Brazil (Oxfam Country Profiles Series)

Rating:
Summary: Obscured by Ideology
Review: In her book "Brazil", Jan Rocha itemizes a good selection of interesting and important national problems but then bogs down in anachronistic ideology. I purchased the book as an introduction to the country of Brazil and as a guidepost into more detailed topics, as well as to see Oxfam's perspective on these various issues. The book does well in summarizing familiar problems such as authoritatian politics and the minority landed oligarchy as well as obscure ones such as attempts to relate a gatherers' economy of babassu nut collection to the twenty-first political economy.
Problems within the book emerge when it tries to discuss these issues using a vocabulary somewhat related to 1960's Marxism. The "good guys" are the workers and aboriginal peoples who are shamelessly exploited by the "bad guys",the government-oligarchy
coalition. The middle class is curiously omitted suggesting the inuendo that perhaps it does not exist at all. For example after mentionning the government policy of rapid industrialization starting in the 1950's the book seems to imply that it was done without a domestic market.
No one denies that terrible attrocities have taken place in Brazil but this carping on negatives of the past fails to achieve a constructive purpose. The book mentions that the government set up a National Institute for Colonisation and Land Reform which has power to confiscate holdings of unproductive lands for redistribution (a very interesting idea for a developping country) but then it does not explain why it has seldom been used or even if it still exists.
Perhaps the last chapter on Carnival (holiday) is the best one. In this one case the book changes tack and identifies a positive role of Carnival by involving people of various factions within national culture. If other chapters were as good, it would be a highly recommendable book but as it stands it limits itself to identifying national issues and then presents a somewhat anachronistic ideological polemic for those who might appreciate it.