30 ANOS OF MAB, a look of economist and sociologist Carlos Vainer

In 1971, at the age of only 22, I was released from the prison of the military dictatorship and banned from the country. After the exile in Chile, Mexico, and France, with the amnesty, I returned to Brazil and entered, in 1980, as a professor and researcher, in the Postgraduate Program in Urban and Regional Planning, now the Institute of Urban and Regional Research and Planning, of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. In addition to classes and orientations, I started to develop research on migration policies in Brazil. That is, how, since independence, the Brazilian state conceived the distribution of populations in the territory and how it intervened to direct flows, establish or mobilize populations.

After studying for several years how the state had imposed its concepts of territory and work on foreign immigrants and domestic workers, I considered it time to look at the conflicting dimension of these processes and see, whether and to what extent resistance and attempts to counter-mobility or self-mobility were developing (categories taken from the French Jean-Paul de Gaudemar).

Around 1986, I heard from colleagues who studied social conflicts in the countryside references to the struggle of populations that would be compulsorily displaced to make way for the deployment of 25 large hydroelectric dams in the Uruguay River basin. It was CRAB – Regional Commission of Dam Affected Alto Uruguay. After getting the name of a CRAB militant from a colleague from the Rio Grande to do Sul, I made contact and decided to get to know this movement. And so, Frederico Araújo and I, at the time my research assistant, went to Porto Alegre, where we took a bus and landed on an icy morning of 1987 in the terminal of Erechim (RS).

Our contact told us to meet him in a church because that day there would be a CRAB Assembly. And there we went. While the people were arriving with their banners and occupying the vast hall of the church, we were able to find our contact and we talked to him after the end of the assembly, because it was about to begin.

The beginning of a lasting relationship in Erechim

Outside we froze, but inside the church the atmosphere was warm. Soon, Frederico and I would discover that this was an assembly of the greatest importance: after years of struggle, Eletrosul had recognized the CRAB as the legitimate representative of those affected by the Itá and Machadinho dams and had agreed to negotiate an agreement. In that Assembly, the terms negotiated with Eletrosul would be presented to those affected for discussion and approval. This was the first agreement made with those affected by the installation of dams before its construction. We arrived in Erechim on a historic day.

As soon as the assembly began, someone stood up and questioned the presence of “Eletrosul agents”, proposing that these people withdraw. The argument was simple and impossible: if those affected could not attend the company’s internal meetings, they should not be able to attend the meetings of those affected. After a quick discussion, the proposal was approved by acclamation. As a result, six people got up and left. Frederico and I were then shot by hundreds of eyes that expected us to do the same; after all, no one knew us and our face, our way, our clothes were more for people of the city than the countryside.

I confess that we had a delicate and uncomfortable time, not quite sure what to do. At one point I went to the table to ask our contact, as soon as possible, to explain who we were – researchers from the University who wanted to know the movement better and listen to those affected. And so it happened, causing those looks of distrust and even anger to turn into friendly and welcoming looks. In the coffee break, many approached to tell the suffering of their communities and the struggle they were fighting. And so began a long trajectory of research on the struggles of those affected by dams, on energy policy, on the social and environmental impacts of dams.

But it wasn’t only our research that began that victorious day in 1987. There also began a 35-year history of collaboration that went beyond research. As part of the ETTERN (State Laboratory, Work, Territory, and Nature), we created the Technical and Educational Advisory Environment and Dams (ATEMAB), focused on technical advice and support to the tireless effort of the MAB to form its militancy. Perhaps I and other colleagues who participate in this have taught something, but I can assure you that we have learned much more than we have taught. I, Frederico, and other ATEMAB students helped organize and participate in the meeting of the Southeast Region and the I National Meeting of Dam Affected, held April 19-21, 1989, in Goiânia. And there we were, too, with our friend and fellow anthropologist Aurelio Vianna, from CEDI, at the First National Congress of Dam-Affected People in March 1991, which marked the official foundation of the Movement of Dam-Affected People.

At this Congress, it was established that March 14 would be celebrated as National Day for Combating Dams. Then, this date became the International Day for Combating Dams, Rivers, and Life, as decided by the First International Meeting of Peoples Affected by Dams, held in Curitiba, in March 1997.

March 14 was a very important date for me because, on March 14, 1987, my daughter Alice was born. And because of this coincidence, for many years, because of the activities of the MAB on this date I was not at home, but somewhere in the country, at some meeting, in some community of people affected. Back home, people used to joke that I should have another family in Erechim… and, to some extent, I did. And the daughter of Luiz and Ivanei Dalla Costa, militants of CRAB and MAB, who is now a doctor, when she started to talk called me “grandpa”.

Yes, I feel part of this family. A family is a little different from the others because built not by blood ties, but by unity and solidarity in the struggle. A family that seeks not only the well-being of its members but of all the working people of the countryside and the cities. A family that fights for social and environmental justice, for an egalitarian society, without class, race, or gender oppression. A family that grows with the struggle of the people. A family that was born little by little, in Itaipu, in the banks of the Tucuruí, San Francisco, and Uruguay rivers, but that is now all over the country. A family that is also Colombian, Mexican, Salvadoran, Latin American and meets at MAR – Movement of People Affected by Dams

Many of those I met at the beginning of this story is no longer among us. But their children and grandchildren continue the fight. To those who have gone, to my brothers and sisters, nephews and nieces, cousins and cousins, compadres and comadres of the MAB, congratulations on these wonderful years of struggle, of suffering are true, but of hope always renewed.

Long live the MAB!
Waters for life, not death!