English

Frei Betto, by the way

In the interview Frei Betto gave Folha de S.Paulo, the best passages are not about Dilma, but on José Dirceu and religion, especially when he uses “by the way”.

If it is true that him [José Dirceu] has so many millions in his account, I cannot understand how he could promote the kitty [to pay the mensalão fine]. By the way, I have friends who contributed to the kitty. They are extremely outraged. They feel aggrieved. […]

Well, many religious schools are mere school companies. By the way, the most corrupt politicians in Brazil studied all in religious schools. One wonders: what the hell did they do, what kind of evangelisation was that?

Harm reduction

The Brazilian government had no time to prepare the market for the reduction of the target for the primary fiscal surplus (the budget balance before interest payments) from 1.2 per cent of gross domestic product to 0.15 per cent. The harm-reduction efforts apparently include increasing the media exposure of the finance minister, Joaquim Levy.

In the past last few weeks, he was interviewed by Fernando Dantas, for Agência Estado, and by Miriam Leitão, for her programme on GloboNews. The minister also wrote an article for Folha de S.Paulo (English version here).

Mr Levy cautiously tries to show some optimism and sends messages to the Congress – with no explicit attacks.

Sergio Fausto: past, present and future of the PSDB

In an article for Folha de S.Paulo, political scientist Sergio Fausto presents a good summary of the past, the present and the future of the PSDB, the main opposition party in Brazil.

During Lula’s mandate [2003-2010], there is no doubt that the PSDB was wrong trying to avoid being connected to the supposedly cursed inheritance left by the Fernando Henrique Cardoso government [1995-2002]. The party committed several times the mistake of giving up a constituent part of its identity […].

Basically, the PSDB did not have conviction that the Cardoso government, despite the crisis and the unsatisfactory results in terms of growth and employment, represented a significant advancement for the country and constituted an asset and not a liability to the party, not only in a retrospective view, but also in a perspective of the future.

The scenario faced by the PT today has some similarities. After the elections and especially this year, with the effects of the crisis more evident, it has been hard to see members of the party defending the first term of Dilma Rousseff. In addition, a fraction of the PT believes that the party or the government mimics the PSDB by committing “the mistake of giving up a constituent part of its identity”.

There is at least one significant difference: it will probably be much harder for the PT to convince the population (and perhaps even itself) that the Dilma government, “despite the crisis and the unsatisfactory results in terms of growth and employment”, will have represented “a significant advancement for the country”.

To stablish a qualified dialogue with this network [of potential PSDB supporters] implies not only to democratise the party internally, but also to define more clearly the place of the PSDB in the ideological map of the country. For that, the party cannot forget it built its history in the progressive and viscerally democratic camp. Forgetting its DNA might seem tempting in the face of the conservative tendencies on the rise in the Brazilian society, but that would represent the irremediable loss of its character and its transformation into a party like any other.

More than a provocation to the most conservative fraction of the PSDB, that message is a warning to his progressive colleagues of the party. “We cannot lose our character.”

‘Brazil: The Corruption of Progress’

That is the title of the latest article by Kenneth Maxwell for the New York Review of Books. Despite a few little mistakes (e.g., “Sérgio Mota” instead of Sérgio Moro), it offers a good overview of what has been happening in Brazil over the past few months.

It can be read here.

Structural problems of the Brazilian economy

Economists Mansueto Almeida, Marcos Lisboa and Samuel Pessôa, in an article (in Portuguese) for Folha de S.Paulo, the most influential Brazilian newspaper:

Contrary to the prevailing view, the fiscal crisis does not stem only from the lack of control of public accounts in recent years. The crisis is deeper and requires a more severe and structural adjustment to allow the resumption of growth. The measures to facilitate a higher primary surplus this year do not overcome the serious challenges facing the country, they only postpone the resolution of the problems, which become even more serious.

Yes, a serious lack of control of public expenditures started in 2009. However, in addition to the short-term problems, there is a structural imbalance. Since 1991, public spending has grown at a higher rate than the national income. […]

Brazil’s serious fiscal problem reflects the unbridled granting of benefits that is incompatible with its national income. We promise more than we have, postponing the resolution of existing restrictions. We leave for future generations accounts payable, but the future has the inconvenient habit of becoming the present.

The article sums up well some of the main structural problems of the Brazilian economy, while also citing the cyclical challenges – caused, in the author’s opinion, by the policies adopted after the 2008–09 crisis.

It deserved more careful editing, though, with some charts and better organised arguments (the text is a bit messy in its bottom half).

The authors are considering translating the article to English. I hope they do that.

The full version, only slightly longer, can be read here.