da Tijuca connecting it to prosperous southern zone neighborhoods of Botafogo, Copacabana, Ipanema, and Leblon. The construction of lengthy tunnels replacing an overhead freeway in the downtown port area allowed its revitalization to proceed as a tranquil zone of new museums and pedestrian leisure. The revitalized port was christened Porto Maravilha suggesting a modern world wonder or marvel. For Mayor Eduardo Paes and Olympic organizers, Porto Maravilha ranked in importance with the upgrades in public transportation as the other main legacy of the Olympics.

Clearly, the middle and upper classes benefit from BRTs, the new metro line, and the opening of long downtown tunnels where traffic flow is not interrupted. They reduce travel time, and demonstrate contemporary big city public transportation at its best.  But will new bus and expanded metro service be within reach of low wage workers and their families, many of whom live in favelas, and distant suburbs? They commonly earn the monthly minimum wage of approximately $300. The cost of a month’s travel to and from work taking the BRT and metro has been calculated as 1/3 of a minimum salary.  Without employer paid travel to work, as might be the case in the informal economy, the cost will be too great for someone earning the minimum wage. The job seeker will look for work close to home. Moving beyond work to leisure, the cost of public transportation to and from Porto Maravilha can also be high. This reinforces a tendency of residents of poor communities to stay at home, to turn inward and be more community bound than they might want. Often overlooked is the frugality of Rio’s low wage workers as they budget for basics such as food, clothing, rent and transportation. Perhaps for these reasons, authorities have considered the option of free rides on the new light rail tram that passes through Porto Maravilha. No doubt they felt a need to show good faith in putting its attractions within reach of as many of Rio’s communities as possible, even more so in the midst of hard fought municipal elections.

There are also distinctly negative legacies. One that dogs the reputation of Mayor Eduardo Paes was yet another cycle of removing poor residents, even whole communities, from homes largely built by them. They were moved and their homes demolished in order to make way for new road and Olympics construction. Removal was part of the first remaking the port area between 1902 and 1906 as overseen by then Mayor Pereira Passos. 20,000 individuals were uprooted as their residences were razed. Many resettled in the nearby favela of Providencia. In the early 1960’s, when the federal government moved to Brasília and the city of Rio de Janeiro became the state of Guanabara, its governor Carlos Lacerda removed 30,000 favela residents from areas he saw as belonging to the middle and upper classes. Lacerda also wanted land for building what became the state university of Rio de Janeiro. Lacerda’s uprooted residents were relocated to the then-new Cidade de Deus (City of God), and to Vila Kennedy, a distant suburban community where the cost of building the housing was partly paid for by the United States Alliance for Progress Program. However, these numbers do not approach the estimated 77,000 individuals removed by Mayor Paes.

For most evicted residents, there was new public housing, or the promise of new public housing. But it was away from the communities in which they had lived which in some cases might be entirely eradicated. A 2016 study of the evictions by Lucas Faulhaber and Lena Azevedo, explained how this was done. In the case of the squatter settler without title to the land removal could be relatively easy. The land might be declared an “area of risk,” meaning the state was acting to save lives, an argument not always easy to contest. Where residents had titles, removal was more difficult. Such was the case of Vila Autódromo whose history as a working class community dated to the late 1960’s. A main quality of Vila Autódromo was tranquility, even bucolic tranquility, in densely populated, noisy Rio de Janeiro. Furthermore, it was a stable working class community without drug traffickers, militias, violence or homicides. For good reasons, its residents did not want to leave. Furthermore, they felt secure having been granted a 99-year right to use the land by former Rio Governor Leonel Brizola in 1994. As late as 2010, Vila Autódromo had a population of 4,000. However, Vila Autódromo stood at the designated point of entry into the Olympic Park for athletes, reporters, Olympic officials and visitors.

Mayor Paes was determined to remove the community. He brushed aside the document with a 99-year right to use the land. It was a “papelucho” or piece of paper of a political demagogue. Paes claimed he needed to build access roads through Vila Autódromo to the new Olympic Village. In 2013, a group of urban planners from the two local federal universities developed a plan showing that building access roads was possible without removal, and that under this plan, the cost would be much lower. The plan went on to win the Deutche Bank Urban Age Award. Paes then argued people coming to the Olympic village would feel unsafe at the sight of a Brazilian working class community so near to them. It was a case of visual pollution. Vila Autódromo did not look middle or upper class. Vila Autódromo defenders pointed to its record of safety, without shootouts or drug trafficking gangs. The Mayor’s team continued to pressure people to leave in exchange for an apartment in one of two new public housing projects. As time passed and people continued to stay, large cash indemnities began to be offered. Residents were harassed as water and electricity were turned on and off. Still a dwindling group determined to stay. Heloisa Helena Costa Berto was a poor black woman and candomblé priestess with a small home and ceremonial religious center in Vila Autódromo. She was also intent on staying. Mayor Paes told her he wanted the area “cleaned.” For critics of removal, Berto had become a victim “social cleansing.” She watched her home and center being demolished in February 2016. Then three months later on May 13, the date slavery was abolished in Brazil in 1888, she received an award from the state legislature “conceded to those who work for the improvement of Afro-descendant, Latin American and Caribbean women of the state of Rio.” In Brazil, many contradictions are on display, or as the local expression has it, “Brazil has these things.” For twenty residents who continued to hold out, the city of Rio was forced to build 20 houses on a small area of what had once been Vila Autódromo.

Perhaps the most unconvincing appropriation of legacy was the illegal and unjustified construction of the Olympic golf course. Golf is an elite, not popular sport in Brazil. A newly built Olympic golf course was partly sold as a contribution to growing its popularity, particularly since the course would be open for a few years to the public. But with green fees of $75, few who are not in the upper middle or upper classes were likely to try golf. Furthermore, Rio de Janeiro already had one private club suitable for international championship golf. But Paes and the local Olympic committee did not pursue this option. Instead, the Rio city council passed a decree in December, 2012 allowing a substantial piece of land to be detached from the Marapendí ecological reserve for building the Olympic golf course. The decree violated Brazilian law in two ways: there were no public hearings, nor was there a required environmental impact study. The transferred land was no longer subject to strict environmental regulations. Without the regulations, it was easier to build nearby luxury high rise condominiums that were the specialty of developer RJZ Cyrela, a large campaign contributor to Mayor Paes. An odor of corruption has overhung the construction of the Olympic golf course from the beginning. Marco Mello, local biologist and environmental activist looking at Olympic area condominium building, and the history of the unnecessary golf course provided his own legacy judgment: “Without a doubt, the Olympics are a great real estate scam.” In the October 2nd election for mayor, Eduardo Paes’ handpicked candidate to succeed him finished badly in third place with 16% of the vote.

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Ready or Not: Rio on the Eve of the Olympics

On the ground in Rio, Philip Evanson, co-author of Living in the Crossfire, reflects on what life is like as the games begin.

For the months leading up to the 2016 summer Olympics games, media reporting has been largely critical of Rio de Janeiro’s, and by extension Brazil’s ability to complete preparations for the mega sports event. This critical viewpoint was shared even by the Brazilian patrician press with perhaps A Folha de São Paulo taking the lead. A stream of reports from inside and outside Brazil focused on delays and mishaps. As late as July 1^st,  The New York Times published an article Brazilian journalist Vanessa Barbara about “Brazil’s Olympic Catastrophe.” The article took us into a world of chaos and uncertainties that seemed an inherent part of preparations for the Rio Olympics. Thomas Bach, the German president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) said that Brazil was an example of a country that liked to wait until the final hour to complete a big task such as preparations for the Olympics. However, he remained optimistic and sure that the Brazilian hosts would get the job done in time for the opening ceremony August 5.

This was his view just the day after delegations of athletes from several countries, including Brazil itself, refused to occupy their assigned residences saying they were unfit for habitation. They entered apartments where pipes leaked, toilets might not flush, and electric wires were exposed. In fact, only 15 of 31 new high rise apartment buildings in the Olympic Village were ready to receive delegations as of Sunday, July 24 when they opened for occupancy. 630 workers were quickly hired to work around the clock to complete the work by Thursday. This was one more public relations disaster and not to be overcome so quickly. Ministry of Labor inspectors made an unexpected visit. They found that Brazilian labor law was being flouted. Workers had not been hired according to rules of formal sector employment. They were working longer hours than permitted, in one case 23 hours straight, and not enough time was allowed for meals. The Ministry fined the Rio Olympic committee nearly $100,000. Still the work was completed and delegation complaints then turned to praise.

Now in the early 21^st century, the port area in downtown Rio is once again a main target of urban renewal. Demolition of an old, dirty elevated freeway, remodeling older buildings and putting up new ones has dramatically changed the area, making it an inviting zone of high interest. For the residents of Rio and visitors, the important lures will be new museums and cultural centers. The Museum of Tomorrow is architecturally the most striking and important structure. Hailed by The Guardian on its inauguration in 2015 as one of the world’s most extraordinary contemporary buildings, it is dedicated to the idea of human and planetary sustainability.

My wife Regina and I decided to see changes in the port area and downtown Rio. We took a ride on the new light rail tramline that circulates between the bus station and the domestic Santos Dumont airport. We could see how in much of the area traversed, the planned renewal has largely been completed and ready to receive tens of thousands tourists who will come to the Olympics. There are Olympics connected projects in the area that are not strictly about sporting events. We got off at the stop on the newly christened Olympic Boulevard where Brazilian graffiti artist Eduardo Kobra is finishing an enormous multicolored mural “We are all one.” The mural celebrates the unity of the human race in five continents, and the search for peace. We wanted to see it, and to see him at work partly because we live in Philadelphia which is a leader in the outdoor mural movement and have become interested in this form of public art. Kobra’s mural is spread over a block long cinderblock wall and occupies about twice as many square feet as the world’s next largest mural. We watched him spray paint areas while standing on a hydraulic lift platform, but there were strong gusts of wind that must have made the work more difficult than usual. He was working from what seemed a color chart. We plan to return to watch again this remarkable work in progress. Kobra is hurrying to complete it by the official opening day of August 5.

We are now in the countdown phase to the opening ceremony—counted in days (now only 3 as this is being written), hours, minutes and seconds. An Olympic media slogan aims for social inclusion “Somos Todos Olímpicos,” or “We are all Olympians,” but a poll published on July 19 showed that 50% of the population was against the 2016 Rio Olympics, 40% in favor, and 10% did not know where they stood. 63% think Brazil will be worse for the Olympics. A certain lack of enthusiasm, even opposition to the games was obviously taken to heart by Rio de Janeiro Mayor Eduardo Paes whose emotional fever chart is always on display. In an interview on August 1^st with A Folha de São Paulo. the mayor lamented the fact that Brazilians were in a bad mood due to the hard times (three years of recession),  also the political crisis of impeaching a president, and the endless Operation Carwash investigations of corrupt practices in the highest places of politics and corporate business. He said to the contrary that Brazilians should feel good about the Olympics. Largely by themselves, Brazilians had been able to overcome all the problems and emergencies associated with the games and that similar problems occurred in other summer Olympic games. The IOC was grateful for the way we responded to contingencies, and surprised that Brazilians had such a low opinion of themselves. Paes called it “our complex of being a mongrel people.”As for critical local press reporting, including in A Folha de São Paulo, it had contaminated public opinion when times were so difficult, in effect, turned people against the Olympics. However, looking at Rio de Janeiro’s ongoing urban transformation as spurred by the Olympics, the mayor brightened. He was sure it would be “more profound” than what even had occurred in the famous Barcelona Olympics of 1992 when Barcelona consolidated its reputation as a great cosmopolitan city.