This thesis centres its analysis upon the fascination for the collective at the potential cost of a delimitation of individual expression, within the confines of the Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra (MST). From the perspective of an applied anthropology, and to the end of contributing a constructive critique of the MST, the thesis seeks to ascertain how the movement has structured itself through the micro-actions of its membership around the domain of collective tropes of identity and where this complex set of understandings is leading the movement, both in the immediate, and more long-term, futures. To these ends, the principal focus of analysis is how actors within the movement construct and understand experiences of movement logic and emotion, as they perceive it, in and around their ambit. The thesis is thus orientated from an ethnographic perspective; throughout, actors’ accounts and experiences are privileged to attempt to throw light upon the manifold processes that being a member of the MST renders part of daily life. The thesis argues that in this extraordinarily dynamic time in Brazil, with socio-economic conditions so different to when the movement was founded, flexibility is going to be key as to whether the MST can endure, remaining relevant to its members and in a position where it can attempt to address its strategic aims. The thesis suggests that the movement faces a signal dilemma regarding the very device on which it has built its success, the unified collective front into which MST members’ identities can be subsumed. This fascination for the collective and its correlates, a hostile attitude to the media and the polarisation that can separate MST members from wider society, is explored through a series of differing contexts and the thesis closes with conclusions embedded within the framework of an applied anthropology; in pragmatic terms, how can the MST best achieve its stated goals at this historically significant point of its trajectory.

Submitted by Johnny Rodrigues (johnnyrodrigues@ufcg.edu.br) on 2018-08-30T17:07:41Z No. of bitstreams: 1 MIRIAN FARIAS DA SILVA - DISSERTAÇÃO PPGCS 2012..pdf: 1539409 bytes, checksum: d91a4ebd2b51328209262946b68f953b (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2018-08-30T17:07:41Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 MIRIAN FARIAS DA SILVA - DISSERTAÇÃO PPGCS 2012..pdf: 1539409 bytes, checksum: d91a4ebd2b51328209262946b68f953b (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012-09 / A partir de meados dos anos 1990, os instrumentos até então consolidados de tratamento dos conflitos agrários no país, que se orientavam para o assentamento de famílias de trabalhadores rurais sem terra via desapropriação de áreas improdutivas, passam a ser questionados pelos propositores do que se convencionou chamar de “Modelo de Reforma Agrária de Mercado (MRAM)”, sob o patrocínio determinante do Banco Mundial. Sob esta nova orientação, no final do primeiro e durante o segundo mandato do Governo FHC (1995-2002), foram criados os programas: Reforma Agrária Solidária do Projeto Piloto São José (PSJ), no Ceará, em agosto de 1996; o Projeto-Piloto de Reforma Agrária e Alívio da Pobreza (ou Cédula da Terra PCT) em agosto de 1997, que operou até o final do mandato FHC na região Nordeste; o Banco da Terra (BT), criado em 1999 e que funcionou até 2003; e o Crédito Fundiário de Combate à Pobreza Rural (2000-2002). Em 2003, já no Governo Lula (2003-2010), é criado o Programa Nacional de Crédito Fundiário (PNCF), que deveria ser complementar a outras ações com vistas à reforma agrária. No Cariri paraibano, e em particular no município de Sumé, o que se vivenciou ao longo da década de 2000 foi o abandono da estratégia de assentamento de famílias via desapropriação de antigos latifúndios improdutivos e a adesão aos novos instrumentos do PNCF, sendo criados, entre 2003 e 2008, 30 projetos de assentamentos (541 famílias em 16.842,95 hectares) na microrregião do Cariri Ocidental e Oriental, dos quais nove projetos apenas no município de Sumé (133 famílias em 4.054,590 hectares). Essas 30 operações são exclusivamente da linha Combate à Pobreza Rural (CPR) do PNCF, e 29 propostas aprovadas são referentes ao Cariri Ocidental. A análise será sobre a linha de CPR que tem promovido transformações nas formas de mobilização de famílias sem terra e nos atores sociais responsáveis pela mediação entre famílias, proprietários e poder público. Esta dissertação analisa estas transformações e revela como as elites locais acabam impondo uma lógica própria às ações do programa, instituindo o que chamam de uma “reforma agrária racional”, que quer dizer sem conflitos, atualizando o debate sobre clientelismo no semiárido nordestino. / In the late 1990s, the instruments to treat land conflicts in Brazil, which were aimed at the settlement of families of landless rural workers via expropriation of unproductive areas, are being questioned by proponents of what came to be called "Market-Based Land Reform”, under the auspices of the World Bank. Under this new guidance, the end of the first and during the second term of the Cardoso administration (1995-2002), some governmental programs were created. In 2003, already in Lula's government (2003-2010), it created the National Land Credit Program (PNCF in portuguese), which should be complementary to other agrarian reform actions. In Cariri region, Paraíba state, and in particular in the city of Sumé, which was experienced throughout the 2000s was the abandonment of the settlement strategy to families via expropriation of unproductive properties. Between 2003 and 2008, 30 settlement projects of PNCF (541 households in 16,842.95 hectares) in the Cariri region were created, of which nine projects in Sumé (133 families in 4054.590 hectares). These 30 operations are exclusively in a special line of PNCF to rural poverty reduction (CPR in portuguese). The analysis will be on the CPR line that has promoted changes in the forms of mobilization of landless families and social actors responsible for mediating between families, owners and government. This dissertation analyzes these changes and reveals how local elites impose its own logic to the actions of the program, instituting what they call a "rational land reform", which means without conflicts, updating the debate on clientelism in the semiarid northeast.