Whatever gains were made between 2003 – 2013 will be reversed. Brazilian workers face a ‘decade of infamy’. The Rousseff regime has embraced the politics of “savage capitalism” as personified in the appointment of two of the most extreme advocates of neo-liberal policiesGood analysis, but depressing outlook. Look for rising social unrest in Brazil and more brutal repression to administer shock therapy. Brazil faces more dark times.
The James Petras Website
Brazil: President Rousseff Declares War on the Working Class
James Petras | Bartle Professor (Emeritus) of Sociology at Binghamton University
Brazil: President Rousseff Declares War on the Working Class
James Petras | Bartle Professor (Emeritus) of Sociology at Binghamton University
h/t Yves Smith at Naked Capitalism
2 comments:
It's long been apparent that Dilma is a closet neolib.
Even some of the "real" lefties in Latin America, like Maduro, don't seem to be able to get their act together.
A common problem seems to be that they borrow money in dollars instead of their own currency, and they attempt to manipulate their exchange rate instead of letting their currency float.
Another problem is that many of the Latin American countries have "extractive" economies which leads to "Dutch Disease." Dutch Disease results in a reliance on imported manufactured goods. It works when the extractive economy is booming, but when exports fall, as they have recently, their currency weakens and the cost of those imported manufactured goods rises, resulting in "stagflation."
If Petras is right, Brazil is following the same universal pattern illustrated by the U.S., Europe, Japan, Australia and New Zealand: welfare state policies will last as long and only as long as capitalists decide to change them. We've all seen this kind of thing happening, no?
In that Rousseff is merely a puppet, like Levy is just a figurehead.
There is no pleading with these people for social responsibility, no persuading them to do otherwise. There is no possible dialogue.
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