How did you like the play Ms. Lincoln?

The last World Cup host without a functional first division was the United States in 1994. There were second and third divisions, but no first. In Brazil, none of the CBF´s four divisions started without legal disputes, the state tournaments have become a disgrace and the organizational frameworks of Brazilian sport have rarely been less transparent or more chaotic. Last week, the presidency of the CBF passed from the octogenarian Jumpin´ José Marin (@seeadarkness) to the septuagenarian Marco del Nero. Upon assuming the presidency in an uncontested election, del Nero said that there “would be no changes because things are going very well.” SQN (só que não, “not”, for those putting together a #WC14 Brazilian twitter vocabulary).

Fluminense, whose principal sponsor is UniMed, was saved from relegation because their lawyers convinced the CBF´s sports tribunal that a smaller team should be sent down because the CBF (having just received millions for a UniMed sponsorship) hadn´t informed that team about the status of a player that was sent on as substitute in the last fifteen minutes of the last game of the season. The Portuguesa directorship fought a bit, and then capitulated. Last week, a fan filed a law suit to continue the battle for permanence in the first division and as the first round of the second division was into its 15^th minute, someone walked legal papers onto the field and the Portuguesa coach took his team to the locker room. The fans were not pleased. This happened in the same stadium where Vasco and Atlético Paranaense organizadas tried to kill each other at the end of last season [ed: thanks to the anonymous comment at the end of this post, the plot is revealed as much more complicated than I describe here and also involves Flamengo and millions deposited in Portuguesa bank accounts. Follow this link to a timeline (in portuguese) of the events]. 

There were also legal battles to determine which teams would play in the 3^rd and 4^th divisions. The CBF manipulated and massaged the tournaments into the form and format that best serves OGlobo and the sponsors. The season will be cut into bits by the World Cup, players will be sold to Europe, Asia and the Middle East in August, attendances are miserable, the stadiums are privatized and sanitized, the football is terrible, the rich teams close ranks within the CBF, there is no transparency, kids are regularly and ritually abused in the youth systems and the October presidential elections may depend on Neymar´s 4^th metatarsal. The state of football in the country of football frustrates and depresses in equal measure.

Brazil continues to struggle with the legacy of the 1964-1985 dictatorship. All dictatorships are necessarily anti-intellectual and the evisceration of public education continues to resonate in the halls of power. It is almost fair to say that the leaders and elites of Brazil were educated not to be critical, progressive thinkers and did not develop the necessary skills to deal effectively with complex problems. They also carry with them a very anti-educational cultural perspective that is reflected in the media, in the public education system and in the knee-jerk violent reactions to public crises (aka, send in the shock troops). This is not to suggest that there are not Brazilian intellectuals but rather that the fetishization of a president with a fourth grade education because he is “of the people” is an indication of the level at which most public discourse occurs.

This week I returned to the Favela do Metrô, 500 meters distant from the Maracanã. When I last wrote about Metrô in 2011, the community was under attack from the city government, supposedly to clear the way for a FIFA parking lot. The city behind its internationally acclaimed (sqn) mayor dissimulated, sowed discontent, bulldozed and left the wreckage behind. The majority of residents were eventually able to move into decent public housing across the tracks, but only after years of delay, a lack of transparency and immensely tiring and emotionally draining fights. Now, returning to the place where I once gave an extension course from the nearby university, there are growing piles of trash and a fetid crackolândia. Most readers will never have visited a crackolândia and I do not recommend it. It is the end of the line dominated by young drug traffickers that have no education and less interest. The burned out shells of humans carry deadened eyes that would reveal the depths of despair if one could bear to look at them. The Brazilian reaction to what I am writing will be:  “You feel sorry for them? Take them home.” Thing is, many of these people had homes before the government destroyed them in the name of progress. Worse, there is no project to turn the area into something with even marginal utility for the World Cup. It is simply destroyed and left to fester.

As the saying goes, if you´re not outraged you´re not paying attention. The World Cup is one of the great collective cultural experiences that we as humans have managed to put together. However, the use of the tournament to consolidate wealth and power at the expense of the cities, countries and people that host it must come to an immediate end. The business model of the World Cup creates notions of distinctiveness and religious fervor at the same time that it thrives in vacuums of responsibility and regimes of exception.

For example, FIFA is parading its trophy around the world as if it is a religious object. Only heads of state and world cup winners are allowed to touch it. Seriously. People buy into this hokum but never ask who the poor sot was that put the trophy on display, or why. The entire World Cup can only come into being because Brazilian elites signed laws giving the shop away to FIFA through the Lei Geral da Copa. FIFA isn´t responsible for stadium construction, yet their demands drive the architectural projects which are heralded as “sustainable”. The cities and states aren´t responsible for the scope and scale of the projects because they have to meet FIFA demands. The federal government can´t intervene in the running of the national football leagues because they would be sanctioned by FIFA. And around we go. There is neither credibility nor accountability, just rentability.

The tensions are palpable in Brazil as the #WC14 rumbles towards us. Buses are burning in the suburbs and in Copacabana. Dozens were killed in Salvador when the police went on strike. The poor, expelled from their homes, see even the churches close their doors to them. The middle classes are being squeezed though rent and daily living price increases. Traffic jams and high taxes are the existential condition in Brazil. Public works that could have brought long-term benefits are fragmenting neighborhoods instead of creating wide-reaching mobility networks. The militarization of cities is happening in concert with the privatization of public spaces. It´s not all the fault of #WC14 but nature does abhor a vacuum.

Rio Twenty Something

Brazil is desperate for some good news that doesn´t come from its entertainment pages. The economy has been sacked by Dilma and the PT, the “pacification” program in Rio is proving that it does not, in fact, make sense to replace one arbitrary, militarized system of justice with another, the World Cup organizers are entering into full-scale damage control and the Olympic projects are so far behind schedule before they even get started that Rio 2016 might change its name to Rio Twenty Something.

The depressing state of affairs in the run in to the World Cup is making everyone quite anxious for the Cup to actually get going. It will be a huge relief to be able to talk about football for a month, though of course there will be protests and violence and human rights violations, arbitrary arrests, massive confusion at the airports, teams getting lost on the way to their hotels and the trumpeting cacophony of the world´s largest herd of white elephants.

We discovered this week that airplanes will not be adding to this noise. As a “security measure” all airports within a 7 km radius of WC elephants will be closed for up to seven hours before and during matches. Why 7 km? Surely it is not for security reasons as a plane could zip into a stadium as easily from 10 km as it could from 7 and there are not yet plans to have anti-aircraft missiles on rooftops. No, the reason for the cancellation of more than 800 flights is to prevent airplane noise from interfering with game transmission. At least there won´t be long waits to get baggage.

The Lord Mayor Eduardo II of São Sebastião do Rio de Janeiro decreed public holidays on all WC game days, cancelled all permits for cultural events between May 22 and July 18, and suspended all public works projects for the same period. That means that there will be no work done on any Olympic related projects, no improvements to city infrastructure, no hammering of any kind for two months. While it will be quieter, what will all of the workers do? Will they be receiving their salaries for staying at home with their kids? The banishment of residents from their own city is what is going to make the World Cup possible – just another form of accumulation by dispossession.

Has everyone fully swallowed the bitter pill of the Sochi Games? Watching the closing ceremonies of the Paralympic Games last night, I could envision the map of Russia that served as the podium growing to

Putin´s message to the West

incorporate Crimea and eastern Ukraine. Sochi 2014 has served as a delightful soft power cover for Putin to pursue his hard power geo-politics. All the while the IOC sits on its pudgy golden ringed fingers, extolling the hackneyed virtuosity of the European aristocracy as a viable model for conflict resolution within the context of a brazenly cynical political economy of global sport.

The latest to add his name to the increasingly long roll of kleptomaniac shysters in Brazilian sport is Ary Graça, ex-president of the Brazilian Volleyball Conferderation and ex-president of the International Volleyball Association. Graça was caught out by ESPN Brasil reporter Lucio de Castro to the tune of R$10,000,000. Graça then renounced his two presidencies but will not likely face any kind of legal action (of course). The person Graça had received his position from, 2016 President Carlos Nuzman, said he was “surprised” just before he took a position on the ethics board of the International Association of Athletics Federations. Asked what more he was surprised about that day, Nuzman revealed his pleasure at seeing the sun rise in the East. 

Tired Resignation

It should be clear by now that Rio de Janeiro does not have the capacity to host its own population, much less a never ending series of mega-events. During a week of record heat there have been widespread power outages, water cuts, transportation breakdowns and absurd scenes of violence. All this while Lord Mayor Paes is off in South Africa taking over the the C40 mayors´ conference from Billionaire Bloomberg. The list of insanities in Rio these past weeks has combined with the incredible heat to make me even more irritable than usual when talking about the city. But let´s go by parts.

First, the city has been made hotter and hotter by its horrible architecture, dedication to the car and lack of connectivity with the water. The most recent horror in the infinite list of heat creating buildings is by the recently deceased Oscar Niemeyer. The picture says almost all you need to know about this new monstrosity at the Fundação Getulio Vargas on the Praia de Botafogo. A big black glass box reflects

Hotter than Hades, uglier than sin. 

afternoon sun onto a treeless esplanade of white concrete. The red sculpture out in front is a reminder that Niemeyer was an expert at creating heat islands unfit for human circulation. Even if it were humanly possible to deal with the space, the kind folk at FGV have made sure that no one can enter it by erecting fencing on the access routes and posting private security 24/7. This kind of building and urban design is so common in Rio as to go unnoticed most of the time – but then no one asks why we have power outages after we cut down all the trees and cram ourselves into air-conditioned boxes that cut off external air circulation. I know ol´ Oscar was a decent enough fellow, but he has really made life a living hell for generations of Brazilians. With one of the most iconic views in the world, he opted for a building with no windows! The heat index in some parts of Rio was 57 celsius yesterday.

Second, violence, violence, violence. Brazilians love them some violence. MMA is one of the most popular sports and much like American Football can be considered a cultural representation of how the country functions. Remember when Eduardo Paes had his bodyguards hold back a disgruntled citizen so he could punch him in the face? This is an interpersonal reflection of the obsession with MMA and the normal way that people in Rio try to resolve their anger. Get on a city bus and see what I mean.

Another example? On one of the wealthiest streets in Flamengo there has been increasing insecurity due to a number of robberies committed by young kids. Part of this insecurity comes from the abandonment of the Edificio Hilton Santos which was previously occupied by live people but has been turned into yet another festering element of Eike Batista´s crumbling empire. The area in front of the building is deserted, and poorly lit and overgrown, making it an ideal place to steal cell phones and wallets. Of course, the police are never anywhere to be seen, busy as they are sitting in their cars with the engines running to escape the heat. So a group of middle class vigilantes decided to take matters into their own hands. They chased down a young black kid, stripped him naked, cut his ear with a knife and locked him to a light post with a bicycle lock – around his neck.  The case has been alternatively celebrated or decried in government and media. Just what Rio needs are gangs of upper-middle class men acting as judge and jury over the lives of poor black kids. Oh wait, that basically describes the justice system anyway.

More violence? How about the invasion of a hospital by armed gunmen who robbed patients in their beds! How about the invasion of the Morro do Juramento by the Rio Military Police that left 6 “suspects” dead. The motive was payback for shots fired against the UPP units in the Complexo de Alemão. The Guarda Municipal of Rio continue to beat up street vendors in the city center in preparation for the World Cup.Want more? How about the video showing police beating up a fan in the bathroom of a stadium. Or the 100 Corinthians fans that cut through the fencing around the team´s training site and invaded practice, throttling several of the players. There are widespread reports of inhumane conditions for Haitian workers at the Manaus World Cup stadium. Yesterday there was yet another death on Rio´s BRT Transoeste line.

Add to this the power outages and water shortages all over Rio de Janeiro and one wonders what the city´s top executive is being lauded for in South Africa this week.

Smart is the new Stupid

Rio de Janeiro. If cars were bread, the city would be the world´s largest, moldiest, most immobile basket. But cars aren´t edible, and therefore we have the blingest, bestest, most smartest city in the world, full of a thousand hidden treasures and a million kilometers of traffic jams. We can all thank the brilliant privatization initiatives and urban operations and mega-events for the wholesale prostitution of urban space and commodification of our increasingly bare lives. We are being led into an impossible smart future by the rising star of hyperbolic, back room, smart guy glad-handing. In the past weeks, Rio de Janeiro has been selected as “the world´s smartest city” at the Smart City Expo World Congress and his royal munificence Eduardo Paes was elected president of the C40 group of the world´s largest cities. 

Congratulations, Mr. Mayor. It´s just that the city is more dysfunctional than ever, the urban future is being built upon car and bus transportation, the bay and the ocean are too polluted for human use, half of the city is controlled by militias, the other half by drug gangs and a brutal military apparatus,  the mayor wants to build a ski slope in the Madureira park and is more concerned with Woody Allen than with reforestation.

Truly, the marketing machine of the city and state governments are the smartest elements of RJ. I have not done a formal analysis, but Rio de Janeiro must be the only city in the C40 that does not have a map of its bus routes. It must be the only port city that does not use the water for mass transportation. It is the largest city in the Americas with one metro line, which does not a metro make. It may be the world´s largest city that has privatized all of its public transportation and continues to blast highways through dense neighborhood fabric without ever having demonstrated that those lines aattend present or future demand. The Olympic bid books have become the de-facto urban planning documents. Rule by decree, violations of human rights, rampant deficit spending, mega event after mega-event, bubbling sewage, increased congestion, violent police, voracious real-estate speculation undertaken by the state, attempts to close high performing public schools, the elimination of Olympic training facilities and tens of thousands of forced removals. This is the toned and bronzed face of the new smart city.

Now, as we welcome another gang of “global experts”  in the form of the Clinton Initiative (with Chelsea! and the president of Nike, Otavio Marques de Azevedo, presidente da Andrade Gutierrez; Candido Botelho Bracher, presidente e CEO do Itaú BBA; Alessandro Carlucci, CEO da Natura; Sylvia Coutinho, CEO do UBS Brasil; Andre Esteves, CEO do BTG Pactual; Angélica Fuentes, CEO do Grupo Omnilife/Angelíssima; Eduardo Hochschild, presidente-executivo da Hochschild Mining; Jorge Gerdau Johannpeter, presidente do conselho de administração da Gerdau; Kurt Koeningfest, CEO do BancoSol)  - as we receive this cavalcade of the lords of the planet, we will again hear how great Paes and Cabral are performing for this brutally limited audience.

On the positive side, the only really intelligent plan to come out of RJ in recent years has won an important international prize. The Plano Popular da Vila Autódromo (link to download), developed in conjunction with the residents of the Vila Autódromo (whose residents possess title to land and whose existence has been personally threatened by Mayor Paes for 20 years), has won the London School of Economics / Deutche Bank Urban Age Award. The recognition of a plan that emerged through the collaborative efforts of residents, universities and urban professionals is an important political statement on the part of the Urban Age. This will give political muscle to the Plan,  forcing the city and state to work with the V.A. to urbanize. It will also make it even more difficult for Rio 2016 to “clean” the Olympic site for its London-inspired urbanization project. More, the recognition that collaborative, grassroots, bottom up planning can have significant and positive effects on urban environments and social relations should be taken as proof positive that despite being smart, there is still hope for Rio de Janeiro.

Dengue, Dudu, Dirceu

Now a UNESCO heritage site but always projected as a  landscape
 frontier for capital accumulation

Still believing the Brazil hype? I´ll just touch on three issues in this post, and do not want to be a haranguing voice of despair but until there is good evidence that urban conditions are being materially improved by mega-events or that a meaningful social change towards a more just society is evident, I´ll continue to point out the gaping holes in the gold-framed 17^th century landscape painting hung on Brazil´s front door.

 Dengue is still a major problem in Brazil, particularly in 6 of the World Cup host cities (doubling of deaths since 2010 and 217,885 declared cases in Brazil in 2013). Dengue is not really that hard to eliminate if there is sufficient investment in sanitation and a focuses public education program to eliminate stagnant pools of fetid water. The chances of getting dengue are still pretty slim, unless you are living in a poor area of town or in low lying areas, or at a job site…

For the World Cup there is a thing called the Matrix of Responsibilities that each city agrees to as part of its host city contract. In Rio, for instance, the Matrix includes  the Maracanã and the Transcarioca. Of course, the opportunity to include pet projects in all of this in order to “maximize” (read: make as much money as possible) the benefit of the mega-event is irresistible. In some cases, such as Brasilia, none of the urban mobility projects made it off paper and have since been eliminated from the matrix. In Cuiabá, all of the urban mobility projects began on the same day, immobilizing the city for years. Not even Neo could get to work on time in Cuiabá.  In Rio, the re-organization of transport lines in order to make more room for cars has made an impossibly bad system even worse. The mayor first asked for residents to be patient and now has told them to leave work early. Some have suggested that he take his own advice. I wonder how this kind of brutal, arrogant indifference is measured by IBM´s smart city machines. Want to find out the best place to get into gridlock? The new Iphone 5s will cost R$3,600 in Brazil and the promised G4 network likely won´t work.

At least there has been some movement towards completing prison sentences for the corrupt operators of the PT´s monthly kickback scheme. Of course, nothing will stick to the former president even though his former chief of staff and the majority of the PT´s inner circle have now been dragged off to prison. Of course it is good that these convicted criminals have to submit to the law of the land (even though prisons in and of themselves are good for no one). This may indicate that something has indeed shifted positively in the Brazilian justice system.

We know that Brazil already has the most expensive football tickets in the world (relative to minimum wage), but what C.R. Flamengo has done to their fans is beyond the pale. After reaching the final of the Copa do Brasil, the cheapest tickets for the final at the Xaracanã were set at R$250. Minimum wage in Brazil, R$690 a month. A judge intervened and set the cheapest tickets at R$120. The Brazilian clubs are run by amateurs who are articulated politically with a closed and cloistered national football federation that is mirrored by a 2014 Organizing Committee that has no information about its organizing structure and that is trying desperately to convince Brazilians that the World Cup is going to be the best ever. Can we stop with the charade that football tournaments are adequate tools for urban and social development? Mesmo sendo um sapo tamanho cristo redentor, stopping the bombast would make the transfer of wealth program that is the World Cup a little easier to swallow. 

The Bursting Brazilian Bubble

Brazil, Brazil, Brazil! We´ve been hearing it for years, again. Brazil is the Latin American development model. Brazil is the new home for “sustainable” capitalism to plant a billion genetically modified seeds to generate green economies of scale. Brazil is the emerging soft super power. Brazil is the safe port in a global shite storm of locked up consumer markets. Brazil´s ethanol, Brazil´s oil, Brazil’s water, soybeans, timber, coffee, cacao, açai. The World Cup in Brazil! Brazil´s educated workforce? Brazil´s creative entrepreneurialism? Brazil´s progressive political reforms? Brazil´s infrastructure?

The Rio de Janeiro teachers have been on strike for two months, making demands for better pay, a viable career plan and an end to the market-oriented dogma of merit-based pay. The embarrassment of Rio´s public education system is not reflected in the dedication of its teachers, but in the lack of decent infrastructure, a poorly functioning state apparatus (with lifetime sinecures for untrained, politically appointed administrators), and an executive that would rather pay Woody Allen “whatever he wants” to make a movie in Rio than to pay teachers a living wage. The result is as predictable as it is pathetic: tear gas, pepper spray, truncheons and rubber bullets to clear Rio´s Cinelândia. Pop, pop, pop.



For those keeping score at home, Eike Batista has lost $34.5 billion and is being ridiculed in the national and international media. So sorry Eike. Perhaps you would like to return the Maracanã to the public from which you stole it? Pop. There is a great deal of speculation about whether or not Eike´s Olympian hubris and chicanery can be understood as a metaphor for the most recent Brazilian economic miracle. The Economist isn’t particularly optimistic and the continuing protests around the country are a good indication that the population isn’t satisfied. There clearly needs to be some political reform but the main opposition candidate for next year´s presidential elections, Marina Silva, was barred from registering her political party through a series of dirty tricks that were likely orchestrated by the ruling Workers´ Party. Pop.

The World Cup has faded somewhat from public consciousness but it is a nagging, persistent and troubling stew of discontent. After the Confederations´ Cup, ticket prices for Brazilian league matches, already the most expensive in the world, have gone even higher. While some attendance figures have jumped, others are pretty low indeed. 8,136 people paid to see Santos x Fluminense at the Maracanã. (Remember Santos, Libertadores Champions in 2011?). Pop. The Botafogo x Fluminense clássico in Rio the other night only had 19,562 fans – and this was with prices reduced to R$40. The average price for tickets in the Minerão in Belo Horizonte is R$50 and in Brasilia´s Mané Garrincha R$66.

The top down imposition of a sport business model where fans are transformed into clients, players into pets and stadia into shopping malls was predicated in part on the promise of Brazil´s ever expanding consumer economy. This time next year, FIFA will be in Russia, the hundreds of government agencies created to deliver the 2014 Cup dissolved and the resounding silence of “legacy” will rattle through the intestines of white elephants.

The persistent chant of the teachers in Rio has been this: “Da Copa, da Copa, da Copa eu abro mão, quero meu dinheiro para saúde e educação!” (I give up the Cup, I want my money for health care and education). FIFA, of course, doesn’t like to hear this and may be too busy trying to tunnel out of the Qatari hole they have dug for themselves to notice what is going on in Rio.

Same band, different tune

Lord Mayor Breads has been singing a different tune lately. Over the past few weeks he has called the Olympics a boon for Rio but an embarrassment for Brazil, said that FIFA is not concerned at all with what happens after the World Cup, compared his municipal habitation employees to Nazis (for tagging houses to be demolished), demanded that the mafia bosses of Brazilian sport end their lifetime tenures, been interviewed by Midia Ninja, sat down with the Comitê Popular, guaranteed the permanence of the Vila Autódromo, the Escola Friendenrich, Museu do Indio and said that Brazil has wasted its opportunity to benefit from the World Cup and Olympics. It’s almost as if he’s been reading and agreeing with Hunting White Elephants.

Pinch me a loaf!

While it is not likely of interest to those who don`t know the delights of the Bay of Guanabara, for those of us fortunate enough to live in the center of the world, Paes’ words and actions are of some interest. There appears to be a rupture in the friendly hegemony that Carioca society erected in the past few years. Deputy Dawg Cabral is really suffering as Govenor, coitado, and has floated some information biscuits about resigning in April in order to escape to Brasilia in 2014. The majority of the protests in Rio have taken Cabral as their target and Paes is clearly trying to get some distance. The ongoing protests have won significant victories and concessions, though as Gramsci (and Nidhi Srinivas) would remind us, “progress occurs as the reaction of the dominant classes to the sporadic and incoherent rebelliousness of the popular masses.”

Paes is also trying to capture some sympathy from the Carioca and Brazilian left. In the absence of strong, persuasive, lefty leadership Paes has seized on the opportunity to make some concessions in order to show how rational and progressive he is. The problem is that Paes continues to be Paes and watching the interview segments that he did on Juca Entrevista one cannot help but note his inability to answer a question directly or to express himself on national television without saying “porra”. Now that he has everything he wants in terms of the closing game of the World Cup, the International Media Center, the Olympics, etc, he can basically say whatever he wants for short term political gain. He has managed to irritate FIFA, the IOC, the Minister of Sport, Snoozman, the CBF and probably Cabral and Dilma. If Machiavelli and Madame Chiang had a child, what would they name it?

Though whistling a different tune, Paes has not changed the band. As evidence, I present this delicious bon mot on the lamentable, but inevitable (according to him) decision to turn an environmentally protected wetland area into the Olympic golf course: “How is it possible that a golf course, that is basically grass and native vegetation, could damage the natural environment?”  

Protest march to the Palacio de Guanabara on 26.8.13 -C.Gaffney photo

To close out the month, the Maraca é Nosso movement has staged a series of protests in the last few weeks to demand the end to the Maracanã concession / privatization. After decreeing that the Escola, Museu, swimming and athletics facilities could not be demolished, the government had to allow for the possibility that the new rights holders (Maracanã S.A.) back out of the contract. Maracanã S.A. is 80% controlled by the civil construction behemoth Odebrecht, 10% by IMG and 10% by Eike Batista’s IMX. It appears that Maracanã S.A. are going to continue and will make tens of millions on this public investment, while taking no risk of their own. After the effective life of the stadium is over, in 35 years, the state will take it back, reform it again with public money and the next generation of Cariocas will repeat the mistakes of their parents.

The immediate return of the Maracanã to public hands is a first step towards solving the problem. Once there, the problem of ineptitude within SUDERJ (State Superintendency of Sports for Rio) has to be resolved. The Comitê Popular has opened a public consultation site so that a more egalitarian and functional management system can be created for the post 2014 reality of Rio. 

The Milkmen of Human Kindness

The Lord Mayor of Rio deigned to receive members of the Popular Committee for the World Cup and Olympics last week. This surprising yet calculated move was a response to the growing pressure from civil society to reverse the privatization of the Maracanã, preserve the athletics, educational and cultural facilities there and to put an end to all removals in Rio de Janeiro. The meeting had two potentially positive outcomes. One is that the Vila Autodromo appears to have escaped the mayor’s bulldozers. This hugely important victory has come after years of unseen struggle and more than a decade of organized fighting on the part of the residents of the Vila Autodromo. The collective actions of residents, social movements, academics and media actors managed to block autocratic and truculent moves on the part of the city government.

The second important element of the conversation with the mayor was the “tombamento” of the Escola Municipal and the Museu do Indio. This was not the work of one international organization (as Meu Rio would have us believe), but rather the concerted work of hundreds of people and dozens of organizations over many years. Tombamento means that the buildings cannot be destroyed. However, Paes made clear in his decree that the function of the buildings was not guaranteed, just the buildings. So it is possible that the school will be removed and the building maintained, just as it is probable that the Aldeia Maracana (the indigenous community) will be removed and the building turned into a whiskey bar for Snoozman and his IOC buddies. The mayor is clearly under pressure to respond in some way to the continuing battles raging in the city and his move to meet with the Comitê, as well as his semi-capitulation, is a sign that things can be achieved with direct social action on the streets. However, Paes’ move should be understood as entirely political, likely reversible and totally incomplete. He will continue to hear loud and insistent knocks on his door.

The city as a whole appears as if it is going to implode. Three weeks ago, just after the Pope took his millions of poopers out of town, a water main broke in the West Zone killing a 3 year old child. Other problems with the sewerage system have also appeared. Is it a coincidence that after millions more users enter the system for a few weeks that things start to blow apart in strange places? There appears to be nothing done about sewage treatment in the Zona Sul, so how bad must it be in Barra and other “forgotten” parts of the city. Neither the public nor private sectors are capable of delivering quality services.

The goons that parade about in Military Police uniforms began throwing rocks at protesting professors in front of the state assembly. Seriously? Protesters have occupied city hall for nearly two weeks. Cabral (Governor) and Beltrame (Sec. of Security) do not appear to have much say in how their troops behave. There has never been any meaningful reform of the police, the Rocinha UPP disappeared a resident, and Brazil’s former golden boy, Eike Batida, has pulled the plug on his UPP funding. For those of you watching from the North, because CNN is not covering any of this does not mean that the social movements have gone away since the end of the Confederations Cup. The Brazilian marketing machine is running in high gear, as ever, and there are some that continue to believe in the magic potential of ill-conceived projects to deliver long-term benefits. Believe it or not, one professor of architecture is calling the clattering abomination in Cuiabá an Elefante Dourado (Golden Elephant). Just to be clear, the public paid for the construction, maintenance and destruction of the old stadium, the construction and maintenance of a new one, and will have to pay elevated prices to go to games and events. Portugal has decided to tear down a number of the Euro 2004 stadia because their maintenance costs are too high. The Brazilian parade of White Elephants will eat everything we have and leave gigantic, steamy piles for unskilled, unhealthy, uneducated people to clean up until they are destroyed. The post-Cup future is golden indeed.

The situation has become so obviously bad that even people like João Maximo, who wrote an obsequiously apologetic introduction for a 60th anniversary book of the Maracanã in which he basically clamored for its deform, has become predictably nostalgic. Why? A Fla x Flu with less than 40,000 people is considered a big crowd. Minimum ticket R$80. Brazil continues to have the most expensive tickets in the world in the most expensive stadiums ever built for a World Cup. But please, ignore all this, close your eyes and wait for the milkmen to come with an extra pint of kool-aid.

A Calm Between Storms

I took the header photo at the São Cristóvão metro station in between waves of assaults by the military police on peaceful protesters. Those familiar with Rio’s geo-political scenario will probably get the implication. C.V. stands for Comando Vermelho, Rio’s largest drug trafficking faction. So far, they’ve been quiet, as have the P.C.C. in São Paulo. It is good to remember that earlier this year there was a massive, diffuse and deadly conflict in São Paulo between various police factions and the P.C.C. The C.V. has lost much of its most valuable territory in Rio’s zona sul with the UPPs. The majority of Rio’s western suburbs are under the control of milicias. It is impossible to know what kind of agreements have been made between the powers that be and those that sometimes are, but if, for some reason, the drug factions or milicias want to break the status quo as much as those they sell drugs to…

It has become clear that the protests were infiltrated from the very beginning by police, right wing loonies and paid vandals. In all the looting and vandalism that happened on Thursday night in Rio, the police only managed 6 arrests. If they had any interest at all in stopping it, they could have done so quite easily. The systematic attempts to de-legitimate peaceful, democratic protests by those in power and the fringe elements that want to push Brazil back into the 17^th century are supported by the very same people that held power way back then! Chega. Como dizen los hermanos, “Que se vayan todos”.

The city government has been criminally negligent in the handling of these protests. None of the people I talked to during or after saw any sign of emergency first aid services. There was a group of young doctors and medical students who volunteered, but that was it. The government knew very well what it was going to do and to whom. Paes and Cabral willingly endangered the health and safety of citizens without providing any kind of service for when their pre-meditated violence actually worked out in practice. This is as reprehensible as it is incomprehensible and I would very much like to hear the opinion of the Pope on this subject, as we prepare to receive his millions of minions in July.

The news from Brazil is big everywhere in the world with the exception of the United States. Uncle Sam is again too busy staring at his bellybutton. The Obama Administration appears to be snowed-in (ahem) by a mound of neo-liberal snarky powder. Hope went to Nope and then Dope too quickly.

The protests in Brazil are not static, nor are they diminishing. Today saw more violent clashes outside of stadiums and in city centers. The number one goal of this movement, rebellion, collective shout, occupation, bananada – should be to rip out the putrid insides of the Brazilian political and economic systems and replace them with something new. This, of course, is the work of decades. Unfortunately, in Dilma’s wobbling, cold and hollow speech on Friday night, she gave no indication that she has any intention of moving in this direction. The lack of viable alternatives and the increasing presence of neo-Nazis and other loonies may convince people to stop their nascent militancy.

In the blah, blah, blah response of Brazil’s politicians there has been almost no mention of police violence. During his press conference, Rio’s mayor began listing what had been vandalized in the center of the city yet never mentioned the 80+ that had to be taken to the hospital as city hall was “defended”. These barbarities and barbarians stand in stark contrast to the dignified, necessary, peaceful, tasteful, and orderly expression of civil and human rights exercised by the overwhelming majority of protesters.

The World Cup will happen in Brazil. It is surprising that there have not been many calls for FIFA and their partners to pay taxes on profits made in Brazil. In London, so many people boycotted the Olympic sponsors once they discovered that they were tax exempt, that McDonald’s and Cocaine-Cola agreed to pay up. This hit the sponsors in the only place it hurts.

For more info, check the Media link above and follow @geostadia.

Aldeia Taksim

Having heard rumors that a new breed of white elephants had emerged in Turkey, I took to the hunt. To my surprise, I encountered with Brazilian consultants and architects who had perfected the murky techniques of pachyderm insemination.  While promising that the Brazilian variety (loxodonta brasilense) would bring infinite returns for those who financed them, these same professionals had mastered the art of depoliticizing the authoritarian use of public money to ensure private profit. These post-modern fakirs go to great lengths to disguise the wrapping of concrete and steel in high-tensile, translucent membranes (manufactured and maintained by foreign companies) as a necessary passage towards modernization and return on investment. Public space has no apparent financial returns and could be used more profitably if given to developers so it is “natural” that this happen.

Except it isn’t natural at all.

After the conference as I walked around one of the great football and stadium cities in the world, I came across the Hippodromo where 30,000 chariot fans were once slaughtered for being on the wrong side of a political debate. In the Byzantium city of the Greens and the Blues, Circus Factions could determine the fate of Empire.  1500 years later, the fans of Beşiktaş welcomed the rival fans of Fenerbahçe and Galatasaray as they organized to protest the Erdogan government in the streets around their stadium. 

Don`t cry for me...Brazil?

The battle for Taksim Square is as much about symbolism as it is about the functional use of public space and the future of Turkish democracy. By eliminating one of the few remaining green spaces in central Istanbul, The Turkish government wants to rebuild an Ottoman-era (read: pre-secular Turkey) military barracks that will then be transformed into a shopping mall. There was no public consultation and the NGO established to preserve the park was violently ousted by riot police. This kicked off the larger protest that has engulfed Turkey over the last week.

As the Rio state and city governments showed in the struggle for the Maracanã, the Turkish state has shown itself willing to use maximum force to eliminate peaceful, public dissent and the right to public assembly. That both police forces use tear gas manufactured in Brazil is an ironic coincidence. That these struggles have as their flash points the authoritarian appropriation of public space and culture to produce symbolic spaces dedicated to conservative and consumerist ideologies is sadly consistent with larger governmental trends in both countries.

Putting down the violent rebels in Istanbul

...using the same perfume and good sense as in Brazil. 

We can see in the recent history of the Aldeia Maracanã he same kind of struggle being played out over Taksim Square. The major difference is that in Rio, no larger protest emerged over the loss of the city`s most iconic public space. Reading the news reports of the Maracanã‘s official opening (Brazil x England) I saw no mention of the years’ long struggles to keep the stadium in public hands. As we know, once the lights are on and the ball is rolling, no one remembers the past. This is a major genetic flaw in the White Elephant.

The extent to which the state will use violence to protect the interests of private capital has been demonstrated time and time again as Brazil prepares to host the World Cup and Olympics. Istanbul, until last week, was the leading candidate for the 2020 Olympics and Turkey will host the U-20 World Cup in July of this year. The Turkish state has demonstrated quite clearly that they too are willing to intercede violently in the pursuit of conservative consumerism. We will find out in September what impression this leaves on the IOC.

As the Turks battle for their public spaces and democratic rights, Brazilians (and everyone else) should pay close attention to what is happening. Brazilians should remember that there is always a chance to raise a collective voice over what has happened in the name of the same kind of governmental regime that the Turks are fed up with. This is especially true in Rio where the mayor reacts to public criticism through personal acts of violence (he punched someone in the face after being called a piece of sh*te). The mayor`s personal actions are a perfect expression of the way he handles the government and this should be reason enough for large-scale protest.

For those with the stomach of an elephant the following shows disturbing scenes from the last week of protests in Turkey.

Pornographic Brazilian Pornography

There was yet more death and mayhem on the streets of Rio as another cyclist was killed. This time (as opposed to the triathlete killed in Leblon) there will be no solidarity cycle and no collective gnashing of teeth  as the cyclist was working, delivering water and gas canisters along impossibly crowded streets in the Zona Norte. The second paragraph in the ever-sensitive O Bobo was dedicated to the traffic problems caused by the accident. An excellent mapping initiative that will register crimes committed against cyclists has come of these recent deaths, but Rio remains an insanely dangerous place to ride a bike.

Following the death in Leblon, O Bobo revealed that on average, Rio’s buses accumulate traffic fines like the Guarda Municipal collects crack addicts. One bus on the line that killed the triathlete had 136 infractions in four years.  There have been innumerable fawning media reports about Rio’s intelligent city project and the mayor has used his technological initiatives to hobnob with the global elite (really looking forward to that Clinton visit in December!). But what’s the point of having an expensive IBM monitoring system when all you can do is watch in HD the streets flood and people get killed by buses? A “smart city” doesn’t willfully place its citizens at risk and then spend millions to watch them suffer.

Way back in 2007 when no one outside of Rio knew the name Eduardo Paes, he was plugging away as Rio’s state secretary of sport and leisure as the city prepared for the Pan American Games. The Olympic Stadium was over budget, poorly placed, behind schedule and, surprise surprise, poorly constructed. It also took on the name of a corrupt and disgraced former FIFA president. The stadium, like its declining namesake, has been closed for business because the roof is about to fall down. It has likely been in this condition for some time and the public has been at risk for years. Paes explained the other day that the stadium was constructed in a hurry  and that he was not at the head of the city government at the time so, hey, what can you do about the past? What exactly was Paes doing in his position of the state’s most important sporting institution when the stadium was constructed? If it is anything like the current secretary of Sport and Leisure, he likely gave nonsensical and offensive interviews with the intention of using the position as a political springboard. (Amber Alert: Marcia Lins).

Oh yes, because of old João’s peccadilloes with the ISL case and FIFA bribery he has not only had to resign from his honorary position at the IOC, but also at FIFA. The mayor-king has also given a green light for the changing of the Engenhão stadium name saying, “I’ve changed the name of a lot of things in Rio. I’ve changed them because I waned to. Botafogo has the naming rights and can call the stadium whatever it wants.” A little known fact is that Botafogo F.R. (who has the concessionary rights for a song) changed the name of the stadium years ago to Stadium Rio. Maybe we should change the name to Joana Havelange, João’s granddaughter who is one of the top people on the 2014 WC organizing committee, just to keep the black box clamped shut. More reasonably, there is a movement by several of Rio’s council people to put the name Nilton Santos on the Engenhão. Personally, I think the name Milton Santos would elevate geo-political consciousness a bit more (if you’re into geography porn).

In case all of this news didn’t excite you, here’s the money shot: After 63 years in the public domain, more than 750 million dollars of deforms in the last six years and a total dis-characterization of one of the world’s greatest sporting venues,  the Maracanã  has been privatized by the State of Rio de Janeiro. The winning consortium is comprised of IMX (Eike Batista’s main holding company that was contracted by the government to do the economic viability study), Odebrecht (Lula’s favorite civil construction firm), and AEG (a US based entertainment group that owns MLS teams and administers 120 stadiums around the world). The details of the concession are too painful to write down, but the rub is that over the next 35 years the state will receive less than 20% of its investment. I will be looking through this particular slice of this futuristic porn in the coming months but might not have the courage (or falta de vegonha) to write it down.