Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs
Brazil Initiative

Event Archive 2014

Dec 3, 2014

Gustavo Azenha - Media, Social Movements, and Citizenship in Brazil

Professor Gustavo Azenha's presentation explores the use of social media and mobile technologies in recent protests and contentious policy debates that have garnered widespread attention and been the focus of intensive new media advocacy activity. The presentation examines the links between “virtual” and “real” social mobilization around pressing socioeconomic issues, as well as the interrelations between emergent forms of asserting citizenship and mobilizing the third sector, with the changing socioeconomic and political landscape of Brazil.

6p.m. – 7:30p.m.   Joukowsky Forum, Watson Institute, 111 Thayer Street

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Nov 25, 2014

F. Daniel Hidalgo - Can Politicians Police Themselves? Natural Experimental Evidence from Brazil’s Audit Courts

To improve government accountability, policymakers and reformers have advocated the creation of auditing institutions that can monitor and punish lawbreaking elected officials. Yet these institutions differ greatly in their willingness to punish corrupt politicians, which is often attributed to variation in their independence from the political branches. In this paper, we take take advantage of a natural experiment embedded in Brazil's State Audit Courts to study how variation in the political insulation of independent auditors affects political accountability. To do so, we examine whether auditors appointed by the executive or the legislative branches punish lawbreaking politicians at lower rates than bureaucrats insulated from political influence using a large dataset of municipal audits. Additionally, we examine whether appointed auditors exhibit partisan bias in their decisions. Inferences will have strong internal validity as assignment of auditors to cases occurs by random lottery. In addition, we discuss the implications of our findings for the consequences of Brazil’s new “Clean Slate” (Ficha Limpa) law that bans politicians convicted of corruption from running for office. 

12p.m. – 1:30p.m.   McKinney Conference Room, Watson Institute, 111 Thayer Street

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Nov 11, 2014

Natasha Borges Sugiyama - Poverty Relief in Brazil: Successes, Shortcomings and Unknowns about the Bolsa Família

Since 2003, Brazil has embarked upon a new strategy for poverty relief under the Bolsa Família (Family Grant) program. What have we learned in ten years? Professor Sugiyama will assess the program and address human capital development, modernization of the bureaucracy, gender empowerment, and citizenship development of the poor.

12p.m. – 1:30p.m.   McKinney Conference Room, Watson Institute, 111 Thayer Street

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Nov 5, 2014

Jan Hoffman French - From Honor to Dignity: Criminal Libel, Press Freedom, and Racist Speech in Brazil

This conceptual paper, presented by Professor Jan Hoffman French, emanates from a press freedom case in Brazil, and argues that honor crimes, such as criminal libel, have paved the way for regulating racist hate speech, which in many Western democracies is deemed to protect equality and dignity. Explaining that the United States is an outlier when it comes to absolute free speech, the paper also critiques the use by international NGOs of local examples to further their goals that are sometimes, and particularly in this case, normatively centered on free speech assumptions of the United States.

6p.m. – 7:30p.m.   Joukowsky Forum, Watson Institute, 111 Thayer Street

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Nov 4, 2014

Manuela Picq - Cosmopolitan Amazons: Disentangling Modernity from the State

How did indigenous peoples come to participate in a parade for gay rights in a place called Benjamin Constant deep in the Amazon? What may appear as anecdotal raises less trivial questions. It is unexpected to find sociocultural modernity in a region epitomizing a wild, isolated, and apolitical nature. How are we to reconcile prevailing understandings of an Amazon detached from political modernity with its cosmopolitan LGBT scene? My project, inspired by this anecdote, explores the imperative of shifting our gaze when looking at modernity.

12p.m. – 1:30p.m.   McKinney Conference Room, Watson Institute, 111 Thayer Street

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Oct 15–17, 2014

CineBrasil 2014

CineBrasil is an annual film festival showcasing the best in recent Brazilian cinema. CineBrasil this year will encompass a broad range of genres from animated film to drama to comedy, and many subjects including disability, inequality, regional differences, sexuality and security in urban neighborhoods. Reserve tickets for each day of the festival here, here and here.

October 15, Carmichael Auditorium, Building for Environmental Research and Teaching, and October 16-17, Martinos Auditorium, Granoff Center for the Creative Arts

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Oct 7, 2014

Rogério Meireles Pinto - Brazil’s Unified Health Care System: Transdisciplinary Collaboration and Integration of Health and Social Services

This talk, by Dr. Rogério Meireles Pinto of Columbia's School of Social Work, will provide an overview of Brazil’s Unified Health System and its Family Health Strategy – with an emphasis on the role of transdisciplinary collaboration among community health workers, physicians and nurses. Dr. Pinto will discuss associations between transdisciplinary collaboration, evidence-based practice, and primary care, public health and social services; and how these associations may facilitate integration of different services in Brazil and other global contexts. 

12p.m. – 1:30p.m.   Case Study Room 270, Alpert Medical School, 222 Richmond Street

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Oct 1, 2014

Moises Lino e Silva - Employment, Marginality and Freedom on the Borders of a Brazilian Favela

In this talk, Professor Lino e Silva furthers the conversation on alternative forms of work that take place in the daily life of people living in a large Brazilian shantytown. He challenges taming narratives regarding the fundamental necessity of full-time employment for the life of the so-called “urban poor”.  Is there a necessary link between unemployment and marginality in favelas? What social fractures are exposed when favela dwellers refuse to engage in formal working relations with the upper classes? What is the liberating potential of alternative employment arrangements for a more sustainable urban future?

6p.m. – 7:30p.m.   Joukowsky Forum, Watson Institute, 111 Thayer Street

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Sep 29, 2014

Antonio Carlos de Souza Lima - Indigenous Peoples and the Nation-State in Brazil, 20th/21st Century: From Tutelage to Participation

 This paper presents an analysis of relations between indigenous peoples and the Nation-State in Brazil from the early twentieth century to the present, examining the standards of governance established by government policies directed at these communities, rights recognition, and ongoing development initiatives. Under tutelage, indigenous peoples were considered relatively incapable for civil life, needing the guardianship of a state agency whose functions implied defining indigeneity and establishing and governing small reservations where indigenous peoples were ideally expected to become Brazilian rural wage laborers.  Under the participation model, indigenous peoples are able to define their indigeneity, act as full citizens, and have their traditional lands delineated according to their uses and customs. However, true basis for participation implies a knowledge of Brazilian and international politics that indigenous peoples are still in the process of acquiring. Through this gap between ideal and actual means to participate, tutelary mediation of churches, universities and NGOs, as well as of public agencies, may be reintroduced in the interethnic scene, bringing to light the contradictions of a colonial history that has yet not been overcome.

12p.m. – 1:30p.m.   McKinney Conference Room, Watson Institute, 111 Thayer Street

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Sep 24, 2014

João Reis - Slaves Who Owned Slaves in 19th Century Brazil

The largest importer of slaves from Africa, Brazil also had a high rate of slave manumission compared to other slave societies in the Americas. In addition, a large number of former slaves prospered to the point of becoming slave masters themselves. What is less known is the phenomenon of the slave owning slave, which is the subject of this lecture. Focused on Bahia, an important sugar plantation region, and particularly on the city of Salvador, the talk deals with such questions as access to the slave market, urban slavery, and slave/master relations.

6p.m. – 7p.m.   Joukowsky Forum, Watson Institute, 111 Thayer Street

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Sep 23, 2014

A Roundtable on the 2014 Brazilian Elections

Brazil stands at a political crossroads, with a complex electoral reality shifting each day. A panel of esteemed Brown professors will discuss the 2014 Brazilian elections in order to shed light on the internal processes affecting voting and party politics in one of the world's largest democracies.

6p.m. – 7:30p.m.   Joukowsky Forum, Watson Institute, 111 Thayer Street

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Sep 10, 2014

Netmundial, Marco Civil, and CGI.br: The Modern Brazilian Regulatory Environment for the Internet

The growing global dependence on the Internet increases the importance of its governance processes.  In this talk, Virgilio Almeida will  discuss several characteristics of the Brazilian regulatory environment for the Internet: the history of the Brazilian Internet Steering Committee (cgi.br), a multistakeholder committee responsible for  coordinating and integrating all Internet service initiatives in Brazil, the process of developing and approving the Marco Civil, which is the Brazilian law of civil rights for Internet users and service providers, and lessons learned from the process of preparing and running the NETmundial meeting, which discussed Internet governance principles and a roadmap for the future Internet ecosystem. He will then conclude by discussing plans for the evolution of the Internet in Brazil.

6p.m. – 7:30p.m.   Joukowsky Forum, Watson Institute, 111 Thayer Street

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Apr 10–12, 2014

Brazil: From Dictatorship to Democracy

Brazil: From Dictatorship to Democracy will examine Brazil's recent past with a day-long conference where Brown students and alumni will present research on contemporary Brazil that will highlight ongoing research at Brown. It will be followed by an international symposium of leading U.S. and Brazilian scholars that will reassess the two decades of the military regime and its legacy, consider challenges and achievements since Brazil’s return to democracy, and discuss perspectives for the future.

111 Thayer Street, Joukowsky Forum

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