Teachers protest in Sao Paulo. Levi Bianco/Flickr. Some rights reserved.
The year 2016 began with a new round of protests in Brazil. The motives are manifold, however grievances related to the rising cost of public transportation, soaring costs of living and the right to the city in general. These upheavals are an omen that the mobilization begun in June 2013 are far from over. The opposite is true, they inaugurated a new political cycle in Brazil, breathing fresh air into society, with consequences that can be seen today in several spheres and not only in the streets. Since then, new spaces and actors have emerged leading to an increase of conflict in the public space and a questioning of the extant codes, actors and traditional actions since political redemocratization.
Although they embrace distinct (and usually opposing) visions and projects for Brazilian society, the individual and collective situate to the left and right of the government mobilized since 2013 until today are a fruit of the same sociopolitical opening. The forms of action and organization they adopted – proper to a transformation in the forms of activism and militant engagement in the country and the world – favored its swift emergence, media attention and the capacity to express and challenge, but also provoked tension and ambivalence in its own constitution and in the results in generates.
