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Widespread violence, legal chicanery and ruthless profiteering have come to characterise the expansion of the agricultural frontier in Brazil. With the advance of this frontier, the pioneering peasants, on the one hand, and large landowners and large economic enterprise, on the other, have become locked in an increasingly bitter struggle for land. In his book, Joe Foweraker draws on extensive empirical research to demonstrate the dimensions and dynamics of the struggle. It is his contention that the process can only be understood in relation to the patterns of economic accumulation in the national society and to the typical forms of political intervention on the frontier. In this way the argument moves beyond descriptive, moral or realpolitik explanations of the political violence and bureaucratic malpractice on the frontier, and integrates these elements into a theoretical account of accumulation and class struggle on the frontier, and of the characteristic mediations of this struggle.
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CAMBRIDGE LATIN AMERICAN STUDIES GENERAL EDITOR MALCOLM DEAS ADVISORY COMMITTEE WERNER BAER MARVIN BERNSTEIN AL STEPAN BRYAN ROBERTS 39 THE STRUGGLE FOR LAND A POLITICAL ECONOMY OF THE PIONEER FRONTIER IN BRAZIL FROM 1930 TO THE PRESENT DAY For a list of other books in the Cambridge Latin American Studies series, please see page THE STRUGGLE FOR LAND A POLITICAL ECONOMY OF THE PIONEER FRONTIER IN BRAZIL FROM 1930 TO THE PRESENT DAY JOE FOWERAKER Lecturer, University of Essex CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS London Cambridge New York New Rochelle Melbourne Sydney PUBLISHED BY THE PRESS SYNDICATE OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE The Pitt Building, Trumpington Street, Cambridge, United Kingdom CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge CB2 2RU, UK 40 West 20th Street, New York NY 10011-4211, USA 477 Williamstown Road, Port Melbourne, VIC 3207, Australia Ruiz de Alarcon 13, 28014 Madrid, Spain Dock House, The Waterfront, Cape Town 8001, South Africa http ://www. cambridge.org ©J. Foweraker 1981 This book is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press. First published 1981 First paperback edition 2002 A catalogue recordfor this book is available from the British Library ISBN 0 52123555 3 hardback ISBN 0 521 52600 0 paperback To Lynne Contents List of maps page viii Preface ix Glossary of acronyms and abbreviations used in the text xiv Glossary of words and phrases in Portuguese used in the text xvii Part i: The pioneer frontier 1 2 3 The pioneer frontier; political violence and the peasantry The process and stages of occupation of land on the frontier Frontier expansion and the national economy 3 27 58 Part 2: Political mediation 4 5 6 7 The legal history of the land on the frontier and the question of dual authority 83 Law and lawlessness on the frontier and the problem of bureaucratic inertia 106 Private and public colonisation of the frontier and the pattern of bureaucratic entrepreneurship 128 The contemporary alliance of state and capital on the frontier and the contradictions within the State 150 Part 3: Accumulation and authoritarianism 8 9 10 Primitive accumulation and violence on the frontier 169 The frontier and the reproduction of authoritarian capitalism 187 The frontier and the formation of the Brazilian State 209 Bibliography Official publications Other primary sources Secondary sources Interviews 235 235 237 241 251 Index 256 Maps 1 2 3 4 5 Brazil: political and administrative divisions Principal frontier r