New Publications

While I do enjoy writing for HWE more than any other outlet, it is occassionally necessary to feed other beasties. 

Here is a link to an op-ed in Al JAzeera that I wrote with Professor Jules Boykoff of Pacific University in the USA. 

"The International Olympic Committee recently convened in Buenos Aires, where it chose Tokyo to host the 2020 Summer Games, restored wrestling to the Olympic programme, and elected German fencing champion Thomas Bach as its new president. Amid the frenzy and spectacle, it would be easy to forget that the prior week, the IOC quietly concluded a pre-Games inspection of Rio de Janeiro, host of the 2016 Olympics.

The IOC's Coordination Commission rehearsed the predictable pabulum about Rio's "strong, solid progress" towards delivering on legacy projects. It soft-pedalled its criticism, urging Rio "to focus on its top priorities", such as venue building and infrastructure construction. But below the shiny surface of the IOC's official imprimatur, serious trouble lurks as the country prepares to host both the 2016 Olympics and the 2014 football World Cup finals.

Continue reading...

And a second article that I wrote regarding the empty notion of sustainability and the Rio 2016 Olympic project (Gaffney, C. Between Discourse and Reality: The Un-Sustainability of Mega-Event Planning. Sustainability 2013, 5, 3926-3940):

The zero-sum nature of mega-event hosting encourages cities to escalate investment with an eye towards convincing event rights holders that a positive outcome will result. The discursive frameworks of “legacy” and “sustainability”, the global competition to attract events and the compressed event horizon make for mega-event preparation regimes that may seriously compromise long-term urban planning agendas in mega-event hosts. By examining the sustainable urban planning literature, the discursive frameworks of sustainability in the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the discursive framing of the Rio 2016 bid, this paper will examine the Olympic Golf project being implemented in Rio de Janeiro. Through this case study the paper argues that unless mega-event rights holders change their candidacy and selection processes, these events will inevitably be detrimental to their hosts

Continue reading...

More elephant hunts coming soon but I need to go find some more ammunition. 

Tokyo 2020

A year ago I wrote a post predicting that Istanbul would get saddled with the 2020 Olympics. That was before I had been to Istanbul. That was before Taksim. That was before the Vinegar Revolt. A year ago, the mega-event monolith appeared to be ready to roll on eternally, ever citius, altius, fortius. Now, the IOC is heading to Asia for efficient Games delivery. As our friends at Play the Game pointed out, Tokyo 2020 will be the fifth IOC event in Asia since 2008 (Beijing 2008, Singapore 2010, Nanjing 2014, Pyeongchang 2018 and Tokyo 2020).

There are very simple reasons to explain the way the Olympic vote went. In 2012, Istanbul was well in the lead with Turkey growing at more than 5%, living a closed-condominium, car-dependent, consumerist dream articulated by a right wing government that wanted to use the Games to open up new urban frontiers for real-estate speculation. Sound familiar? Then, the Erdogan government went too far, trying to eliminate Taksim Square by using ultra-violence to crush popular expression to further the goals of a religiously capitalist autocracy. The repressive measures of Erdogan’s police forces effectively turned the secular middle-class against the Olympic project. These are precisely the people that need to be convinced to gamble their savings on poorly planned“legacy” projects.

The increasingly well-articulated resistance to the Istanbul bid went well beyond Games criticism, highlighting the larger urban-political project underway. The future of Istanbul is up for grabs right now and the awarding of the Games to an authoritarian and repressive regime would have signaled the IOC´s explicit approval of Erdogan´s government.

A month after Taksim, Brazil exploded during the Confederations Cup, with protesters targeting FIFA and the IOC as parasitic aliens. The delays, enervating bureaucracy, lack of transparency and keystone cops organization of the Brazilians were already major concerns for both of the Swiss hegemons. The presence of millions of agitated people in the streets when the very idea of a mega-event is to banish locals to their houses was a major wake up call. With higher than 25% unemployment in Madrid, what would the Spanish capital have looked like after the Olympic announcement? More practically, with more than 70% of the installations already built, where was the possibility for “urban transformation” that so enchants the European aristocracy on Mount Olympus?

So we were left with Tokyo. The Japanese economy has, by some measures, been stagnant for two decades. However, the Japanese have the world’s highest literacy rates, lowest crime, greatest life expectancy and aside from Fukushima, brilliant infrastructure. Does anyone doubt that the Games will be delivered on time? Does anyone question whether or now Olympic spending will significantly alter the course of the Japanese economy? Tokyo is the largest city in the world, will the majority of people even notice the Olympics in their daily lives? No, no and no. Three shakes of the head, one big nod for Tokyo.

The rub is that perceived political, economic and social stability are likely to be major keys to the selection of mega-events in the future. Gerome Valcke has suggested that countries have a plebiscite before being allowed to host, that way when spending goes through the roof and white elephants plop down FIFA can say, “look here, you voted for this.” But clearly, a yes or no vote is not a sufficient criterion for hosting mega-events. “Democracy” would merely function to exclude everyone that voted against it. This is the same way that Erdogan, Bush, Paes, Cabral, etc. conceive(d) of their democratic mandates. Something longer term, more consensual, more progressive than democracy has to be in place to minimize the damage of these events.

The massive, ongoing protests in Brazil have shown that mega-events may have reached the apogee of their gigantism, arrogance, and general indifference to the lives of the people who subsidize the party and profits of the global elite. The threats of protest in Istanbul and Madrid, in addition to geo-political and economic considerations, made Tokyo 2020 happen in ways that were nearly unthinkable a year ago. Brazilians can be proud of their role in drawing global attention to the plight of mega-event hosts.  

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. 

São Sebastião and his pet monkey

It is a lovely day in Rio.

Marcio Fortes might be on the beach in Barra de Tijuca after resigning his position as the head of the Autoridade  Publico Olimpico (APO). Fortes, who has run a handful of Brazilian ministries since the beginning of time, handed in his resignation to Dilma citing “personal reasons.” Remember, the dispute for the top spot at the APO was a little confusing as Brazeel`s power figures tried to figure out where the power within the Olympic Games organizing apparatus lay. After Forte`s resignation, Mayor Breads (Paes) called the APO expensive and unnecessary. That may be true, but the Lord Mayor also affirmed that he was not going to cede control over the construction of the Olympic City to anyone. The overlapping extra-governmental structures are confusing and inefficient at best, but what is really going on is a political power play that has paid off nicely for Paes. As I pointed out in 2011, just putting together the APO cost around 22 million.

FIFA is back in Brazil to ask and answer questions. One of the major questions they will have to answer is regarding the price gouging that World Cup hotel operators are engaging in. The FIFA hospitality group MATCH, owned by Blatter`s nephew, has contracts with Brazilian hotels for the World Cup. These hotels, a recent report demonstrated, are elevating their prices by as much as 500% for the tournament. A paradigm of managerial opacity, MATCH continually wins contracts for the World Cup and has been involved in numerous scandals. Did I mention that it is run by a relative of the FIFA president? The average cost for a hotel room in Rio de Janeiro during the World Cup will be US$460. Save those shekels!

This weekend the Comite Popular took the fight for social justice to the Mayor`s residence in the Alto de Boa Vista. Protests are abundant but it appears that some people do not like to have their daily routines interrupted by the dissatisfied. Predictably, OBobo has published an op-ed lamenting the incomodos of the manifestations, saying that  “nothing was left undestroyed” by the righteously indignant. The argument is that manifestations have their place, but not if they actually disrupt life as it is. Truly, this is neither Istanbul nor Cairo.

And finally, a photo that says more than a thousand words. This book is an apologia for the transformation of Brazilian football culture into an aseptic exercise in consumption. The empty stadium is symbolic and emblematic of the myriad elements of this transformation that I have been cataloguing here for years.

However, in the bottom right corner of the picture is the banner that is in the second photo, which I took from the press area. I am not sure there is too much to be read into this but it was refreshing to see that even slick apologists cannot avoid reality. 

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.

Maracanã Sem Álcool

I have finally figured out what the S.A. in Maracanã S.A. stands for: sem álcool. The good news about last weekend’s Vasco x Fluminense game (aside from the result) was that there is still some life in carioca fan culture. The bad news is that this culture will likely wither on the vine as the areas around the stadium have been completely sanitized and securitized and ticket prices are going to be out of reach for the majority. The cheapest ticket was R$60 with the usual caveat that anyone with a way to squirm themselves into a half-price ticket will do so. For the upcoming Flamengo x Botafogo match this weekend, the cheapest seat is R$100. For fun, what follows is a comparison between two classicos held three years apart. While I recognize the limitations of statistical comparison based on two events, they are reflective of some general trends that have been through a more robust analysis than I care to expose my merry band of elephant hunters to.

Vasco x Fluminense, 21 July 2013

Total gate receipts R$ 1,554,000.00

Total fans: 46,860

Ratio of paying fans to non-paying: 34,634 (74%) / 12,226 (26%)

Average ticket price per person present: R$33.16

Average ticket price per paying fan: R$44.87     

Missing revenue (nonpaying fans x average paying fan price): R$584,458

Vasco x Flamengo, 1 August 2010

Total gate receipts R$ 1.368.290,00

Total fans: 60.202

Ratio of paying fans to non-paying: 50.447 (84%) / 9755 (16%)

Average ticket price per person present: R$ 22.73

Average ticket price per paying fan: R$ 27.11

Missing revenue (nonpaying fans x average paying fan price): R$ 264,430.71

Some broad generalizations can be drawn from these numbers:

45% increase in overall ticket price

65% increase in ticket price per paying fan

10% increase in gratuities

221% increase in missing revenue

23% fewer fans produced 13.5% more profit

And here are some photos to make you choke and sputter like the Popemobile in a Guaratiba mudpit.

23, 25, 26? The edge of rows all have different numbers. 

The Lords of the Rings may or may not be getting their drink on. 

The Museo do Ìndio and the Xaracanã. This area was formerly inside the walls of the Aldeia and covered with trees. When I asked the security guard if there were still Indigenous people living here he laughed sarcastically. 

Manifestation in front of the Xaracanã before the game. Aha ooho, O Maraca é Nosso!

The seats inthe middle started at R$120 and went as high as R$250. No wonder they were empty. From 50 rows up, the view of the entire field is possible. Any lower down and one wouldn´t be able to see the corner of the field. Note the absurdity of the line of security guards staring at the empty stands to prevent pitch invasions. For this game, the authorities liberated the use of traditional flags and musical instruments. Next time, who knows.

A dumb way to buy tickets

A HWE first! This is a guest post by Rodrigo Nunes, an assistant professor of Global and Latin American Studies at St. Edward's University in Austin, Texas: 

This is another potential dumb way to die in Rio: buying tickets for a match at Maracanã.

I exaggerate; but at the very least the process can lead to irreversible damage to one’s ability to think rationally, and shake whatever faith in the private sector one might possess. Readers of this blog should be familiar with the stadiums recent history of over-budgeted reforms and transfer to private hands, but they are not prepared for the sheer level of incompetence that the new lords of the stadium have displayed in the last couple of days.

Of course, I can only speak about my own experience. I wanted to buy 9 tickets for the Sunday match between Fluminense and Vasco, the first official game of the Private Maracana era. I’m no cambista, mind you, but I have a group of American students that are dying to experience the jogo bonito live (they are in for some disappointment on that front also). In any case, the game is on Sunday and on Tuesday it was announced that online sales would begin the following day. Ah, for the conveniences of post-industrial life! 

The first ducha de agua fria hit me when the online seller limited each buyer to three tickets. No matter, I said, I have two credit cards and a debit card. 3x3=9. As I proceeded, the next guardian of the gates raised its ugly head: online sales do not grant you a ticket. After the purchase, you have to print a form, sign it, and bring it together with an id and the purchasing credit card to the Maracanã in order to redeem your ticket! 

But mind you, tickets will not be distributed on the day of the game. No will-call window. You, dear customer, have to haul your sorry carcass to Maracanã in the middle of the week to collect your online-purchased tickets!

At this point I’m already fuming. And I root for Mengão! But now for the cherry on top: For this convenience, futebolcard.com will charge you a R$6 fee, which basically amounts to 10% of the ticket price. Are you still with me? Hello, hello?

This is beyond incompetence, it’s just mean.

So I collect a few students and go to an official ticket booth in the Zona Sul where we can supposedly buy tickets without having to pay a convenience fee. There is a line. The line does not move. The line does not move because everybody in Brazil, apparently, is entitled to a half-price ticket. But to get these half-price tickets, you see, we need to make sure that you are who you say you are, of the age you say you are, of the profession you say you are, etc. Every person walking into the ticket booth spent 10 minutes filling up forms and unearthing documentation. In the meantime, a gentleman started fuming because he was told that he could not buy a half-price ticket for his 12-year old son. The reason? His 12-year old son, rather than be in line like a good consumer, was at school (or with his mom, or doing whatever it is that 12 year olds should be doing on a beautiful winter afternoon). How can we know he’s really 12? Without the kids documentation, or the kid, there was no chance. 

All’s well that ends well and we got our tickets. But if this process is any indication of things to come, I’m not sure I’m looking forward to watching this game after all. Maybe I should do a pay-per-view and watch it at home.

Oh, wait, that will cost $R80….

Lightning Counterattack

From Brazil, FIFA President Sepp Blatter flew to Turkey to open the under-20 World Cup. As his private jet was taking off, he boldly threw $100 million at the Brazilians, saying that the money would be used for some kind of social fund. The absurdity should be apparent, but if it isn’t, allow me to spell it out. If FIFA is so worried about their profits that they refuse to pay taxes, require duty free shopping on a continental scale and don’t have to open their accounts to public scrutiny, they why don’t they think twice about throwing out US$100 million? As I reported here some time ago, if FIFA were to actually pay their volunteer Brazilian labor force minimum wage (which is not, of course, adequate), the wage bill would only be around US$ 7 million. Why not take that US$100 million, invest in education, language training and actual projects rather than let it flutter down out of the sky into the dark corners of congress? Really, R$1 for every Brazilian as a return on our R$30 billion investment is pretty disgusting.

In other disgusting news, the Xaracana consortium has decided to ban every item and practice of Brazilian football culture. There will be no more large flags, banners or musical instruments. Fans will be prohibited from smoking or taking their shirts off. Swearing might become a criminal offense. They might even replace the referee with a robot and have drones determine offside calls. The head of the Xaracana S.A. has explicitly stated the obvious (which sometimes people need to get the ideas more completely in their heads) that there needs to be a “change in the type of fan” that goes to the stadium. This is consistent with all of the other World Cup venues. The cheapest ticket for the upcoming Vasco x Flu classic is R$60. The average ticket price to see Vasco x Flamengo in Brasilia last weekend was R$70. The 5.860 people that saw Santos x Portuguesa @ Santos paid an average of R$29. Tchau Neymar.

The continued absence of Brazil’s torcidas organizadas both in the protests and in relation to the stadium projects is as disheartening as it is revealing. Contrary to the ultras in Egypt and Turkey that have long been politicized and are pushing for social change (see James Dorsey’s amazing blog), in the Brazilian case, the torcidas have done nothing. They are perhaps so compromised by their dependency on the clubs to maintain their little pockets of power and so unable to overcome their long-standing rivalries with other clubs to unite for a common cause that they are impotent actors in a very complicated economic and political chess game. Their collective inability to politicize their own involvement in Brazil’s football world has greatly weakened their own position and been a loss for Brazilian civil society. This trend may be reversing itself with the statement of the Força Jovem do Vasco regarding the Xaracana, but it is the only such position that I have come across.

In case things in Rio weren`t difficult enough, here comes the Nope to really bungle things up. Not only is he bringing millions of McDonald’s eating adolescents, he’s brining 3 full holidays, shutting own traffic everywhere and substituting the rubber bullets of the Military Police with the live ammunition of the Brazilian Military. Yup, if you try to get within 13 kilometers of the site of the big mass in the west of Rio (not coincidentally, a site owned by one of Rio’s wealthiest who is having it fixed up nicely so that it can then be subdivided), you just might get your head blown off. The city is being progressively occupied by the military and of course they all want to behave like Rio's PM. Chega de evento. 

Fortunately, it is another lovely day in Rio. The sun is shining, the sewage is flowing into the bay, two and half million Catholics + the Pope will be sharing their personal effluence with us and we have three major holidays coming up! Bring on the Copa when we will have the entire month off. Put that in your economic return multiplier and smoke it. 

A lovely day in Rio

It was really a lovely day in Rio. News that the private company that runs the x-Maracana has found a team to play there made my heart leap. Fluminense will have the rights to 43 thousand of the Arena’s 78 thousand seats. All of those seats are behind the goals. It doesn`t even bother me that in the first fifteen rows you can`t see the goal line, or that when I walked into this fanciful and spectacular stadium and was marveling at the that the harmonious symphony of colors and delightful twists of nuance in the architectural I nearly sliced open my leg on protruding metal bits. I was absolutely enchanted with the idea that I could leave the confusion of Rio simply by stepping into the Maracanã! It was a delightful escape from the smell and sensation of people. I was worried, though, that when watching a game that I couldn`t quite see completely, that I might be attacked by the opposing fans, or that some obnoxious fan of my own team would block even further my view by standing up with one of those obnoxiously large flags. To my complete relief, those flags and the pestering tic-tic-tak of musical instruments are no longer going to be allowed. I though it such graça when the seleção played a little rodinha de samba after they beat Spain. Neymar is such a cosmopolitan fellow and that Dante! Meu deus no céu, que fofo. Onde é que ele corta cabelo? I wonder if Fred is going to play a little before every game as an inspiration.

As I was saying, I have fear of being attacked by rabid bands of opposing fans when I pay R$100 to get into my private space, so I was absolutely thrilled to hear that Maracanã S.A. is going to install dividing walls between us. I hope they also put gas masks under the seats so that if anyone shouts a palavrão at the referee the police can just launch some tear gas in their general direction and shut them up. Of course, before the World Cup they will have to take it down again, then put it up again for 2015 and then take it down again for the Olympics, but that is why I am willing to pay premium for these seats! I even heard that they are going to have the same kind people that were there during the Confederations Cup to help us to our seats and to get people to sit down. I’ve always said that what this place needs is a good bit of civilizing. And I just can’t wait to see Beyoncé, Shakira, Britney, Justin, and Roberto Carlos. I wonder if they are going to have those big cups of beer again. I collected as many as I could at Spain Tahiti, but could only manage to drink one beer for every goal. Thank God there is no Lei Seca after games at the Xaracanã!

Besides the great news about the Xaracanã, the whole city was off work, so I headed to the beach. I was horrified later when all of these disgruntled people started throwing trash all over the streets and calling the governor a dictator. You don’t vote for dictators do you? I voted for him twice! And that was just the first election. I don’t know what everyone was so upset about last night, but I leaned out my window and gave them a good finger wagging. Those shock troops looked like they were right out of Hollywood – so exciting to see! It´s too bad that that gas makes it up to the 10^th floor, it really made the poodles suffer. Coitados.

2013 Copa das Manifestaçãoes

 Here is a short version of why we were tear-gassed yesterday outside of the Maraca.

The Maracanã, a public space of tremendous historical, cultural and architectural value, has been successively deformed since 2000. The first deform cost around R$100 million. This was ostensibly for the FIFA World Club Championship. They put in sky boxes which closed off the access to the stadium from the big ramps and eliminated much of the air circulation. Plastic seats also went in.  A stupid move that reduced the capacity to 129,000, but much of the stadium’s character remained.

In preparation for the 2007 Pan American Games the state laid out another R$330 million on the Maraca, this time grossly disfiguring it. The geral disappeared, the field was lowered, huge televisions put in and the VIP section expanded, the capacity reduced to 89,000. At this time Brazil knew it would be hosting the World Cup and these reforms were intended to serve as a “legacy”. Beneficially, there was investment in the Julio Delamare aquatic center and in the Celio de Barros athletics facility. The stadium was closed for 20 months.

Despite being disfigured, the Maraca still held some of its old charm. That was until 2010 when the Gigante do Derby was closed again for unspecified reforms. The initial budget was between R$400 and R$500 million. That has since ballooned to R$1.2 billion. The aquatics center has been shuttered, the athletic track replaced by a parking lot, the public school on the grounds is in threat of imminent removal and the former national Indigenous Museum has been violently emptied of its people and history. Brazil’s formerly richest man has won the rights to a 30 year concession – a competition he won after being contracted to do the economic viability study. During the destruction process, Delta, one of Brazil’s biggest construction firms was caught in bed with the governor and was kicked off the project. There has never been any dialogue with anyone who wasn’t already at the table (which is in a smoky back room inside a huge black box).

Now, instead of a place of popular manifestation and convivial emotion, the area around the stadium is a sterile environment, a brutally empty zone of transition between the organic and inorganic. Inside the Zone of Exclusion, there can be no informal commerce, no music, nothing except overwhelming police force that are there to guarantee the safe passage of the wealthiest segments of Brazilian society into the shopping mall environment of the stadium. Protected on the outside by the national army, shock troops, and military police, the well-manicured are guarded on the inside by a sense of entitlement and aloof condescension. No drinks are available on the outside, but once in the stadium they can drink campaign and eat caviar. Inside the stadium, there are no smells. Outside the air is like Venus: hot, acrid and impossible to breathe. The off-world of FIFAlandia is mirrored by a nether-world of repression.

On the outside, everyone is a potential criminal, vandal or threat to public order. On the inside, everyone is a walking cash machine. Outside, the right to manifest in public is repressed and rejected. Inside, the right to public culture is manifest through one’s capacity to pay for it. The performative spectacle of police violence on the outside has been countered with pacific displays of social solidarity (with some radical, fringe opportunists that trigger the police and vice versa). On the inside, the performative spectacle of capital reproduction is manufactured, understood and internalized by prodigious flag-wrapping, fetishization and baleful ignorance. Both are publically financed spectacles and speak to the rifts and ruptures that define Brazilian society.

There is no one narrative that can explain what is going on here, but the 2013 Copa das Manifestaçãoes has definitely changed the profile and structure of social movements in Brazil. As these movements take stock of the problems and possibilities we will likely see both an expansion and consolidation of the political project that takes as its target the barbarities being committed for the Good of the Game.

A quick scratch for a big itch

The ongoing protests in Brazil may appear to have come out of nowhere, but the grievances have been building for some time. Despite the co-optation Brazil`s historically strong labor and social movements into the framework of the ruling Worker`s Party, issues such as public transportation, health, education, police violence and public transportation have been kept in the public consciousness by smaller groups of activists and a growing alternative media. There are Popular Committees for the World Cup in all of the host cities that have kept the embers of discontent burning in public consciousness. The deteriorating condition of urban infrastructure and services has been exacerbated by the spending of public billions to create a heard of shiny white elephants. The World Cup was part of a larger promise of continued economic growth that would raise consumer capacity and living standards for all Brazilians. Only the first part of this promise was completed. The decision to raise bus fares on the eve of the Confederations Cup was the spark that lit a larger fire.

Brazil is an overwhelmingly urban country that has a fascination with the car. This is a bad combination. One of the federal government’s principal development strategies has been to stimulate the automobile industry to the detriment of public transportation. There are no rail networks connecting any major cities in Brazil. The Metro systems of São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro have a combined length of 120.4 km that have to service more than 30 million people. The city buses are dangerous, expensive, and uncomfortable and are the only mobility option for those who live outside of city centers. The increase in fares that set off the larger protests throughout the country have to do with issues of urban governance, corruption, collusion, incompetence in urban management and the fundamentals of the Brazilian democratic system. When people take to the streets to voice their grievances it is a sign that they have exhausted their democratic channels. The violent police reaction to these protests signals a series of other problems with Brazilian democracy.

The Brazilian president has tried to calm nerves by announcing a series of “reforms”. Among these are a R$25 billion urban mobility proposal and a willingness to meet with social movements. The announcement of these measures as “new” is an indication of their previous absence. Wasn’t urban mobility at the very core of the World Cup and Olympic spending? Weren’t these events supposed to open paths of social inclusion for all Brazilians? Clearly the president’s move in this direction is welcome, but tells us that the opportunity to use the World Cup and Olympics to attend to the basic infrastructure needs of Brazilian cities has been wasted. It is a tacit acknowledgement that the government has failed to communicate with its nominal base and is now scrambling to explain why. With the slowing of Brazilian economic growth and the twilight of an economic model based on unbridled consumption, the lost opportunities of the last decade are coming into sharper focus. 

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.

Chega de Bullying

The lines to buy Metro tickets were impossibly long. It was not, I thought, an accident that the increased demand for public transportation to get to Rio`s biggest protest in a generation had not been anticipated. The unusual presence of Military Police at the station entrances gave an unmasked vision of the hooded cowards that would be waiting a few hours hence. I walked towards downtown, eventually entering the metro in Catete.

My fellow passengers were dressed for a walk in the park, not a military confrontation. They carried poster-sized banners, handbags, cell phones. One of the better posters read “Se Pelé é Rei, eu sou jacobino” (If Pelé is King, then I´m a Jacobian). Coming from the zona sul, the attitude was light, festive, but different from Carnaval. There were small groups of friends, couples and individuals – mostly in their late teens, twenties and thirties heading to Candelaria to start the long march to the Prefeitura.

A carnaval-style sound car led the way, with chants blasting over the throbbing mass. This gave the procession a familiar air, but there was no dancing, no gyrating and skimpily clad women to ogle. The sound car moved slowly as a human tide rose behind it.

Several political parties (or unions) had their banners out: UNE, CTB, AMES, PSB, PSTU, ANEL. Compared to the march of 100,000 on Monday, this showed a jockeying for position among vested political interests, exactly what the majority of the protesters don`t want. Later, I heard that the CUT and PSTU groups had their banners shredded. The ANEL banner was prescient (At least on the night):  “Isso aqui vai virar a Turquia” (This here will become Turkey).

In the middle of a crowd it is impossible to determine its dimensions. In order to get some perspective, I ran forward to overpass that links the Prefeitura building with the Cidade Nova metro. I arrived to find the metro access doors closed. 150 people, journalists and photographers, PM and Metro security were inside. 5 minutes later the journalists were gone.  

Looking back towards Candelaria, some 3km distant, a human wave rolled. Directly below me, the vanguard had arrived and was dancing underneath the overpass. The Maraca é Nosso flag whipped through the air as the songs and rhythms from the x-Maracanã made protesters jump and chant as if they were watching a game unfold.  Hundreds had pushed forward towards the front of the Prefeitura building (aka Piranhão, or big brothel). The mass of the protest was still coming but had slowed. Fireworks. Bap bap bap, boom. Cheers. Military helicopters swooped. Jeers.

Bap, bap, bap, Boom. Cheers. Elderly people huffed up the stairs to get into the metro. Security told them it was impossible. Como pode? We heard that BOPE was going to enter the station. Bap bap, Boom. Cheers. Journalists climbed up for a better angle. The stairs were crowded in order to see the impure spectacle. Below, the growing chorus  bellowed stadium chants. The most popular “Não vai ter Copa! Não vai ter Copa! “

History stretched, ran here and there. 500,000? 600,000? During Carnaval, O Bobo inflates counts. There was light conversation in an atmosphere of civic solidarity and pride.

Boom. Boom. Crack crack crack. No cheers. The air filled with tear gas as people sprinted towards the oncoming hundreds of thousands. I was stuck on the stairs, with my back protected and seemingly out of the line of fire coming from city hall. Crack crack crack. More gas canisters flew into the streets, chasing those who are already running. Brave young lads picked them up and threw them back or kicked them in the canal. Someone with his face covered smashed the bus stop. I can`t decide if that is a satisfying sound.

Minutes extended as I judged a good time to run in front of the rubber bullets and tear gas canisters to get away from city hall and back towards the crowd. More gas flowed  through and we choked and coughed and spit and cried. I try not to rub my eyes, sprayed some vinegar on my mask and rode out the wave of pain. Three guys with medic coats came up and offered a spray of milk of magnesia  - a base substance to rub around the eyes. I felt horribly for these people with me on the platform. They were all overweight and scared and in the right place with a wrong government.  

The front of the crowd was chased away and in their place came the tough young guys with masks and muscles to throw things back at the PM. More bombs, more smoke, more anger, more vandalism. I decided to run for it as a rainstorm of tear gas canisters falls from the top of buildings, or helicopters, or who knows where. Blinded again, I ran towards the crowd retreating along Presidente Vargas. A small group sprinted down a side street and was confronted by shock troops. They retreatd  around a corner, but they were prepared with Molotov cocktails and bombs. One cocktail exploded in someone`s hand, catching his hair on fire. Será que valeu a pena?

Caught between two side streets where the shock troops laid down constant tear gas and percussion grenades, we were pressed from behind by the PM which had been systematically following the salvos and establishing the new front. Again, I timed a run and was again caught in a world of tear gas. We were up against the Canal do Mangue, a putrid, open sewer that would eat through a tennis shoe faster than a taser. The PM continued launching gas into the slow moving crowd. Como pode?

For an hour we were pushed back with gas and bombs and bullets. The crowd walked quicker, with small groups occasionally running to get out of the way of falling canisters. When they fell at my feet again I was blinded, but not as much as the person to my left. I wrapped my arm around him leading him forward as quickly as possible. He was helpless. I was not much better. Minutes later the torment passed and we were again walking with the masses, beating a new path to the state legislature building. The beer vendors were out. Antartica has never tasted so good.

Near the intersection of Rio Branco, it seemed that the crowd had moved on. Explosions and sirens punctuated an eerie silence. The scene was one of Holywoodian destruction. The PM was 100 yards distant. The menacing force stood shadowed by clouds of tear gas and black smoke, the red lights of their trucks making scary shadows. Dozens of people sat down in the street. My friend and I joined them. BBC Radio called me for a live interview. The number grew to two hundred people, legs crossed, V signs raised.

The PM attacked from two sides: bombs, gas, bullets. Blindness, searing lungs and a full sprint into the side streets while trying to talk on the phone. I don`t know if the BBC aired the interview. I blindly jumped over broken trees, cobblestones and shredded metal while running forward, trying to explain what was going on. Bombs exploded all around and more canisters rained down. There were no machos here, just people running for safety.

I ended up on Rio Branco heading towards Praça Mauá. The vandalism was out of control, universally undertaken by young men with their faces covered. Then again in front of the Museu da Amanha, another attack from the police that sent us running yet again.

It was a long walk to the metro. PM roamed the streets like rabid dogs, guns pointed in everyone`s faces. Worse, they threw tear gas into restaurants. These are the same tactics employed in Turkey. Solidarity!

For my usual trenchant analysis you can find links to the million interviews on the media page. And if anyone heard that BBC interview, please send it along.

My banner choices of the day: Chega de Bullying; Mais Amor Menos Paes; Desigualdade social é uma violência estrutural

[p.s. I had it easy]