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SOCIAL MOVEMENTS IN BRAZIL 337

more institutionalized, started in the 1990s. civil society was tantamount to an act of civil
Some examples are various forums like the disobedience and of resistance to the domi-
National Forum for the Struggle for Housing, nant political regime.
the National Forum for Urban Reform, the During this period, new players appeared
National Forum for Popular Participation, the on the public stage, giving special emphasis
Forum for São Paulo XXI, and so on. These to popular urban social movements, demand-
forums established the practice of large-scale ing public goods and services, land and hous-
national meetings, generating diagnoses of ing, as well as the new social movements that
social problems, as well as defining goals and fought for the recognition of social and
strategic objectives in order to cope with cultural rights: race, gender, sex, standard of
them. living, environment, safety, human rights and
Several partnership initiatives between so on. The common ground of these social
organized civil society and public power players was the demand for social rights and
emerged, impelled by the government policies, justice. In the sphere of urban movements,
such as the Participative Budget, the Minimum there was a great increase in the diversity of
Income, the school grants, administrative the collective players taking part in the strug-
counsels in social public areas and so on. gle: they were not exclusively confined to the
trade unions or political parties. The popular
movements played an important role in the
construction of the Constitution of 1988. It
THE SETTING FOR SOCIAL adopted several social rights that produced
MOVEMENTS AND OTHER FORMS OF juridical instruments of participation for civil
‘ASSOCIATIVISM’ IN BRAZIL society, among them the participative coun-
cils and decentralization in the federal
It has become commonplace to hear that civil sphere, for instance, which promoted the del-
society is consolidating itself as the driving egation of responsibilities to municipalities.
force behind innovations and change, even With the gradual opening of channels of
on an international level. In Brazil, the notion participation and political representation fol-
of civil society is undergoing reformulation, lowing the fall of the military regime, the
following the trajectory of the country’s social movements (especially the popular
political and social struggles. Generally ones) have been losing the centrality that
speaking, civil society first came into promi- permeated discourse on participation in civil
nence in the period known as the ‘transition society. There began to be a fragmentation of
to democracy’, at the end of the 1970s, when the ‘historical social subject’, who played
the term was introduced into the political a relevant role in the social change and trans-
vocabulary then current and became the formation that focused on the popular sectors
object of theoretical elaboration. In political and was the fruit of an alliance between the
terms, it became synonymous with the trade union movements and the popular
participation and organization of the civil neighbourhood movements (workers and res-
population in the struggle against the military idents). A plurality of new actors appeared
regime. One of the main focal points of civil as a result of new forms of ‘associativism’
society’s articulation at that time arose from on the political scene. This led to a broaden-
the notion of autonomy: it was a question of ing and diversification of organized groups:
getting organized independently of the state the creation of new movements, associations,
(mostly by ignoring the state). Direct partici- institutions and NGOs. This trend has
patory democracy carried out autonomously, created several social networks and config-
at home and at work, was held to be the ideal ured new patterns for the organization of cit-
model for building a counter-hegemony. izens in what is widely recognized as ‘civil
To participate in the practices of organizing society’.