the Brazilian Workers Party HOW CAN we break the barrier between workers' movements and ecologists, which still exists in many countries?
How can we bring about, in theory and in practice, a convergence between the class struggle and the fight against the destruction of nature; between the socialist programme and detence or te environment? The Brazilian experience is perhaps an important step towards this goal.
The struggle of Chico Mendes, leading the rubber workers and indigenous communities in defending the Amazon rainforest against the destructive actions of the big landowners, is well known. Mendes was a local and national trade union leader (he was elected to the leadership of the CUT trade union federation in 1988) and a Tolnder or The Workers Party (PT).
His courageous battle, which inspired both socialism and ecology, cost him his life: in December 1988 he was murdered by hired thugs of the big landowners.
The exemplary struggle and sacrifice of Chico Mendes have left their mark on the political culture of the Workers Party, though not without resistance, notably from certain economists.
Programme
The governmental programme put forward by the PT for next October's presidential elections represents a considerable step forward.
The PT is proposing Luis Ignacio da Silva, 'Lula', as its candidate: in the last opinion polls he had already won 42 per cent support, leaving his main rival, the right-winger Henrique Cardoso, well behind.
Of course that can change over the coming months, but Lula has a real chance of being elected.
The governmental programme of the PT contains a chapter entitled "The Ecological Basis for a Project of National Development". It proposes to open up a new perspective by going beyond the traditional view of an economy based on the concept of quantitative growth.
The choice about priorities in production will no longer be made on the basis of the logic of the market, but must also integrate the social needs of the population (education, health) and the safeguarding of the environment.
It is not a question of rejecting technological progress but of breaking from all technology that destroys nature, opting for methods of conserving resources, avoiding harm to the environment and creating socially useful products.
In short, it is a question of transforming the current mode of development, which is responsible for the degradation of the environment and growing social inequality, into a model of sustainable development resolving the problem of poverty.
Agrarian and urban reform are two of the central points of this programme. Industrial products The former military regime had imposed on the countryside the "Technological Package for Agriculture", a model of development which was strongly dependent on the massive use of modern industrial products: chemical fertilisers, pesticides, agricultural machinery.
It resulted in considerable ecological havoc, a worsening of the living standards and health of rural workers; and the accumulation of power in the hands of the big agro-export businesses, leading to a rural exodus and the concentration of people in the miserable shanty towns on the edges of the major cities.
The intensive use of pesticides has been responsible for the pollution of rivers and the atmosphere and the poisoning of the food chain.
In contrast to this mode of development the agrarian reform programme seeks to establish a solid economy based on peasant cooperatives, alternative technologies, redistribution of profits and with priority given to the production of food and other goods destined for the local or national market.
The cities present an increasingly severe problem from an environmental point of view.
Industrial pollution, accumulation of domestic, hospital and industrial waste, lack of drinking water, lack of drains in poor neighbourhoods, a bad transport system etc.
These problems are intimately linked to the unequal urban structure which concentrates the whole infrastructure in the rich areas.
Radical urban reform is therefore a necessity. The process of production, appropriation and consumption within the urban space must be subject to social and ecological criteria.
Priority must be given to policies of sanitization which guarantee the population control of atmospheric pollution, provision of drinking water, a drainage system, regular collection and treatment of urban waste, development of green belts, urbanisation of the shanty towns without displacement of their populations.
The programme also proposes specific measures for different regions of the country, particularly Amazonia. The last great tropical forest in the world is under attack.
Highway
The trans-Amazonian highway, military projects, deforestation for the production of charcoal, pollution of the rivers with mercury, destruction of the forest for cattle ranching or for mining activities etc.
These activities are always accompanied by violent aggression against the rural workers, the rubber tappers and other small-scale producers, as well as indigenous populations.
It is necessary to break with these practices and reorientate investments towards ecologically and socially useful activities, such as the extraction of natural wealth by craft workers, rubber tappers, chestnuts, fishing etc.
Extraction of minerals and the search for gold must be strictly controlled by ecological considerations. Official credits and financial incentives for the RESICENTE