The New York Times article about Brazil's Landless Workers Movement (MST) barely mentions one of the most important factors for their success: they are explicitly operating within the framework of Brazil's constitution. The reason that courts have recognized so many of their land occupations is that the Brazilian constitution says that "property shall observe its social function," and that this social function includes the "adequate use of available natural resources and preservation of the environment." Wealthy landowners purchasing farmland that they never use does not meet this requirement.
The MST is not a bunch of crazed armed rebels running around the countryside threatening small family farmers, it's a movement of millions of poor people who are successfully pushing back on one of the deepest problems plaguing Latin America: a landed aristocracy which is both destructive to democracy and economically inefficient.
The proliferation of legal settlements has turned the movement into a major food producer, selling hundreds of thousands of tons of milk, beans, coffee and other commodities each year, much of it organic after the movement pushed members to ditch pesticides and fertilizers years ago. The movement is now Latin America’s largest supplier of organic rice, according to a large rice producers’ union...
Daniel Alves, 54, used to work in someone else’s fields before he began squatting on this land in 2010. Now he grows 27 different crops on 20 acres, showing off bananas, peppercorns, bright pink dragon fruit and the Amazonian fruit cupuaçu — all organic. He sells the produce at local fairs.
He said he remained poor — his shack was lined with tarps — but was happy.
“This movement takes people out of misery,” he said.
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