Economic Modernization, Urbanization and the Rise of the Brazilian Feminist Press in Opposition to Authoritarian Politics
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2010-12-30
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Abstract
The mid-1960s marked the beginning of profound political and socioeconomic transformations in Brazil. The regime change that resulted from the 1964 coup d’état was the starting point of a process of industrialization, mechanization of agriculture, expulsion of millions from the countryside and intense urbanization – all necessary conditions for the military government to launch its new model of economic development. The new economic model generated several distortions, particularly marked social inequalities and explosive growth of several metropolitan areas, but, inadvertently, it also promoted the opposition against authoritarianism in the form of a new urban working class with the presence of female workers in significant numbers. It is within this context of authoritarian politics, economic hardships and unplanned urbanization that a multiplicity of society groups started to mobilize politically in the 1970s. Lawyers, labor union leaders, neighborhood activists, and human rights advocates, with the support of the Catholic Church, organized protests against the military abuses demanding political openness and social justice. The popular resistance also included a variety of women’s groups, among them, female journalists whose opposition to the military is often neglected by the literature focusing on democratic transitions. This paper is an attempt to rescue the contributions made by the feminist press to ending the period of authoritarian politics in Brazil.