MARIA CELIA PINHEIRO-MACHADO PAOLI

LABOUR, LAW AND THE STATE IN BRAZIL: 1930-1950

Thesis submitted for a Ph.D. degree,

Birkbeck College, University of London.

. .~

:.,,; ~', .. \
 ABSTRACT
This thesis describes the struggle for social labour
rights in Bfazil between 1930~1945. This battle took place
between workers, employers and a paternalistic State which,
responding to pr~vious battles, enacted a sophisticated set
of labour laws. Against a background of backward
industrialization, Brazilian workers were confronted by the
.
unique nature of the industrial bourgeoisie. Employers'
adherence to the cultural tradition of the Brazilian past,
prevented them from caring or understanding what the sale of
free labour'power for wages actually meant.
Through a historical analysis, this thesis argues 1)
that this struggle created a common cultural horizon for
workers who were otherwise differentiated (due to different
technological processes, regions and backgrounds) by the
nature of industrialization; 2) that, in spite of State
recognition of workers' rights in the form of the law, these
were effective only when the labour movement fought for
their application. Hence, workers had an ambiguous relation
to the State, and labour rights and laws were at the heart
of the strikes of the period. This is why the strikes cannot
be reduced to a struggle for economic demands. It is also
why unions, political parties and ideologies which sought to
mobilize working class people on grounds other than this
space of law and culture, failed to link the everyday lives
and common beliefs of working people to institutional
politics; 3) In this ambiguous State and socio~political
context, the labour movement in the 1930s and 1940s
developed its struggle for justice in a fragmented and
differentiated way, between a strong tradition of local
strikes organized by informal groups at the workplace and
professional and bureaucratized unions.
?

In short, the dynamics of working'class culture and

politics in Brazil emerged from the collision between
.
traditional cultural ideas of labour and its management, a
modernizing authoritarian state and the daily experience of
proletarians in search of their rights. It is against this
background that the peculiari~ies of the Brazilian workers,
as a class, must be understood.

J •
CONTENTS

I'NTR.ODUCTION ••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 5

CHAPTER I- THE WORKING CLASS AND ITS DIFFERENCES: RIGHTS AT

ISSUE, SOCIETY AT ISSUE(1906-1929) ••.••••••••••••••••••• 35
1.Becoming proletarian •••••••••••••••••••••••••• 37
2.Factory work experiences ••••••.••••.•••••••••• 67
3.The source of working-class heterogeneity ••••• 82
4.The emergence of the class •••••••••••••••••••• 99
.
Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . ~ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 119

CHAPTER II - A RIGHT TO THE SUN: THE WORLD OF LABOUR AND THE

STRUGGLE FOR JUSTICE (1930-1934)
1. Privileges and inequality ••••••••••••••• : •• '.132
2. The redeeming power: the Ministry of Labour •• 155
3. Women and children ••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 175
4. The eight-hour day: the oldest demand •••••••• 193
Notes •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 203
CHAPTER III - MERELY POLITICAL INCIDENTS: WORKERS RIGHTS,
UNION STRUGGLES (1930-1939)
1. Labour rights and trade union laws ••••••••••• 213
2. The effectiveness of the social laws ••••••••• 237
3. Workers'rights in institutional politics ••••• 251
4. The textile industry and the entrepreneurs'use
of the social laws ••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 271
Notes ......................................... 279
J

CHAPTER IV - THE AGENTS OF PUBLIC LIFE (1939-1944)

1. The destruction of the public realm •••••••••• 287
2. The silent conditions of labour •••••••••••••• 291
3. Individual solitude and mass spectacle ••••••• 310
4. Minimum wage and patterns of working-class
life . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 320
Notes •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 348

CHAPTER V - THE CULTURAL AND MATERIAL HERITAGE.:

REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRACY AND SOCIAL RIGHTS (1945-:'.950)
1. Political and social crisis •••••••••••••••••• 355
2. Street politics: a defence of social rights •• 379
3. The 1946 strike wave ••••••••••••••••••••••••• 386
4. The unsolved patterns of factory exploitation.409
Notes .•.•..••••••....•••.•...•.........•.•... 428

CONCLUSION .•....•..•••••.•.••••••••.••.••••••••.•••••• • · · 437

BIBLIOGRAPHY
APPENDIX

/
 5
INTRODUCTION:

In October 1930, a military and civilian conspiracy

overthrew the last elected president of the Republic of
1890, ending a decade of intense, sporadic mobilization by
various social groups in Brazilian society. What later came
to be known as'" the Revolution of 1930 thus marked the
emergence of a new way of exercising political power -
although historians and interpreters of the period have
since endlessly questioned the term "new" in their search to
define its meaning.

Putting this moment of the past on stage involves

recreating the performance of various social groups, each
with their specific causes for exasperation and conflict.
Appearing on stage simultaneously were the regional
oligarchies fighting amongst themselves for political power
.,
and seeking new forms of legitimacy through diversifying
their political parties; unpopular presidents and regional
officials caught up in a political game whose rules and
access had long been closed; armed regional revolts; an army
redefined through its nationalist and conspirat~.ral

lieutenants, determined to spread the idea of immediate

justice; a 24,000 kIn march, pursued by the government for
its revolutionary intent-:'ons; an urban population highly
dissatisfied with fraudulent elections and the cost of
living; a labour movement strongly influenced by anarchism
and anarco-syndicalism; a recently-created Communist Party,
acting in the trade unions and later in parliament; murders
and political violence; and, above all, the idea of 6
revolution on everyone's mind. (1)

The 1930 revolution - that melange of conflicts and

intentions - was apparently unified solely by its outcome:
the emergence of a strong and authoritarian state,
relatively autonomous in relation to social classes and
interest groups. This state intervened extensively in social
life, absorbed differences and conflicts and defined its own
•
meaning as the dynamic centre of society.

Interpretes of this multifaceted moment have long asked _ ~

themselves about the implications of its outcome. What did
this state mean? Whom did it represent, what prospects did
it express? Who won and who lost? Did 1930 represent the
destruction of the oligarchy based on export agriculture,
the coffee
bourgeoisie? Did it express the industrial
.,
bourgeoisie's desire to become dominant, allied to agrarian
groups producing for the internal market? Or was ira case of
the middle class asserting itself, having finally found its
place in history? Was the state, in fact, liberal or

authoritarian? Was it paternalistic, conservative,

modernizing? Did it contain the genesis of rule by

technocrats? Did it replace the social classes, unable as

they were to achieve internal coherence?

While the mobilization of social classes throughout the

period ensures a continuing debate among authors who resortw
every existing model to explain this transition as something
resembling a bourgeois revolution, there is nevertheless one
aspect recognized unreservedly by all. The post-1930 state _7

- particularly in its Estado Novo (New state) form (1937-

1945) -- effectively shifted existing discourses from their

previous axes to the states's own new forms of action. (2)

The content of this new state discourse, in turn, was

substantive: industrialization or at least a project for
it.

Indeed, the resulting industrialization -- or, more

precisely, the historical construction of the hegemony of
industrial capital -- had not previously been formulated as
such, by whoever might have. been speaking through the state •
•
Throughout the entire period form the provisional government

to the end of the Estado Novo (that is, 1930-1945) those in

power rarely refered to industria"lization in a direct way,

preferring instead to address a variety of other themes: the

need for the legitimate principle of authority; for
J
organizing the people into a Nation; for strong state-

management, capable of creating the society's political and

social life, and hence, of coordinating its progress; for

Brazilians to be protected against helplessness; for the

organization of the nation's basic expectations; for a moral

consensus, homogeneity, harmony; for society to be protected

against conflicts, disintegration and abandonment; for

technical hierarchies, professional corporations,

competence; for the social uses of capital and of industrial

progress; and, above all, for labour to be valued as the

source of the moral and personal fulfillment of both workers

and the society itself. (3)

 Nevertheless, the indirect language of ideology 8

homogenized by the State and personalized by the figure of

Getulio Vargas, the president -- was unable to hide the
concrete practices which, particularly after 1937, favoured
industrial capital. Indeed, the decision to invest
decisively in basic industry ( steel, o~l
- , chem~cal)
_ s as
well as the favouritism shown to the consumer-goods
industries, not to mention the creation of technical
agencies aimed at industriali~ation,
. may say more about this
state's berneficiaries than its nationalist, socializing and
corporative discourse.

The question, however, has often been badly posed.

Indeed, what is at stake here is not actually knowinq, fifty
years after the fact, that the emergence of Brazilian
industrial capitalism, following the 1930 revolution, was
inevitable, and hence confirmed despite some local
.,
peculiarities - the accustomed winners and losers. Nor is
the problem one of knowing how capitalism in this case
managed to assert itself. Since the State in the Vargas
period was certainly not fictitious, one must acknowledge
that it did build and articUlate a context within which
class conflicts were transformed into hierarchic social
differences susceptible to legitimate management by the
state. This, in turn, explairs how the State was able to
undertake industrialization, transforming what was or might
have been a pluralist and diversified change into a uniform
project. As long as the "real" political agents who actually
forged this history are seen as belonging to a sphere
determined by the state (i. e. the state bureaucrats, the
most important elites, the army) historians will always be 9
able to classify them as such, despite all the evidence
pointing to the numerous conflict-ridden stages where
industrialization was being produced: the factories, trade
unions, entrepreneurial, industrial and rural associations,
parties and underground groups, the state councils,
neighbourhoods, streets, the barracks and the universities.

However, even if we were ..to accept an interpretation of

Brazilian industrialization as a process organized
according to the presence of the state, what upsets
historians is the fact that those who shoUld be the main
actors in the drama rarely appear as such on the stage.
According to the prevailing historiography on the period,
the industrial working class actually did struggle until
1934, in spite of the fact that by then the battlefield had

already been
mined by the recently created trade union
.,
legislation. After that, it is as if the workers disppeared
into the repressive and suffocating darkness that the labour
laws came to represent. What is perhaps even worse, their
very nature seems to change, as industrial development
dissolves them into recent urban migrants fascinated by
social mobili ty , wi th high rates of job turn-over and who
experience both work and politics in a highly peersonalized

way. In short, they come to be regarded as lacking a

proletarian view of struggle. (4)

The other actors in this historiography, the industrial

entrepreneurs, receive scarcely better, reviews. Absent from
the 1930 Revolution, they are portrayed as openly opposed to
the state in 1932 and as conservatives holding outdated 10
privileges in 1934. By 1937, they resemble state parasites
since they participate in state agencies but do not manage
to formulate an entrepreneurial ideology. Thus, they used
the State more as a means of securing partial advantages
against other fractions of their ,'own class than for
constructing some degree of autonomous political identity.
In short, the industrialists scarcely acknowledged their

.
priviledged relation to the state, became entangled in the
'

traditional structure of domination, or avoided involvement

in anything beyond their own short-sighted visions of profit
-- not to mention their inability to establish diversified
alliances with other groups in soc~ety. (5) Other social

groups the urban middle classes, 'rural elites, the

commercial and financial bourgeoisie appear sporadically

as extras in the state's project.

Brazilian industrialization thus appears as a drama

without actors precisely during the phase when it was
actually being formulated as a project. In their place, the
kind of power that emerged was both impersonal an
enormous state apparatus which penetrated, regulated and
defined everything, as well as encompassing everyone -- and
personal, for the society's real movement was embodied in
its chief and in the civilian and military technicians whose
competence produced legal rules, promote innovative projects
and established repressive norms for those who insisted on

advancing their antagonistic private interests and

fragmenting this hierarchiacal body.

 There certainly is no way of . 11
ignoring the radl.cal
novelty of the post-l930 state, as it regulated the
relations of production and reproduction in Brazil.
Ne¥ertheless, it is surprising to note how difficult it has
been for the interpreters of the period to distance
themselves from the enchantment of the state, even though
they are aware? of its dictatorial and authoritarian
dimensions. For, however authoritarian it may have been (the
Estado Novo has been variously
. termed as corporative,
totalitarian, dictatorial and fascist) historians have
characterised its intervention using the same premise its
mentors had themselves advanced: the State embodied the
meaning of the movement of society.

Judging from available descriptions of the period, the

question its interpreters pose -- which classes and groups
were its beneficiaries? -- only arises much later and is
.,
external to its history • Similarly, criticism of the
state's authoritarianism does not prevent society from being
seen fundamentally as the object of State intervention,
while the social classes and groups end up portrayed as
empty subjects -- mere forms driven by the State momentum.

In almost every study on the period, these social

classes and groups appear through state laws and decrees,
texts, projects and intentions and, hence, acquire political

relevance. The aim seems to be to show (with varying

emphases, it is true) that society, in this period, emerges
solely through the power of the state. Workers appear
through labour laws, the class from trade union legislation,
 . . appears th roug h
th e b ourgeo~s~e .
corporat~ve ·
assoc~ations and 12
in the state Councils, the cities are sketeched out in
urbanization plans, culture emerges through official
holidays and celebrations, women are present in labour
regulations and suffrage, the family appears in the civil
code, conflicts exists through police records, the nation
emerges by means ?of the federal bureaucracy.

Because Brazilian industrialization is not seen as the

resul t of a collective endeavour constructed through the
mobilization of groups and classes, it appears instead to
have been created by the state -- without which it probably'
would not have occurred. The history of Brazilian
industrialization is generally understood to have taken
place in three consecutive periods, as defined by the
state's decisive interventions in the process. (6)

The first period runs from the last decades of the

nineteenth century to the mid-l930s, and consists of the
industrial growth prior to the state intervention. The
modest industrial achievement of the period were
subordinated to agrarian, particularly coffee, export
production. Not only did coffee dominate agriculture, but it
was also the explicit concern of economic policy. Government

manipulation of the world price maintained its

profitability, as did constant currency devaluation.

Existing in the shadow of coffee production and taking
advantage of the favourable foreign-trade dynamics of the
coffee sector, industrial growth seems to have been based on
sudden spurts of increased production. The internal market
had created favourable conditions, providing . 13
a growl.ng
population (and hence an effective. demand) an expanding
railroad network, and higher el~ric power potential.

But the haphazard nature of industrial production is not

apparent solely in the marginal benefits it drew from the
state policies, blatantly directed away from
industrialization. It is also reflected in the industrial
structure, in particular the precarious
. technical conditions
for improving production. Descriptions of the factories
(particularly in textiles, but also in other industrial
sectors) indicate that companies saw their production in
terms of immediate profits, hence explaining their limited
acquisiton of capital goods and raw materials. Inadequate
factory buildings overflowed with machines, people, dust and
gasses, for there was no interest in upkeep nor in
constructing more appropriate buildings, even for the
-'
factories' own expansion. The equipment itself was barely

known, for once it had been installed by the foreign

technicians sent together with the machines, it was left in
the hands of the factory foremen and workers who operated it
daily. Nor did management possess a very clear notion of
increasing factory output. Production was not adapted to
local supply sources and the various industrial sectors were
not coordinated (7). In short, according to economists, in
the periods of industrial growth and stagnations running
into the mid-l930s, there were no significant changes in the
structure of industrial production, no expansion or changes
in industrial jobs, little increase in the productivity of
the labour force, no significant increase in real wages, a
low incidence of capital concentration, and a persistence of 14
the familial organization of industrial firms.

The industrial panorama was very different by the third

period (the 1950s). Sketching a general overview of the
early part of the decade, economists point to the
beg.1nnings of a ?strong cycle of expansion in the industrial
sector, to the diversification of the productive structure,
to the high growth rates. of production, to greater
industrial integration, and to an increase of urban markets
and of fixed capital (8). The state apparatus was also
ready to focus its economic policies directly on
industrialization -- as can be seen by the institutions
created specifically for financing developemnt. In the
latter half of the 1950s, Brazil began decidedly to produce
consumer durables (motorcars, home appliances) and capital
goods (machines and equipment) as well as to expand
.
considerably its iron and steel and chemical activities.

According to Celso Furtado, by the end of the decade and

into the early 1960s, "Brazil had become ani industrialized
country, in spite of remaining notoriously underdeveloped.
Nine-tenths of the supply of finished products and their
main industrial raw materials came from internal production
and, contrary to what had occurred in other industrial~zed
countries, the very process . of creat5.ng fixed capital no
longer depended on importing equipment. There was no doubt
that a SUbstitute had been found for coffee, three decades

after its collapse". (9)

 What actually happened in the interim, that is, between 1S
approximately 1935 and 19507 It is true that economists

differ over what could be called the "main impulse" leading

to ~he domination of industrial capital over production.
Nevertheless, the very way they discuss the "behaviour of
economic factors" (generally on the basis of the ongoing
tension created" by the insertion of an economy of the
Brazilian type into international capitalism) suggests that
that behaviour should be evaluated
. predominantly at the
level of the state, and considered independently of the
existing interest groups. Although government policy is as
"neQtral" as economic factors, it nevertheless seems to have
been the main creator of the conditions required for
industrial capital accumulation: labour legislation, wage
policy, the policy defending national resources, the
creation of basic industry, the exchange policy for creating
capital, the tax policy, the guidelines deliberately aiming
.,
at infrastructural investments (eletric energy, warehousing
amd grain elevators, ports, roads), the preserving of the
agrarian structure. These measures are all explained either
in terms of automatic market behaviour which the government
knew how to interpret (even when it proved to be mistaken),
or of the state which created a new form of accumulation,
based on a class pact that in turn only existed through the

state itself. (lO)

In short, it seems that between the 1930s and the 1950,

following the foreing-trade crisis, an internal market was
indirectly created for what was then an incipient national
industry. Brazilian industray as a whole recovered quickly
 from the 1929 crisis, and by 1933 industrial production had16
once again' reached its 1928 level. The analyses of most
economists agree that the explanation of this phenomenon
lies essentially in the import reductions 1n
•
real terms,
caused by the crisis itself. Pressured by events, the
Brazilian government depreciated the currency and
selectively restricted the purchase of ,goods abroad. The
Brazilian industrial complex, which had thus far been
r~stricted to specific sectors of the consumer market, was
'~'." ~
e.

.
...... : . .

,. r
.: .
'.

'

then able to fill the gap left by imports. Internally, this

was made possible by the existence of equipment and
industrial facilities which were not being used at full
capacity. These conditions allowed production to be
increased without enormous extra expense. Indeed, this
situation opened up Brazilian industry's real growth
potential on a long-term basis, through what has
traditionally been known as "import substitution". (ll)

Economists have delved deeply into Brazilian industry's

chances of growing through import SUbstitutions - i.e., the
reduction of previously-imported industrial goods
particularly from the point of view of "external" economic
performance and its impact in terms of favouring higher or
lower rates of industral growth. '!he state's role was
fundamental here, for it developed an exchange policy
allowing resources to be transferred from other sectors to
industry, as well as financing equipmemt and intermediate
goods and restricting the importation of industrial consumer
goods. According to Francisco de Oliveircil.' the state turned
industrial companies into the "centre cof the system". One
must, however, understand the expanded scale of state l7
activity: in addition to protectionism, credit, subsidies
and resource transference, the state's role was also crucial
for redefining the price of labour power through fixing the
• •
m1n1IDum wage as well as for leaving productive relations in
the countryside untouched and making industrial acumulation
compatible with the existing backwardness, poverty and
resource concentration.

Thus, the history of industrial capital's establishment

in Braz il is, to put it mildly, paradoxical. While the
twenty years of growth in industrial production (1935-1955)
profoundly altered the structure of the society, class
dynamics seem to have vanished in the process. Once the
working class had asserted itself in a significant struggle
against both the entrepreneurs and the state intervention in
its trade unions, it became an amorphous, heterogeneous mass
which had no bargaining-power other than that conceded to it
by the state. The industrial entrepreneurs, for their part,
having first sought to make the domain of their firms
autonomous, ended up dependent on the state in every way,
even for maintaining their industrial cohesion. In the
countryside, the predominantly non-capitalist production.

relations and concentrated f.orms property were

maintained, precisely in order to make i~lstrial capitalism

viable. The old patrimonial and ~rsonal forms of

domination were also kept and, hence, ag~ian conflicts did

not attain institutional forms of politkal pressure (12).
Instead of social class dynamics, the industrialization
process created, during those years, a pmwerful bureaucracy
of military officers, high officials in state ministries and 18
secretariat~, and state-council technicians. These
bureaucrats were so far removed from the real conflicts of
society that they were able to formulate the notion of an
authoritarian "social.democracy" to redeem society from its
anarchy. At the same time, traditional forms of repression
continued to exist, now raised to a centralized form of
Itnational security". The technical bureaucracy was so firmly
articulated with that of repression that when the government
(which had created, unified and sustained that
articulation)collapsed in 1945, both continued making real
hist.ory -- in spite of and beyond the political parties and

parliamentary life.

Indeed, the moral of the story, narrated this way, might

be a melancholic one for its critics, though substaneially
real for empiricists and, for the realists, seemingly the
only possible one under the existing condition. In fact,
given the way this history is narrated, how could one deny
the weakness of such a society -- with the confused forms
its demands took, and its fragmented diverse aspirations?

Some central ideas have indeed been the basis for

understanding this period and, perhaps, even for commonly-

held notions underlying the way Brazilian problems are even
now perceived. As Castro Gomes points out, a series of

influential notions were "willed to us by the Estado

Novo":"ttie idea that the country's social and economic
development is not compatible with the liberal experience of
freedom and equality; the idea of a new kind of citizenship,
based not on electoral representation, but rather on
professions; the idea of a society made hierarchic and 19
integrated by the state-nation; the idea of a political
leader who symbolizes the 'collective person'embodied in the
nations population; in short, the idea of an authoritarian
state which seeks to be, democratic and, thus, is the
'natural \ expression of the cou.ntry's needs" (13) . Above
all is the idea that workers in this society do not have a
clearly formulated social or political identity and are
unable to represent themselves
. as a specific class within
.
the broader political struggles. The working-class's
weakness at the level of professional identification would
thus lead to the trade union's weakness in organizing the
working class; the heterogeneous and diverse cultural and
ideoloqical guidelines, to populism and paternalism; the
preeminence of poverty, to organizational dispersion and to
the absence of the class in national political issues. When
all is said and done, the only thing which might ultimately
provide the weak working class organization with a political
perspective would. still be, paradoxically, the labour
legislation -- precisely because it stemmed from the state

itself. (14)

In short, the paradox of the history of these twenty

years can be found in its own image. Anchored in the new

and innovative post-1930 state, this image points to a

society whose changes were encapsulated by the established

power, without which these changes would have been

unthinkable. While a capitalist productive apparatus was
actually built under the general conditions of "backwarded"
capitalism, according to the historiography, the state's
economic policies alone were decisive in setting the rythm 20
and viability of Brazilian industrialization. Thus the
state I s predominance in history is simultaneously proof Of"·
the weakness of society. It is also why at the political
level, traditional historiography did not even have to refer
to social classes to account for the history of the period.
At most, one mic;ht note the political composition of the
elite within the state. References to social classes in
later historiography point ~o their impotence, to their
•
sudden loss of dynamism in terms of their power
possibilities, to the gradual loss of class experiences, in
short, to their at least partial retreat from the
battlefield.

The question then arises as to whether this story could

be told in another way, one which starts from a different
representation of the dynamics of Brazilian development but
would be fully asfreal as that based on the state. Could the
history of these events be recounted as something other than
. .
a tragic episode in which the state triumphs over the
weakness of a divided society, unable to organize its
political struggles collectively outside the sphere of the
central power? Could we consider this history instead as one

of a transformation based on the conflicts and

confrontations of the classes that lived through it? Is it

possible, in sho~, "to . consider the conflicts which

Brazilian society experienced in the post-l930 period as a

history engedered by its internal antagonisms and

inequalities, and not as conflicts produced by the state and

controlled within it, however much the latter may have
institutionalized antagonisms, transforming , 21
them ~nto

hierarchical differentiations?

The possibilility of a social history of

industrialization in a country whose political tradition
revolves around a strong centralized state entails several
presuppositions which need to be clarified. In the first

place, such a history focuses attention on social classes

and groups as the principal ,historical actors, rather than

on the intervention of the post-1930 state in society. This
is not to deny the importance of the bureaucratic-
administrative apparatus through which that intervention was
carried out; nor is it even to deny the' solidity and
effectiveness within the Brazilian political tradition of
the ideoloqical world constructed by the state on the basis
of the myth of its own indispensability in holding together
a society always on the verge of rupture. Nevertheless, in
this approach, ~e state as an established power is not the
postulate, presupposition or basis for the interpretation.
As a part of history, power is an open possibility, renewed

by-events, even though its institutional dimension provides

the drama. But this develops elsewhere: in social life.

In the second place, the historical event of

industrialization is a drama which unfolds through its

actors in their concrete relations and experiences during a

given period, and not on the basis of the institutions which

resulted from them. If we already know the outcome of the

history of the period which the bases of

industrialization were being constructed, along with a

strong state, it is also necessary to see that this result 22
was by no means inevitable. It is this consideration which
refers the history of the period directly to its a'ctors, who
lived it as an unfinished and indeterminate present; they
had choices which are not always evident to the historian,
especially if he or she assumes the received interpretation
of the past.

These two points, which form

. the bases of the historical
•
approach being proposed, bear in turn a critical relation
ship to the two principal interpretations of the 1930-1950
period. At the risk of considerably oversimplifying this
debate in Brazilian historiography, I will first consider
what can be termed the "traditional" interpretation, which
establishes a profound break between the pre-1930 period and
that ~ch followed (IS). For the reader of twentieth-century
Brazilian history, in this interpretation, 1930 comes as a
complete surpri~e. The events of that year suddenly
interrupt an entire history which was being recounted
through the conflicts occurring over the liberal-
oligarchical state and the birth of capitalist
industrialization, as a part of an explanation which
identified recognizable political groups and social classes.
In 1930, however, the actors leave the stage, the state
enters, and historiography treats the post-1930 period as if
the history of the state were the history of society itself.
Thus the inevitable question: what happened to the earlier
scene formed by class conflicts, to the tensions and

inequalities which had previously been central to

understanding the fact of industrialization and the form of

 power? What happened to the alliances, h ost~'1"~t~es, 23
resistance, solidarity, to the cultural and ideological
universes which formed this history? The answer provided in
the historiognphy is exactly the history of the triumph of
this state. Like a giant vacuum cleaner, the new and
dominant political institutions formed by the centralized
state removed the history of people, groups and classes
precisely so that industrialization could occur. This
raises the first question: are social conflicts in fact so
,
•
historically insignificant in explaining the viability and
consolidation of capitalist industry? Could it really be
that "everything important" for this explanation begins and
ends with the state which emerged from the' revolution of
19301

On the other hand, what could be termed the "new"

historiography takes as its point of departure precisely the
quetions which have just been raised (16). Its way of
answering them, however, is generally less a direct
encounter with the practices and social conflicts of the
past than an attack on "traditional" historiography which
silenced such practices and conflicts. It has been a
historiography which seeks primarily to explain conservative
expertise; it aims at understanding how it was possible to
hide class confrontations. This historiography attemps to
see why a history was written in which the common people are
so absent and why so many voices were stifled. Such
cri tic isms showed that tradi tional historiography, by
falling silent about the dominated and explaining the motive
force of the country as that of its elites, succeeded in
 excluding from the historical memory of Brazilian society24
all those who undertook cultural and political projects
wh{ch were eventually defeated. It is because of this that
the social movements of the workers, their culture and their
social life, were eliminated from the traditional account of
industrialization and of the cuI tural and political
formation of social classes in Brazil.

Nevertheless, to investigate the mechanisms

.. of
conservative or traditional expertise which produced the
silence of the defeated is not the same thing as knowing the
(silenced) practic~s of the dominated. In a certain sense,
the social and political practices of the' workers --the
deteated-- appear in this "new" historiography either as
sketches of political projects counterposed to the complete
projects of the dominant groups, or as projections of the
disciplinary strategies of the dominant classes (17). Thus,
if certain periods of the previously mysterious history of
the formation of social classes in Brazil are illuminated
because its dynamic is sought in social life, in class
confrontations, and~ in power itself as repression and
ideology and this is the great merit of the "new"
historiography -- history seen as victory or defeat seems
to propose considering the class struggle as either an
immense comedy of errors (by the working class, its leaders,
its parties, by history itself which eliminated them) ,or as
a notable triumph of the capacity of the dominant class in
domesticating the workers (despite their resistance) to its
economic and political needs, so that we have reteurned by
another route to understanding "traditional" historiography.
 This rapid and simplified 25
version of the
historiographical debate is included in order to introduce

the principal narrative difficulty with which this theses

has to deal. How to recount as one and the same history two
levels of events which are usually separated: on the one

hand, the creation of a centralized state which poses as the

only political matrix and source of social change in the
country; and on the other hand, the creation of a class
society of manifold confrontations. The fact that the
.•
historical and sociological literature has narrated these
levels as disparate histories, often quite separate, is
explained less on theoretical grounds than by the
inflexibility of state power in Brazil, which establishes
its autonomy from social classes ana is endlessly closed to
the demands and struggles proposed by the dominated.

The actual separation of state and society in Brazil's

political cultur& explains why, in my point of view, the

history of industrialization often tend to be either a

history of the state as the organizing directive power which

succeed in making it (since it is assumed that the social
classes do not possess will or force) or a history of the
working class and popular political defeats as preconditions

for successful capitalist industrialization. In any case,

the indirect and unequal encounter between state domination

and the labour movement tends to emphasize either one or the

other. The aim of this thesis is to combine these two levels

of analysis and for this reason the narrative simultaneously
treats both the state, as it constructs in an authoritarian
way its image as the sole centre of society, and the class
 confrontations experienced in the face of this power, Which 26
does not mean the loss of class expressions.

It is also important to know under what conditions it is

possible to formulate this proposal. The historian today,
writing fifty years after the events he or she seeks to
narrate, during the visible emergence of
differentiated social movements, which are not confused with

the institutional sphere formed by the power of the state •

•
These are movements which regard themselves as heter~geneous
and active political subjects engaged in the construction of

a new politics in the country, however indistinct its

contours may still be. Given these developments, in which
the initiative of the dominated have repeatedly shaken the
present, the question is innevitable: why only now? Why was
it possible only in the 1980s for working class groups to
create movements on the basis of their specific experiences
with domination -and elaborate them as representations and

collective actions, relatively autonomous in regard to the

sphere of state power? Why was it impossible previously for

political practices to emerge which could not be captured by

the language of the ordering of established power, be it thi

language of bureaucracy, of parties certainties, of

populism? How did it happen that until recent years the

symbolic universes, as well as the political and ideological

perspectives of the classes and social groups, remained so

absent from the real development of industrialization?

The new movements impress the observer with the striving

for self-organization which inspires them, the debates they

established among themselves, their search for a pOlitics 27

which expresses the conflicts and domination of their lived

experience, the hatreds and hopes in their affirmation of

rights # the imagination which redefines old spaces of
struggle. Old spaces, old relations: to see the specific
demands of the labour movement today, as raised in the
frequent stoppages and strikes with which the movement seeks

to reposition itself in Brazilian society, evokes at the

same time everything that was demanded in other periods and,

in fact, constituted the movement itself. The same questions
reappear: low wages, arbitrary discipline, production
demands beyond the point of exhaustion, feelings of wounded
dignity, hunger, poverty. New political forms led the

movement to remain faithful to the experience of workers,

seeking to make thei;- experience the viable centre of its
politics. Why did this not happen before?

Thus the pro~osal of an encounter between a history of

state power and a history of popular and working class

mobilizations also begins from the confrontation of past and

present. Al though this enconter encompasses some of the

responses already established by historians (who proved that

the Brazilian working class was not passive, nor inert, nor
backward) the question of knowing what it actually was, its

collective experience of life and struggle, becomes more

pressing.

This thesis shares the point of view of those who see

workers experiences as developing subjective common worlds,

which poses for the historian the task of understanding what
 these people lived through in concrete terms (18). 28
Th e
existence of these common worlds proposes . 1
S1mu taneously the
formation of a social class as a means of collective life.

Working class common worlds implies its political organized

sectors, but actually goes beyond them. As Hobsbawm points

out, a history of workers becomes inadequate when when it

takes the institutionalized notion of politics in absolute

terms: "It tends to replace the actual history of the

movement by the history of the people who said they spoke

..
for the movement ..• It tends to replace the class by the
organized sector of the class, and the organized sector of

the class by the leaders of the organized sector of the

class .•• " (19)

Thus, this thesis seeks a notion of class which is

something more than a precisely defined objetive structure
of antagonistic interests. It attemps to understand the
formation of the' working class as one of struggles which
express common practices from the common conditions of

workers existence. This is not exactly, in this case, a

wholly theoretical position, but is in part a perspective

which arose from the necessary encounter with the time and

world being narrated. It includes the daily life of the

workers, popular movements, the labour movements and the

demands posed by everyone. All these diverse dimensions

seem, nevertheless, to be related to one another through the

cultural and ideological world in which the workers moved,

that is to say by the languages and acts the workers

produced. If the political practices were unequal,

uncoordinated and fragmented (perhaps not only because of

 the action of the state which constantly broke and separate29
them), they formed, in their difference, a time o'f mutual
recognition on the basis of concrete experiences
a
collective time, a space of their own to be won, both as an
immediate aspiration and a distant promise. This created a
subjective collective world not always expressed by
organized politips, but certainly present when the latter
was able to break forth. Common experiences, mutual
recognition, collective subject: the practices involved in
.
advancing common peoples demands gradually formed the class ;
into a real body, expressive in itself and visibly different
from other classes. The organized labour movement
retranslated this experience in its own terms, revealing
difference and inequality as domination. But, in any case,
class struggle was already present in the numerous protests,
movements, direct actions and demonstrations through which
the class was formed against another.

A few words are in order about how the workers' common

experiences appears empirically for the historian of
Brazilian society. The historical reconstruction of popular
practices in Brazil faces an almost insurmountable obstacle:
the lack of direct testimony or, to use Chaui ' s and De
Decca's phrase, the silenced
.
vo~ces (20) • Unlike, for
example, English historians, whose society permitted
historiographical work which rigorously distinguishes an
institutional economic and political history from working
class culture, lived and felt as class experiences, the
Brazilian record 0f th e d ay- b y- day formation of urban
workers appears in all forms, except as the direct
 expression of the workers themselves. 30
It appears in the
political texts of the parties, involved in the struggle for

power and proposing to speak "in the name" of the class; in

trade union newspapers, frequently not very independent,

which said they represented the class; in texts by agents of

foreign governments (the t!SA, Great Britain) who "helped" in

the repression ot. working class political movements; texts
by party militants of the left, who offered to "redeem" the

class politically; in texts from the daily press, which

.
documented the problems brought on by the formation of the

class; in texts by businessmen who dealt with disciplining

the class as a labour force. If all this forms a living and
coherent history --- and the important current work by
historians of the working class shows that it does -- there
is always a space between what everyone said about the

meaning of this process of proletarianization (be it in

respect to daily life or to the political presence of the
workers) and the representations which shaped the
elaborations, the choices, the strategies and the options of
these workers in the face of that process.

Not having the discourse of its subject as text or open

expression, since even popular urban culture production is

heterogeneous, it remains for the historian to seek in the

remaining record not only what is hidden but also what is

said about common people groups. If today the task of a

popular history, of the dominated, appears as the task of

making visible that which was hidden, to hear what was

silenced, to understand domination as the response to an

interlocutor who rarely appears because his activities are

obscured in the text which registers them, it is not for 31
this reason that one can reduce such "official" records to
mere established discourses, homogenized by their
relationship __ to power. In reality, I am a_?suming that these

texts, as they turn to contain or confront the different

groups of working-class people becoming a class, end up
speaking of this?class in the way it relates itself to the
forms of domination imposed on it •

•
Fillllally, there is no question here of establishing a
"new truth", showing that everything produced earlier about
the period was ideological. More than the creating .of a "new
truth" , • • •
I th~nk that this and other attempts to find the
working class which is lost in the winding tangles of
Brazilian history is a new way of posing an old questi,on:
how an historical Subject is produced historically and put
into history through its practice. In this way, there is a
sense in which seme current perspectives are involved, at
the moment in which Brazilian society finally dares to try
to recognize workers and the legitimacy of their aspirations
for autonomy. This is important in understanding the
development of the thesis, since it constitute the way I
approach the past events. As Lefort has pointed out (21),
the relationship to the past is experienced according to
historian own times, as he or she seeks to read the events
of a past time so that a history can, in turn, be read into

it.
 32
NOTES

(1) On the 1930 Revolution and mobilizations of the 1920s

s7 e : . ~austo,_ Boris, A Revolucao de 30, Historiografia e
H~stor~a, Sao Paulo, Brasiliense, 1972; Sodre Nelson
Wern7c~,Formacao Hist6rica do Brasil, sao' Paulo,
Bras~l~~se, 1962; Santos, Wanderley Guilherme, Introducao
ao ~studo das Contr~dicoes Sociais no Brasil, Rio de
Jane~ro, ISEB, 1963; L~ma Sobrinho Barbosa A Verdade.sobre
a Revolucao de Outubro, Rio de Ja~eiro Ed. Veritas 1933.
Silva, Helio, 1~30: A Revolu9ao Traida Rio de J~neiro'
Civi~iza9ao Bras~leira, 1966; Santa Rosa, Virginio, ~
Sen~~do do. ~enent~smo, .Sao Paulo, Alfa-Omega, 1976; Forjaz,
Mar~a Cecl.I~a, Tenent~smo e Politica, Sao Paulo, Polis,
1978; Decca, Edgar de, 1930: a Sil~ncio dos Vencidos Sao
Paulo, Brasiliense, 1981. '

(2) On the debate concerning the nature of the post-1930

state see: Weffort, Francisco, "Estado e Massas no Brasil",
Revista Civilizacao Brasileira n. 7, Rio de Janeiro, 1966;
Sodre, Nelson Werneck (1962), OPe cit.; Furtado, Celso,
Formacao Economica do Brasil, Rio de Janeiro, Fundo de
CUltura, 1959; Santos, Wanderley Guilherme (1963), Ope cit.;
Vianna, Luiz Werneck, Liberalismo e Sindicato no Brasil, Rio
de Janeiro, Paz e Terra, 1977; Tavares de Almeida, Maria
Herminia, Estado e Classes Trabalhadoras, (tese de
doutoramento, USP, Sao Paulo, 1979); Martins, Luciano,
Politi e et Develo ement Economique, Structures de Pouvoir
et S stemes de Dec~sl.ons au Bresl.l (these e oc ora
d'Etat, Parl.s, 1973); Fernan es, orestan, A Revoluyao
Burquesa no Brasil, Rio de Janeiro, Zahar, 1975.
(3) Cf. Vargas, Getulio, A Nova Politica do Brasil, vols. I-
IV, Rio de Janeiro, 1934-36). Also Oliveira, Velloso and
Gomes (eds.), Estado Novo: Ideologia e Poder, Rio de
Janeiro, Zahar, 1982.
(4) See the standanlworks on the subject: Tavares de Almeida
(1979), Ope cit.; Martins Rodriques, Leoncio, Sindicalismo e
Conflito Industrial no Brasil, Sao Paulo, Cifel, 1966;
Rodrigues, Jose Albertino, Sindicato e Desenvolvimento no
Brasil, Sao Paulo, Cifel, 1968; Simao, Azis, Sindicato e
Estado Sao Paulo, Dominus, 1966; Cardoso, Fernando
Henri~e "Le Proletariat Brasilien: Situation et
comporte~ent Social", Sociologie du Travail, nUmero special,
4/1961- Ianni octavio, Industrializa9ao e Desenvolvimento
social' no BrC:sil, Rio de Janeiro, civiliza9ao Brasil 7ira,
1963; Touraine, Alain, "Indu,stria,lization et. consc~en:-a
Ouvriere a Sao Paulo", Soc~olog~e du Trava11, numero
special, 4/1961; Bernar?o,. Antonio c~rlos, Tutela e
Autonomia Sindical: Bras11, 1930-1945, Sao Paulo, T. A.
Queiroz, 1982. For a critical discussion about these work~,
see Paoli, Maria Celia and Sader, Eder, "Notas sobre,a z:ocr ao
de 'classes populares' no pnesamento soc~olog~co
brasileiro", in Cardos?, Ruth (ed.), A Aventura
Antropol6gica, Rio de Jane~ro, Paz e Terra, 1986.
(5) On industrial entrepreneurs, see: Castro Gomes Angela 33
Maria, ~ur esia e Trab,alho: Poli tica e Le iSla9a~ Social
nO,Bras~l, ~9~7-1930, R~o de Janeiro, Campus, 1979; D~n~z,
E~~, Em resar~o Estado e Capitalismo no. Brasil: 1930-1945,
R~o de Janeiro, Paz e Terra, 1978 ; aenz eme ar~sa
dealo ia dos Em resarios Industriais no Brasil, 'petropoI1s,
V~zes, 1982; Carone, Edgar, A Segunda Republ~ca, Sao Paulo,
D~fel, 1973; Carone, Edgar, A RepUblica Nova Sao Paulo
Difel, 1974; Carone, Edgar, 0 Estado Novo Sao Paulo Difel'
·
1 978; Mart~ns, . , "
Luc~ano, Industrializa9ao, Burguesia Nacional
e Desenvolvimento, Rio de Janeiro, Paz e Terra, 1968; Souza
Martins, Jose de, .Empresario e Empresa na Biografia do Conde
Matarazzo, Sao ?Paulo, Hucitec, 1967; Cardoso, Fernando
Henri que , Empresario Industrial e Desenvolvimento Economico,
Sao Paulo, Difel, 1964; Dean, Warren, A Industrializa9ao de
Sao Paulo, Sao Paulo, Difel, n. d.

(6) On Brazilian economic '. history see: Furtado, Celso

(1959), pp. cit.; Furtado, Celso, Analise do Modelo
Brasileiro, (5th ed.) , Rio de Janeiro, Civiliza9a o
Brasileira, 1975; Oliveira, Franscisco, "A Economia
Brasileira: Critica a Razao Dualista", Estudos CEBRAP, 11,
Sao Paulo, 1972; Villela, Annibal and Suzigan, Wilson,
Pol1tica do Governo e Crescimento da Economia Brasileira:
1889-1945, Rio de Janeiro, .IPEA/INPES, 1973; Malan, Pedro et
al., Pol1tica Economica Externa e Industrializacao no
Brasil: 1939-1952, Rio de Janeiro, IPEA/INPES, 1977;
Tavares, Maria da Conceiyao, Da Substituicao de Importacoes
ao Capitalismo Financeiro, Rio de Janeiro, Zahar, 1972;
Mello, Joao Manoel Cardoso de, a Capitalismo Tardio, (tese
de doutoramento, campinas, UNICAMP, 1975); Baer, Werner,
Industrializacao e Crescimento Economico no Brasil, (2d ed.)
Rio de Janeiro, Fundayao Getulio Vargas·, 1975.
(7) Cf. "Condiyoes de Trabalho na Industria Textil", Boletim
do Departamento Estadual do Trabalho, Sao Paulo, SACOPSP,
ano I, n. 1-2, 1912; Also Pinheiro, Paulo Sergio and Hall,
Michael A Classe operaria no Brasil, Documentos: 1889-1920,
vol. II: Sao Paulo, Brasiliense, 1981.
(8) Cf. Oliveira, (1972), Ope cit.; Villela and Suzigan
(1973), OPe cit.
(9) Cf. Furtado (1975), Ope cit., p. 33.
(10) For the first position see Villela apd Suzigan (1973),
Ope cit. and Malan et al., (1977), Ope c~t. For the second
see Oliveira (1972), Ope c~t.
(11) Cf. Furtado (1959), Ope cit.
(12)" Cf. Oliveira (1972), oP: cit,; and Souza Martins, Jose,
"A Economia do Excedente Agr~cola , Debate & critica, n. 3,
Sao Paulo, 1973.
(13) Cf. Castro Gomes, Angela Maria, "0 Redescobrimento do
Brasil", in Oliveira, Velloso e Gomes (1982), Ope cit.

(14) Cf. T avares de Almeida (1979) , Ope cit. and Martins-

Rodrigues (1966), OPe cit.
 34
(15) See the wo~ks of Sodre, Nelson Werneck, Formac:;ao
Hist6rica do Bras11, (2d ed.), Sao Paulo, Brasiliense, n.
d.; idem, Historia da Burguesia Brasileira, Rio de Janeiro
C~vilizaQAo Brasileir~, 1964. Also San~os (1963), 9P. cit.;
V1anna (1977), OPe c1t.i Fernandes, Florestan, A RevoluQao
Burguesa no Brasil, Rio de Janeiro, Zahar, 19 ; Jaguaribe,
. .
Helio, Desenvolvimento Economico e Desenvolvimento Politico ,
R10 de Jane1ro, Fundo de Cultura, 1962; Prado Junior, caio,
A RevolucAo Brasileira, Sao ~aulo, Brasiliense, 1966; Fausto
(1970), Ope cit.; Diniz, E11, "0 Estado Novo: Estrutura de
Poder e Relacroes de Classes", in Fausto, Boris (ed.),
Hist6ria Geral da Civilizac:;ao Brasileira, 0 Brasil
Republicano, t. lII, 3. vol., (2d. ed. ) Sao Paulo, Difel,
1983; Martins Rodriques, Leoncio, "Sindicalismo e Classe
Operaria: 1930-1964", idem ibidem; Tavares de Almeida, Maria
Herminia, \~1-8, a?~ c,.;t .

(16) See specially Vezentini,: Carlos A. e Decca, Edgar de,

"A Revolucrao do Vencedor", contraponto, n. 1, Rio de
Janeiro, 1976; Decca (198.1.), OPe cit.; Munakata, Kazumi, "0
Lugar do Movimento Operario", in Anais do IV Encontro
Regional de Historia de Sao Paulo (Movimentos sociais), SAo
Paulo, 1978.
(17) Cf. Rago, Luzia Margareth, "Do Cabare ao' Lar: A utopia
da cidade Disciplinar, Brasil:' 1890-1930", Rio de Janeiro,
Paz e Terra, 1985; Antonacci, Maria Antonieta M., A vit6ria
da Razao, (tese de doutoramento, Sao Paulo, USP, 1985).
(18) See Hobsbawm, Eric, Labouring Men, London, 1964, and
the studies in Worlds of Labour, London, 1984; Thompson, E.
P., The Making of the Engl ish Working Class, t9lf.
(19) Cf. "An Interview with Eric Hobsbawm", Radical Histo~
Review, n. 19, 1978-1979, p. 113-14 i Hobsbawm, Eric, ".Labour
History and Ideology", .Journal of social History, vol. VII,
1974.
(20) On this debate over the IIvic~ors' ,unique :,oice".and the
consequent "silence of the vanqu1shed see, 1n a d1fferent
level, Chaui, Marilena, "Prefacio" to Decca's book, ..and
Chau1, CUltura e Democracia: 0 Discurso Competente e outras
Falas, SAo Paulo, 1981.
(21) Cf. Decca (1981), OPe cit., p. 31.
(22) Cf. Lefort, Claude, As Formas da Historia, Sao Paulo,
1979, chaps. VII, X and XI.
 35

Chapter I: THE WORKING CLASS AND ITS DIFFERENCES: RIGHTS AT

ISSUE, SOCIETY AT ISSUE (1906-1929)

If from the standpoint of the organization of power there is

a history which begins in 19.30, from the standpoint of the
formation of the working class this same history begins much
.•
earlier. Its starting-point in fact is the
proletarianization of men, women and children which took
place under the conditions of severe coercion prevalent in
industrial and urban employment during the First Republic.
The extremely high degree of exploitation in factory work,
the relations of arbitrary discipline underlying the
personal power of employers over their workers, the misery
of everyday life, the length of the working day, violence
and control as a Jfnormal" horizon of subsistence - all this
constituted the very mode of existence of Brazilian workers
during the period. They occupied the place reserved for
them by the mentality~of a society which had only just
emerged from slavery and considered indispensable their
unbridled exploitation.
This experience, however, was punctuated by the appearance
of demands (at first" diffuse, but later organized) which
disputed the dominant idea of legitimacy and raised the
question of social justice. Independently of the breadth of
the organized labour movement at the time and of its
capacity for resistance, what mattered were the countless
 36

forms of protest which, alongside the experience of

proletarianization, grew from the demand that the aspiration
to dignity of those who lived a proletarian life must be
socially recognized. It is worth stressing that this
preceded the formation of an organized labour movement, and
had much more to do with the localized, circumstan.tial
experiences of work, such as dismissals by management at one
factory, arbitrary discipline'. at another, the petty tyranny
of foremen at a third, coercion of women and children, wage
cuts, arbitrary decisions concerning increased working
hours and in~ensity, and various kinds of fines and
deductions. These widespread and repeated "minor"
impositions by employers formed the nucleus of workers'
protests in the period prior to 1930. During these years, a
representation of the lack of minimum rights pointed the way
toward demands later formu~ated by organized working-class
movements. This dual process of proletarianization and
revolt, both unpreceden~ed as a framework for the experience
of the people living through them, became simultaneously the
..
subject of debate, collective demands and social movements.
In 1917-20, these movements clearly emerged as forms of
class expression (1) and maintained this character during
the 1920s, although with reduced force.
What must be emphasized in all th~5~ c~nsiderations is that
the issue of social rights gave rise to tlie political
thought and action of the workers; this same issue survived,
to re-appear in different forms and in the new historical
 37

conditions of the post-1930 period. This is why it is

important to consider it here in some detail, in order to
characterize more precisely the workingclass which witnessed
the events of 1930 and the emergence of the new state which
,
was to interfere so greatly in their members' lives.

I. Becoming proletarian: crossroads of new and old

experiences

Who were the urban workers when 1930 arrived? In 1920(2),

1,168,247 people were employed in urban manufacturing,
includinq the buildinq trades and small workshops(3). They
accounted for 13% of an estimated 9,5000,000 people in
occupations of all kinds, 66% of whom worked in aqriculture.
The population of Brazil then totalled thirty million, after
a period of growth due not only to natural increase but also
to an intense process of immigration, which by 1920 had
brouqht more than 3 million immigrants to Brazil(4). More
than half of these were Italians, followed in order of
importance by Spaniards, Portuguese, Germans and swiss,
Lithuanians, Lebanese and Syrians, Poles and Japanese.
Durinq the century following 1872, some 5,500,000 people
entered Brazil, of whom 4,000,000 were to settle
permanently(5).
For our purposes, the importance of foreign immigration
derives from its well-known influence on the formation of
 38

the industrial proletariat, above all in the areas of

greatest industrialization (Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro).
Most of this population originally came to work on the big
coffee plantations in Sao Paulo after the abolition of slave
labour. "Of all the Italians who came to Brazil", say
~

Villela and Suzigan,"between 1888 and 1920, 73% ended up in

Sao Paulo - 70.6% of the Spaniards, 34.9% of the Portuguese,
and 58.6% of other nationalitiesll,(6). The efforts made to
encourage immigration to serve the Sao Paulo coffee
planters, however, ran up against the intolerably high level
of exploitation tO'which these labourers were subjected,
through the system known a~ the colonato. They lived
miserable and poverty-stricken lives owing to the system of
payment and discipline on the coffee plantations (where the
planters refused to realize that the colonos were hardly
slaves), and this undoubtedly see~ to them like a
J

continuation of the unemployment and misery which they had

left behind in their countries of origin(7). It must have
been a vivid contrast to their dreams of saving enough money
to allow them to live comfortably in Italy, or even Sao
Paulo, as rural or urban smallholders(8). For a time this
labour force strove to put up with the extremely low levels
to which its living standard had been reduced, but by about
1905 ~h~ immigrants began to flee the coffee plantations.
This time they dreamed of making a new start in Argentina,
or even returning to Italy, but when these plans proved
impossible because of the high cost of re-emigrating, most
 39

of these workers ended up in the big towns, mainly in Sao

Paulo. This was a continuous movement, and ever since it
became visible through the protests of representatives of
the foreign governments concerned, leading some of these to
ban further emigration to Brazil, it led to the emergence of
the spectre of a labour crisis in agriculture; and this in
turn made the Brazilian government intensify its official
immigration programes(9). with workers leaving the coffee
plantations, the increased number of immigrants arriving in
Brazil and their settlement in the towns, over a period of
40 years there arose a mass of people whose potential
proletarianization now became real(lO). In 1920, foreign
workers occupied 25% of all industrial jobs in Brazil, 51%
of industrial jobs in Sao Paulo and were predominant in the
building, metalworking, textile and food industries(ll).
As Azis simao points out, the immigrants and their
.,
descendants were practically assimilated into the notion of
"working class" widely .held by Brazilian society at the
time, especially in Sao Paulo. Even workers' newspapers
shared it, and it is commonly said by the historians of the
period that "the foreigners and their descendants were more
successful in competing on the labour market. They at once
began taking advantage of the new opportunities for
employment which were arising from th~ growth of the urban
economy, to which they contributed with their own presence
and activity" (l2) • This identification of the figure of the
worker with that of the immigrant would seem to have formed
 40

one of the corner-stones of the image of the working class

constructed during the First Republic, and to have lost its
importance only in the 1940s. Through it the attitude of~
urbanized Brazilian society to the working class blended
often disparate convictions; the liberal state of the First
Republic used it to repress the labour movement; and the
labour movement had to face up to it when discussing its own
unified constitution, i.e. the possibility that different
men, women and children of 35 different nationalities could
belong to the same class but experience their internal
divisions in differentiatiated symbolic spaces. The lack' . of
homogegeity among these symbolic spaces and the experiences
of proletarianization joined up directly and indirectly with
the construction of a class moment, and their differenbiated
ethnic origins was one of its aspects. It is worth dwelling
somewhat on this .,point, in order to investigate the
heterogeneity of the working class, since this image was the
forerunner of other aspects which later emerged and modify .
the differentiated internal makeup of the class.
The first observation concerns the aspirations of the
immigrants and, through these, their relative lack of
identification with the condition of factory worker. A great
many accounts from this period show immigrants workers as
hostile to the country and also to wage labour in the
factories. Everardo Dias, a printer and active militant in
the 1917 Sao Paulo general strike, describes the "average"
immigrant in 1919 as follows:
 41

"Most of ~hem were neither peasants nor workers: they

were unsk~lled labourers without any specific trade.
Many of them had come in search of adventure to make a
go of i~ in America ('fare l'America') ••• a h~terogeneous
mass, ~~~ purely utilitari~n te~denciesfaiming at
econom~c ~ndependence, gett~ng r~ch at business and
returning without delay to their native sOil .•• Those who
were unable to set up a small workshop (as carpenters,
joiners, ironsmiths, printers, cobblers, etc.) and make
their own living without submitting to a boss, learned a
new trade or moved away to another town or even another
country ••• Thus, personal egoism held sway among the
immigrants: their aim was to make a fortune or to avoid
the enslavement of wage-Iabour;to be self-employed and
self-reliant through well-paid work as artisans ••• (13)."
For the Portuguese anarcho-syndicalist Neno Vasco, "the
immigrants as a whole have only a single aim: to save enough
money to return to their own countries(14)". For Antonio
piccarolo,socialist propagandist , writing in 1906, the
immigrants were "floating and uncertain elements who are
constantly changing and are concerned only with
themselves"(15) - in a word, "unstable, discordant,
ambitious dissidents"(16). strong words these, and
undoubtedly a reflection of the despair felt by the
militants in their difficult work of grouping, uniting and
giving collective form to demands in a country where
"horses' hooves, sabres and bullets" were the usual
I

treatment alloted to "workers demanding better working

conditions and healthier workplaces", and where organizers
of such movements were "constantly receiving police
summonses and being kept under surveillance, arrested,
pursued and harassed, while their families were troubled by
sinister threats" - to cap it all, they were even in danger
of being deported(l7). But the strong words referred to
 42

above also express an irrefutable reality: the "average"

Italian, Portuguese or Spanish immigrant had usually been a
peasant in his own country, and therefore had no previous
urban or trade union experience. As Maram points out, "the
average immigrant had little contact with organized labour
...
in his home country ••• he was reluctant to take part in a
movement which could (and in fact did) lead to the sack,
arrest and, even worse, deportation to his country of
origin, where he would return to the life of misery he had
always wanted to get away from"(18}. It must also be
remembered that "the decision to emigrate was part a
struggle for work in a country - Italy - where unemployment
was high. On his arrival in Brazil, and at least for the
first few years, the immigrant tended to hold on to his job
for all he was worth, for fear of becoming unemployed, a
nightmare which was still extremely vivid, even when he was
not a native of the south of Italy"(19).
However, rather than seeing all this as the negat~ve outline
of an "ignorant mass" of backward men with little
understanding of their rights and who refused to assume a
proletarian condition, it may be more significant to try to
find out what went on in the minds of this nascent
proletariat in its search for a chance to live a better life
in a far-off, unknown~ ~redominantly agricpltaral country.
The first point is the immigrants/expectation of becoming
smallholders by being faithful to the ethic of the good
worklnan, or what Souza Martins has called "the work ideology
 43

of the big plantation"(20). This was the instrument of an

attempt to persuade the immigrant that "righteous, sober and
laborious" work on the coffee plantations would lead to the
chance to own a small property. Built into the adherence
to
this project by immigrants, there was perhaps the
?

peasantry's traditional belief l.n

•
its right to the land, a
. the countries of orl.gl.n
right which had been destroyed l.n . . by
the changes resulting from the development of European
capitalism(2l). Indeed, it was a right which had been doubly
trampled on, by the unemployment, hunger and misery caused
~ this expansion, and not only in Italy. As recalled today
by a former worker who immigrated from Spain and arrived as
a child in Brazil in 1926, his father "had emigrated not to
find gold but to find peace of mind. His thoughts were only
for work. Nothing else but work. supporting his family was
his only concern" (22) • From the idea of the right to
J

property (solidly based also on communal tradition) to that

of the right to work on which to live, various forms of
accomodation were attempted to the transformations which
dismantled traditional communities and familiar ways of
making a living. Souza Martins refers to the attempts at
seasonal migration by former pauperized Italian peasants who
went to other parts of Italy and Europe before deciding to
emigrate for good(23).
It is no wonder, then, that this experience had made the
immigrant workers simUltaneously very submissive but also
clearly in revolt against their fate. This was not exactly
 44

the political and directly politicizing revolt attempted by

the early militants and organizers of the labour movement.
It was a revolt, rather, which became apparent through an
individualized but general search to re-appropriate those
rights, and above all -the right to own small property _
y

known (and much regretted by working class militants and

historians) as the aspiration to "work on one's own
account", or to be self-employed. The right to work without
a boss would thus seem to have been partly a result of the
previous experiences , based on tradition, of these former
peasants(24), reinforced on the other hand by the tough
initial experiences of wage labour under capitalist
conditions. Immigrants accepted any type of work and even an
arbitrary boss, provided that this enabled them to save
enough to set up their own business, even though it entailed
the high price of having a very empoverished standard of
.,
living. The ideal of self-employment based on s~llholding
was tenaciously pursued by many immigrants, who remained
crafstmen and small farmers, and frequently shopkeepers.
Before the expansion of large-scale industry, for example,
in Rio Grande do SuI and Santa Catarina (two southern states
of Brazil) there grew up a craft industry involving such
manufacturing and production areas as milling, spinning,
weaving, brewing, foundries, cutlery and potte~!

manufacture. The colonos in these states, "helped by ethnic

solidarity, were the agents of exchange, supplying salt,
sugar, cloth and farm instruments, as well as the sellers of
 45

the colonies/agriculture produce and goods from the craft

industry to the urban centres"(25).There are also accounts
from Rio de Janeiro of the predominance of the Portuguese in
small trading (groceries, bakeries and so on) and on their
initial refusal to work for wages(26).
?

Small trading, occupation of land considered worthless by

the latifundia, and craft industries, all point to the huge
effort by a great many of the: immigrants to avoid becoming
proletarians, despite the fact that for large numbers, or
possibly for most of them, the proletarian condition was
something which they had not experienced. All the evidence
would seem to indicate that their fundamental commitment was
to the symbolic universe of the peasant condition, or to
that of the crafstman in village or town. In these cases,
the conceptions of rights involved are those of access to
small property, the claim to fair pay and sufficient
earnings to be able to save, and the importance of engaging
in some activity according to experience and skill. All this
had already been profoundly shaken in their countries of
origin, but it was undermined even more by their experience
of the colonato and direct wage labour on the coffee
plantations, the balance of which represented the last straw
in a process of dispossession and pauperization which ha~

begun elsewhere(27). Even those who ventured il:~O small

farming, basing their labour on the family group (mainly the
immigrants who lived in the agricultural colonies of the
south), found themselves not only pauperized in terms of
 46

living standards bu~ also in terms of their farming

techniques, and were obliged to reduce their activities to
the Subsistence level(28). Those Who tried to succeed as
artisans were swallowed up by the expansion of large-scale
industry (although in parts of the south, small and medium
industry flourished). In some cases, they even tried to set
up their own distribution network, but were also
unsuccessful in keeping their', activities going. In some
cases, there are reports of what happened: for example, in
the case of a pipe factory in Osasco, which had a monopoly
on production at the turn of this century, "as long as there
was no competition, the whole family worked in production
and made a living from it. Bur they failed to mechanize and
were eventually overtaken by rival firms which made the same
product more cheaply ••• The younger members of the family
went to work in the new factories, especially the Osasco
Ceramic Company, where they were dealing with familiar
material, clay ••• The younger members of the family made
their escape from this type of cottage industry where they
worked for the family and received only board and lodging in
payment, because working in a factory they were paid a
wage ••• "(29).Here it is clear that a whole pre-existing
system of relations fell apart, while some of its features -
such as manual skills and knowledge of the labour process
are appropriated by industry under different conditions.
This must have happened in "virtually all the technically
complex operations in factories, performed by immigrants who
 47

had some family tradition in manual production or some

personal experience operating factory machines"(30). For
most of the period, and even iater on;' it was the immigrants
and their descendants who occupied most of the skilled
factory jobs; there were certainly many artisans among them,
who had tried to set up factories based on their own craft
skills (working with fertilizers, glue, sieves, nails,
casting, pastry, weaving, etc~) (31) but had had to sell
these skills to the large capitalist organizations with
fragmentary labour processes.
In all cases, however, what was regis~ered as an immigrant
ethic was a project which dated back to their prior survival
experience, in which their own resources guaranteed some
areas of "freedom" determined by custom (e.g~ decisions and
ways of making products at the level of the labour process).
And this project, at least in "typical" cases, meant moving
away from the working class, particularly the factory,
condition. As Everardo Dias put it, when he recalls the
immigrants of the first and second decades of this century,

"the family would toil hard, the daughters as domestics

servants, the sons as apprentices in various trades
(barbers, tailors, covblers, painters)or as salesmen;
once some capital had got together, enough to make a
start the whole family would engage in the new business
heart'and soul so as to give it the impulse required to
make it prosper" (32) ,~.

It may well be with this same ethic that immigrants

experienced their lives as workers (in factories or other
jobs), which was after all the real experience of survival
for the majority. But it was undoubtedly also on this
 48

symbolic basis -- so despised by the political militants

because it represented the negation of being working class _
- that urban immigrant factory workers mobilized to take
part in popular protest. These traditional symbolic elements
can be found in the very forms through which the labour
•
movement arose and made its mark. For example, the idea of
worker control over his or her work, which allows some
mobility, is present in the occupational situation of the
immigrants who first supported the anarchist political
project: skilled workers, technicians in workshops and
factories, artisans, tailors, barbers, shoemakers, painters,
builders and masons, who were self-employed or paid by task
(33). Another example: the point at which the immigrants'
relative submission and docility (be it for fear or losing
their job, be it for believing in being able to save money)
broke down. This breaking point seems to have been caused by
the "exacerbation" of the unfair treatment they received, as
E.Dias put it; that is, as was well an~sed by Maram, the
collapse of those projects which had led to emigration
itself (especially clear around 1917):" Their golden dream
of making it socialIty and returning to their homeland rich
had been shattered during the long years they had struggled
while receiving merely subsistence wages. Many of them with
time ac~epted Brazil as their permanent home. Haunted ~y

inflation, in pragmatic terms they began considering their

involvement in organized labour as necessary for survival,
and this as intensely as they had tried to avoid it
 49

before"(34). still another example was the maintenance of a

communitarian utopia (35), already free from ethnic
stratification and replaced as working-class cultural life.
Eduardo Dias shows in his memoirs how powerful was community
organization in the working-class residential districts of
.,.
Mooca and Bras in Sao Paulo, the ideal of having sports
clubs as centres for working-class collective life, the
dances and the recognition itself of a common existence:
"All my life had been spent in crowded areas in Sao
Paulo, where workers were concentrated ••• I would walk up
and down those districts, first as a boy, later on as
teenager and then finally as an adult. I had never seen
anything else but these places. With their problems, the
struggle for life, their people, their daily routine, a
permanent come-and-go, that higher aspiration never come
true, never reached ••• Days, years go by with the daily
work, old age comes sooner, tiredness ••• "(36)
Excellently interpreted by anarchists, the concept of
community took shape as a celebration of the oppressed,
through which i~igrant workers adhered to political
J

mobilization proposed with a class connotation (37) , thus

overcoming the regional and national divisions and tensions
amongst immigrants themselves(38).
Francisco Foot Hardman has shown with extreme sensitivity
the spaces, the times and the levels through which anarchist
culture developed in Sao Paulo, with its festivals,
meetings, lectures, sports, games, so~ial theatre, poems and
novels which in their own way elaborated on themes of the
collective existence of urban workers - where the immigrant
workers' symbolic universe is particularly present, changing
into elements that interpret a proletarian condition of
 50

life. I~ that sense, when Everardo Dias shows, during the

first years of the century that "proselytism could only be

,
carried out through small meetings, picnics, festivals,
lectures, the celebration of dates which are significant in
terms of human progress"; and when Eduardo Dias states that
collective organization via soccer sports clubs was "the
kind of organization people understood", through which
collective solidarity was kept alive(39), they are both
pointing towards a symbolic world which seems to be a
decisive element for the acceptance by immigrant workers of
a labour politics, lived as the collective expression of
their segregation. Perhaps the labour movement at that time
did not go so far as to break radically with all those
values originating from the European peasantry, and it is
possible that the immigrant workers might have felt, in the
way they were being mobilized, something like the recovery
of lost rights or the restatement of their project of
autonomy which had been eroded by the capitalistic
exploitation of factory work. But certainly either starting
from this world or returning to its symbolic elements, the
representation of class (mainly anarchist) embodied in the
labour movement transformed the older concept of localized
and customary rights into something more general and
politically collectiv~ as the @xpression of an actual class
condition.
The predominance of immigrant labour in the factories of Sao
Paulo, in the south of the country and in some sectors of
 51

industrial and urban employment in Rio de Janeiro during the

First Republic did not mean that local labour was being
rejected, in spite of all the stigma falling upon the ex-
slaves, their children and the former free rural workers.
As has been much emphasized by historians, the values
..
prevailing in Brazilian society during the transition from
slavery to free labour contrasted the professional skills
and education.of immigrants to the lack of skills of the
local workers, as well as the immigrant's "will to rise" to
the negligence and carelessness of the national worker
towards himself aand society as a whole.
Nevertheless, industry in Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro,
especially during the post-World War I period, increasingly
absorbed this type of labour, only resorting to those stigma
in order to depreciate the local workers within the
technical and wage hierarchy in the factories. Except for
Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, the vast majority of factories
in other areas of the country in reality operated with
Brazilian workers, depending directly upon them, especially
when installed in less urbanized regions.Even though they
were proletarianized in the same way as the immigrants in
terms of the technical division of factory and urban labour,
local workers were assigned a lower social category by
society as a whole and their image, at least up to the
1920s, was that of a sort of scum of the urban working
class, a reserve army that occupied the lesser jobs in the
factories, and the worst paid and most degrading forms of
 52

urban work. It is frequently stated that their technical and

cultural level was extremely low, that they did not have any
experience with systematic work, and that their aspirations
corresponded to a life of low expectations. When compared to
the immigrants, local workers appeared indolent, weak and
ill, incapable of anticipating and thinking about the next
day, illiterate and adjusted to utterly precarious
conditions of life(40). However, it is worth noting that the
experience of the few factories that existed in the
nineteenth century was exactly the opposite: in 1891, for
instance, representatives of textile manufacturers to the
National Con~ess stated their confidence in the "skills and
intelligence" of the Brazilian workers, their main quality
beinq their "complete adaptation to work", a sign of their
"recoqnized superiority" over the "mechanical exclusiveness"
of the Enqlish technical workers (who came along with the
.I

machines imported· from England and were incapable of

handling different activities). "The only significant
complaint the manufacturers had (during the last decades of
~

the century) was that workers lacked a sense of order for

operating the machinery as well as enthusiasm for their
work. Apart from that, they were at the same level as the
\'
best European workers ••• (41)
In building a negative image of the Brazilian worker, one Jf
the main factors has been the extremely devaluated
definition of productive work by society itself, especially
manual work. This idea of work as being undignified (perhaps
 53

the most important cultural inheritance from slavery)

classified as degrading certain everyday tasks performed as
-- such as garbage collection,
part of urban and factory work,
shoeshining, vegetable and fruits selling in the street
markets, newspaper delivery, all domestic chores and all
manual labour in the factories. Ideas generated in the
previous century assigned them a "lack of moral value", with
,. inherent vices II, as well as being IIdirty work", a set of
"secondary functions" to be performed by "lower members fo
the social body"(42). This has been such a strong prejudice
that even after implementing the centralization of
productive factory and urban work, after havinq~~edefined

the division of work in a capitalistic sense, and even when

a free labour market had been formalized by proposing the
same condition of citizenship for everyone, from both a
political and.juridical standpoint, almost nothing
J
-changed
in terms of the value and the treatment given to manual
workers. This can be clearly exempliflied by the industrial
bourgeoisie's failure, during the whole period of the First
Republic, to regard the working class as entitled to any
valid contractual rights in terms of regular hours, minimum
wages, and a standard of living compatible with their
production as workers. Not by mere coincidence, a large
number of articles publish~~ in the working-class press at
the time called attention to the fact that their current
employers in the factories had previously been slaves
owners (43) .It can also be exemplified, unfortunately, in the
 54

language of the labour press when denouncing dissension and

treason within the labour movement itself, referring to
strike-breakers as "unskilled people, shoeblacks, bearers,
, f
banana sellers and vagrants"(44) - and as being Brazilian
"coloured men" who, for money, came to the factories to keep
the work running during strikes. According to Maram, "not
even the oldest among the anarchists, impregnated as they
were with the ideals of human-equality and class solidarity
remained immune to cultural exclusiveness ••• the problems
created by ethnic and racial divisions and that had to be
coped with when organizing the proletariat were extensively
discussed through the press during that period"; all the
effort spent on organizing the unions came up against the
rivalry and struggles over the ethnic and racial make-up of
the leadership, and local workers resented the cultural
superiority disp~ed by the foreign workers. (45) Finally, the
cultural stigma of work after so many centuries of slavery
was reflected in the attitude of local workers themselves,
who dramatically elaborated symbolic resistances which
referred back to their past experience.
The former slaves, after a short period in which it was
possible for them to develop a few ha~raft activities in
the cities, ended up not being able to cope with competition
from the free local workers and most of·all from European
workers. One factor contributing to this has been, according
to Florestan Fernandes, a concept of rights directly and
antagonistically related to their old submission: " •.. the
 55

concept according to which liberty would mean one's full

disposition of one's self, the pratical corollary of which
would grant each individual the ability do decide, out of
their own free will when, where and how to work; the
representation according
.. to which the dignity of free men is
not compatible with degrading jobs; and the pre-capitalist
principle that the commitment to work should be regulated by
.
the consumption needs of each'individual along with their
families"(46). This would practically mean "the refusal of
certain tasks and jobs; frequent absenteeism; the
fascination exerted by actually or seemingly dignifying
jobs; a tendency to alternate regular working periods with
longer or shorter periods of idleness; the aggressive non-
acceptance of direct control and organized supervision; the
lack of motivation for individually competing with peers and
for turning wage ~ork into a source of economic
independence" (47) - which immigrants would dream of. This
ethic is obviously unacceptable under capitalism, based as
it is on seeking liberty and not on the rationality of
savings, or of acquiring wealth and success; most of all,
this ethic cannot permit any reminder of the unbearable
submission which was the basis of the historical heritage of
slavery. The new urbanized and civilized Brazilian society
Jid not- forgive the former glaves-~ their forms of
resistance, their "silent protest" as Florestan Fernandes
termed it. society assigned them the "nigger jobs", those
which demand little skill and much strength: "a nigger does
 56

not have enough brains to manage his own life ll (48). still
according to Florestan, around 1920 things had become even
worse: only few blacks had any profession at all. In the
factories, they were assigned jobs the IIItalians would not
accept" (heavy and hazardous for health); in commerce, they
did manual labour; in town, blacks were hired as janitors,
porters, shovel and mattock workers, and finnaly as body-
guards of their masters. All'. of these were badly-paid jobs
and ranked quite low in the scale of urban occupations. No
wonder, then, that many blacks would prefer.not to "make
fools of themselves" and not to "sell their blood like
slaves". But Fernandes once again is right when stating that
"vagrants, thieves and prostitutes confronted smaller risks
and would be able to secure a much better lot in life. In a
sense, only they could become successful and display the
signs of their triumph through the kind of life they led, by
-'

the way they dressed and the fascination they exerted on

,.
other people's imaginations(49) - even though the actual
image of the former, linked to urban blacks, was in large
part a projection of the white's own imagination. The vast
majority actually worked wherever they could, from their
earliest years, suffering the consequences of crossed images
of submission, prejudice and resistance, in permanently
precarious c~~ditions that und~~~ined their attempts to be
"orderly negroes"(sic). In that sense, even when they had
the opportunities of securing permanent wage-paying
employment, the black popUlation in the large cities of
 57

Brazil during the first 30 years of this century, being the

children of ex-slaves, formed a reserve army of industrial
labour for the countless jobs required by urban
expansion.They were far from being jobless:" ••• the rate of
,
unemployment itself was minimal", states Florestan
Fernandes, but "they would have to wait for the future" in
order to be able to enter industrial and urban occupations
in a more stable manner(50). :
In the small to medium-sized towns of the Brazilian
hinterland which had some factories, the proletariat was
mostly composed of workers who had recently left the
condition of rural smallholders, many still maintaining a
double identity as workers and farmers. In the south, for
instance, the children of immigrants (primarily Germans, who
had arrived intermittently since 1860) from the old
nineteenth-century colonies, were hired by small (yet
-'

important) textile factories, metalurgical and food

processing plants of Joinville, Blumenau and B~sque (state
of Santa Catarina) and Rio Grande, Pelotas, Porto Alegre and
Novo Hamburgo (state of Rio Grande do SuI), without ever
totally breaking their ties to peasant family life. They
apparently remained faithful to their culture of origin, as
for example, regarding rights of primogeniture; it 'can be
presumed that the acceptan~p ~f the conditions of
proletarian life was subordinated to the values represented
by craftmanship and to the prospects offered by small rural
property operating as a family production unit(51). The sons
 58

and daughters of immigrants were forced to proletarianize

themselves as wage workers since, as families grew larger,
the small farms were no longer able to provide for all their
members; Singer mentions, for instance, that in Rio Grande
do SuI the continuous subdivision of land into smaller and
smaller properties led to an increasing number of
excessively small farms ("minifundios"), a process that had
started in the beginning of the century, causing migration
into the cities or to the agricultural frontiers. It is
estimated that lithe settlements (located) in Encosta da
Serra lost 122,000 inhabitants" in fifty years (52). Limeira
Tejo mentions the fact that the worker in Rio Grande do SuI
was someone who moved back and forth between rural and
industrial urban jobs, according to the opportunities
encountered(53).
The same basic process of being forced to leave the farms,
although without a complete separation from the rural
universe, can be found in an even more dramatic form as the
basis for migration of people in the Northeast of Brazil,
into the large cities, especially Recife(54). These people
came mainly from the arid areas (Agreste and Sertao) where
they had made their living from subsistence agriculture
since the eighteenth century. These were usually the rual
smallholders whose number became too lar;~ for the land
available as they were pushed into the semi-arid areas
because of the increasing and continous expansion of large
properties. During the nineteenth century, with the
 59

reorganization of the sugar industry using higher technical

standards, more land was required for the sugar cane
plantations. Thisihad such consequences as the closing of
the old "banques" (small plantations kept by the share
croppers), the replacement of tenants and sharecroppers by
sugar mill owners -- a process continuing quite intensively
until at least 1930 (55). The abolition of slavery had
already contributed to increasing the number of landless
workers, who could no longer survive in rural areas. Thus
"migration became larger and larger each year, as people
went after new joqs, sometimes as a simple condition of
survival, sometimes with the hope of improving their
situation or of receiving higher wages. Periodic droughts
have made the process of" abandoning the older areas even
more serious ••• "(56).Ousted from the land, they would go to
the small sugar mills
.,
("engenhos"); ousted from the small
sugar mills, they would go work in the larger ones or in
plants ("usinas ll ) where the manufacturing structure had
already redefined the concept of rural work and was getting
close to mechanizing the work process. Even so, the
transition involved in the I. industrial revolution in
sugar", as Singer put it, on the one hand set free workers
who had previously been integrated into the subsistence
sector of the economy, but on the other did not repre~~nL a
linear transition to free labour, nor the direct abandonment
of those activities. Many of these workers left their own
crops to be harvested by women and children of their
 60

families and went looking for jobs in the Zona da Mata

(which is a region that includes part of the states of Bahia
-
,
and Minas Gerais), working in the sugar cane harvests for
wages - and later on they would return to their small farms,
thus going through quite different production processes.
Their migration into the large cities would take place when
it became totally impossible for them to survive from the
different forms of farming activities ruled by the existence
of the large sugar plantations, which in all cases were
forms based on total expropriation and pauperization: the
remuneration itself of workers in small and large mills was
a combination of monetary and non-monetary compensation, and
the autonomous reproduction obtained by families working the
land would not even be enough for mere survival.
The industrial growth of Brazil during the first 50 years of
this century was to a large extent regional, mainly through
J

the instalation of large factories in small towns and less

developed villages, which became true cities because of
these factories. Singer mentions the case of the state of
Minas Gerais, for instance, which was characterized by a
significant degree of industrialization, yet had small
factories allover its territory. The state of Santa
catarina also had factories built next to towns throughout
the state, which in turn have become more or less
independent regional centres(57). In many cases, these
industrial centres were true company towns, self-sufficient
in terms of raw materials, energy, machinery maintenance and
 61

labour supply - as is the ,case of Fabricas Paulista, in the

Recife area, one of the most important textile plants from
early in the century through the 1950s (58). This factory
grew by attracting peasants directly from the rural areas of
the states of Pernambuco, Paraiba, Alagoas e Rio Grande do
Norte, and settling them next to rural workers and fishermen
in a working-class district, that is, having them settled
down as a permanent labour force by offering them housing
built by the company. In this case, making them into
fac~ry workers was a "sudden transplant", according to
Leite Lopes, from their previous condition of relative over-
population when they used to live as free peasants.
Moreover, the Paulista recruited whole families of workers,
thus proletarianizing all their members - women, children,
youths and dependants. All these people were then
distributed throughout the countless tasks performed in the
large, self-sufficient enterprise; the Paulista, besides the
spinning and textile mills, also had its own maintenance
shops, civil engineering workS, its own forests for
supplying firewood to boilers, its own means of
transportation, an auxiliary ceramics tile factory, and
docks. Perhaps not so complete as the Paulista, other
factories at that time followed the same model with some
variations, especially the constant sup~Lyi~J of workers
they needed - the most frequently quoted examples being
Brasil Industrial, Andarai and Bangu factories in Rio de
Janeiro; Votorantim, in Sorocaba (state of Sao Paulo);
 62

Reingantz, in Rio Grande do SuI. The model of "factory-

company town" as Leite Lopes has called it, goes back to the
first textile factories in the nineteenth century. Stanley
Stein describes various kinds of "bribery" techniques used
by some of of the large factories in Rio, Bahia and Minas
Gerais in order to keep workers in their jobs, mainly
through housing facilities, which evolved from dormitories
to company towns. They would also create some food and
clothing supply services for their workers - which later on
openly became one trait of the domination system, in the
form of "company stores" or warehouses. All that effort
would contrast clearly with the belief ( originating from
the slave-based matrix of colonial and imperial times) that
"the poor (i.e. rural workers) were a class tending towards
indolence if not forced to work"(59). Even after the
contingents of free workers became larger, because of the
abolition of slavery and the growth of foreign immigration,
the Brazilian factories increasingly hired local workers,
and grew as a consequence of appropriating their work.
The Brazilian proletariat was thus recruited from universes
with quite different historical backgrounds. The
chronological contemporaneity in which the slave, the
peasant, the European ar~isan and the rural smallholder-
wn~k~rs of the vast Brazilian rural hinterland were formed
(as well as the simUltaneous crisis that occurred within
their different social conditions) cannot hide the radical
historical differences separating them. In fact, it was not
 63

just a question of pre-capitalist universes that were

inevitably disappearing, nor of different value systems

,
expressed through customs, language and habits. It was more
than that. Each person, each family, each group, male or
female, that became workers in Brazil from 1890 to 1930,
suffered a continous displacement process of historically
differentiated times - and entered into another process,
which was new, unheard of, unimaginable for most of these
people. Each of these groups had the notion not of a generic
subordination, but of concrete submission to owners,
masters, oligarchs and "coroneis". Each had lived with
authority and command in a precise sense, had known poverty
and hunger in different ways. Based on different
experiences, their aspirations to dignity and liberty and
the meaning that the concept of work acquired, necessarily
had to be different. Having to coexist in the same factory
space, which homogenized their expeirence; and in relations
that did not differentiate them one from another, ignoring
their past, these new proletarians had to experience at the
same time capitalist relations of production and the search
for new ways of thought and action. But their search began
at the crossroads of their new and old experiences, and in a
precise.way: it was a search for autonomy, a rejection of
the proletarian ~ol.dition. All these ex-slaves, ex-feudal
peasants, ex-inhabitants of immigrant settlements and
villages, ex-artisans, ex-free rural workers from the period
of slavery, rejected as much as they could the idea of
 64

subordination to a boss, depending on a salary and working

in a directed and undifferentiated job. This was regretted,
one might add, not only by the industrial entreprene~rs but ~.
also by those heroic militants of the working-class
movements at the turn of the century, though obviously for
quite different reasons.

Employers complained of the lack of a positive acceptance of

factory work; militants of the ideological and political
indifference of workers toward issues related to the working
class. Initially such complaints were restricted to
Brazilian workers. It was said (after praise for their easy .
adaptation to work with machines) that they were indolent
and inconstant to such a degree as to be "intransigent"
toward systematic work, with little interest in their tasks,
not submitting themselves to any kind of control,
disregarding their own work contracts - and, what made the
employers even more upset, the workers would quit at the
least insistence on their part(60). This had been attributed
to the most varied reasons, all stigma being thus
reinforced: these included descriptions of the local
workers/personalities as corrupted by centuries of slavery
and of being treated as outcasts, as well as considerations
regarding the ease of life in the tropics - not to mention,
again, the racial prejudices. However, when thl "~ard­
working" immigrants also started to become "intransigent",
it was difficult to explain this as a behavioural pattern
caused by climatic or racial factors, even though some
 65

people have t~ied to do sO(61). The employers'.complaints

accumulated during the whole period, and the action taken by
the factory owners regarding disciplinary issues and cases
of job abandonment was in fact worthy of the pro-slavery
tradition of the country.

The issue concerning the adaptation of labour to factory

work lasted throughout the period of the First Republic,
except perhaps for the crisis~immediately before and during
the first years of the war (1912-1916). The strict system of
fines and discounts to wages as penalties for workers being
absent or coming late to work, as well as the construction
of workers' housing by many factories, indicates the effort
made to settle and fix the labour force necessary for
~
maintaining production. In 1912, the State Departament of
Labour stated in a report of visits to 31 textile factories
in Sao Paulo that the managers "were complaining about a
constant lack of personnel; this complaint is equally
expressed by all the textile manufacturers"(62). Ten years
later, the presidential candidate, Artur Bernardes, proposed
in his platform a series of measures for obtaining "the
stability of workers in factories, one of the most important
requirements for industry"(63). In 1926, the Centre of
Textile Entrepreneurs of Sao Paulo, in response to the Law
on Holidays, put the issue in the followin~ terms: the
employees' holidays would mean an "annual absence, a regular
absence, one which cannot be punished as is permitted by
law, and shall have as a consequence the ruin of promising
 66

entreprises( •.• ) Many, very many, factories would be

inoperative ..• "(64). It is worth mention that there was
enough labour available, since between 1872 and 1920
population growth was much higher that the growth in the
number of jobs: "The number of employed people went from
5,726 to 9,150 million between 1872 and 1920, thus with a
growth rate of 59.85%; the number of people in the
economically active age group: increased from 5,999 to 16,257
million, with a growth rate of 171.0%" (65). It should also
be mentioned that in spite of the vitality of coffee
production, and of many other kinds of agricultural
production, there was·a strong migration from the rural
areas into towns, especially in the state of Rio de Janeiro
and the three southern states (even though it was not as
intensive as it became after 1930 and shared its numerical
s~qnificance with rural-rural migration) (66). Finally, the
peak of foreign immigration, already described, occurred
precisely within the 1900-1920 period. This reinforces
observations such as the following: "even for the more
experienced city dwellers, factory job were incidental.
Workers have always considered these jobs an unpleasant
alternative, as they would rather work in commerce,
transportation or even construction jobs, when they could
find one"(67).
 67

II. Facto work e eriences: differences and similarities

Why did the workers reject employment in the factories? This

,
can only be partly explained by the historical origin of
those who became proletarians during the first 30 years of
this century. This certainly is due much more to labour
relations inside the factories and to 'the wage levels, even
though these were not much different from non-industrial
wages (68). Labour relations inside the factories marked the
whole process of the reproduction of the working -class
condition, forming the crucial world of prole~arianization
as a daily experience of men, women and children. The work
experience was the most critical point in the formation of
the working class. In their working relations inside the
fctory, men, women and children were called to live the same
order of perceptions and were also invited to share the
J

adventure of a common involvement, which would allowed them

to discover the collective sense of something which was
replaced everyday. It was not by chance that from the
experience gained in the factories the labour movement was
born, even though this experience in Brazil has taken the
shape of a refusal of the working -class condition.
Let us follow the proletarianization experience in the
Brazilian factories during those 30 years - and also ~n the
docks, railways, transportation companies, mines and
construction firms in order to discover what lay behind the
initial formation of the working class, and what has been
 68

the critica~ factor influencing the shape taken by its

political options. The critical year was 1906, when the
First Brazilian Workers' Congress wa; held irrRio de Janeiro.
This is also the year in which a significant though
intermittent industrial expansion started, to be interrupted
?

only in 19l4(69}. Leaving aside for the moment the issues of

political organization raised at the Congress (where
anarcho-syndicalism established itself as a dominant trend)
a few of the fundamental issues present in the day-to-day
activities of the working class became evident, which formed
the basis for the proposal of a unified claSs commitment.
The workers ~ssembled to discuss trade union organization
issues and expressed their views according to which unions
should be open to "any kind of workers, but only those who
are paid wages, those who do not exploit other workers or
apprentices on their own". Workers had already been called
J

upon to "abolish the barriers separating the craft

corporations". They excluded from the class foremen,
supervisors, and "workers who held any command function",
since they "are the employers' true representatives". The
delegates recommended as working-class means of struggle and
action "all those means which stem from the direct and
immediate performance of their jobs, such as general or
partial strikes, boycotts, sabotage, use of the union label,
demonstrations, etc.". They defined as the main issue in
their struggle the reduction of the number of working-hours,
"especially if supported by the abolition of job work and of
 69

overtime"; the Congress also called for "strong resistance"

against "fines applied for any reason to workers in shops
and factories", even when these were used to maintain the
,
employers' mutual aid association for their workers. The
delegates also proposed union arbitration for work
accidents, and forcing employers to accept it. As for wages,
the problem was making sure that these would be paid on
time; the Congress advised workers to try to "make the
payment periods as short as possible ••• as this way workers
will be able to avoid countless forms of exploitation and,
at the same time, whenever they are cheated, ~hey will be
losing smaller amounts". Another- critical issue was
actively rejecting job or piece---work, inasmuch as this
would lead to "the worker'ruin", besides creating "a large
and strong barrier to the most sought-after objective of the
workers 'associations, the eight-hour working-day". Finally,
the Congress discussed the need for organizing women
workers, so as to "make them partners in the struggle", thus
putting an end to a situation which turned them into "men's
terrible competitors"; and it also recommended that "workers
should not send their children to work in shops and
factories before they reached the proper age". The Congress
sadly admitted not being able to do anything on a short term
ha~is in favour of handi_apped workers (except for the
general recommendation to fight) "because as long as the
present system is in force, workers will not be able to free
 70

themselves from the contingencies of misery and of

helplessness"(70).

As one can see, the insistence upon the figure of the wage
worker as forming the working class was built on concrete
relations of domination, which are specified in detail: the
relations which are generated from what is immediate daily
experience at the workplace, with its different forms of
management, its fines, the long working days with overtime,
wages that are not guaranteed, intensified productivity
ensured by job and piece work, the employers'manipulation of
women and children's labour, and frequent accidents. The
text emphasizes, above all, the extreme helplessness to
which workers were pushed by working class-conditions. There
is no need to describe a society in which such a situation
exists, for this can be apprehended trom
~ . the text: the
existence of productive labour is something that concerns
only its bearers, and there are no cpllective mechanisms of
social responsability. It should be noted that the class
aspect and the independent character of the proposed
organization are placed and stated in the name of the
defense of the rights required to perform the work: against
unpaid wages, against "the excesses of brutalizing and
exhaustive w~~kl., against the application of fines, again~t

the legal ineffectiveness of social measures concerning work

accidents. By listing their claims in this way, workers
turn their objective helplessness into the starting point of
a collective mobilization, thus converting their
 71

exploitation into a fundamental opposition between an openly

unequal society and another one which implies the
recognition of their rights.

The Congress took place during a period of widespread

strikes and mobilizations, and it is possible to see in them
the claims proposed in the Congress as actual events. In
1906 and 1907, collective expressions of workers' discontent
with their working conditions. were breaking out
everywhere. Sao Bernardo, March 1906: at the Ipiranquinha
factory, 500 textile workers went on strike against a 20%
decrease in their wages, which was paid by piece-work, and
the company estahlishes as compulsory the daily production
of 40 meters of fabric per worker. The working day starts at
5:30 in the morning and goes until 6:30 in the evening; at

the dyeing section people work 11 hours a day over large

tubs filled with hot water at a temperature of 50 C, and
with acids - which causes burns on the hands of workers.
Some 150 weavers work in a room with four windows, under a
manager who knows nothing about the job and who orders the
watchmen to kick people. The factory owns houses that are
.
rented to the workers and keeps a grocery store for selling
foodstuff to them, deducting all this from their monthly
pay, sometimes in advance. Employers are authoritarian and
arrogant and give rude politi~al answers to workers'demands:
first, they make vain promises, then they call the police
(who come and arrest people, intimidating them and speaking
on behalf of their chief) and finally, they have false
 72

information published in the press(71). Sao Paulo. April

1906: printers working for Casa Duprat strike for better

wages and against their foremen; the owner hires strike-

breakers (tlkrumiros"); workers from other printing shops
express their solidarity(72). Jundiai. May 1906: 3,000
..
railroad workers of the Paulista Co. go on strike, demanding
the readmission of a colleague who had been arbitrarily
fired; behind such a claim are management's "countless
vexations" and "threats", not permitting work on holidays,
thus causing wage losses; they are also protesting against
their mandatory participation in the "benevolent society"
maintained by the company with 10% of their wages~

Expressing their solidarity, the Sao Paulo, Campinas and Rio

Claro units also go on strike; and the workers of two other
railways, the Mojiana and the Sorocabana, join the strike as
well. By the end .,of the month, the general strike by the
Paulista railway workers had spread to almost the entire
state of Sao Paulo, as printers, barbers, hatters,
shoemakers and mechanics joined; law students called rallies
and pickets in the city of Sao Paulo's working-class
districts, preventing the trams and the garbage collection
vehicles from running. Workers in Santos and Rio de Janeiro
went on strike in solidarity with the movement; there are
also reports of strikes in N~~eroi, Pet~opolis and a general
strike in Porto Alegre (Rio Grande do SuI). The President of
the Paulista co., an "old courtier of the monarchy •.• highly
esteemed in the market of the repulsive republican
 73

oligarchy" according to A Terra Livre, tries to talk with

the strikers, but the terms of conciliation he suggested
reject all their claims; engineers are sent, together with
firemen from the Navy, to operate the trains, but workers
sabotage the engines, hoses, injectors and rails; the police
?

are sent to force the workers back to work; access is not

permitted to the strikers' lawyers; the police make arrests,
beat people, obstruct. meetings, break into the newspaper and
the headquarters of the Sao Paulo Federation of Workers; at
the last rally, on May 30th, two workers are killed. In the
middle of all these events, a priest in the town of Jundiai
suggests obedience and humility; the Supreme court refuses
to grant habeas corpus in favour of the strikes; the
followers of Positivism, invoking Auguste Comte, ask for an
agreement which had moral weight •• And finally the strikers
did not obtain what
., they were fighting for, basically a
change in the company's management relations(73). Rio de
Janeiro, July__.l909_: Shoemakers make several attempts to
convince shoe manufacturers - 130 large and small factories
- to accept a single wage-scale for their work. in view of
the employers'refusal, they go on general strike by the end
of August, demanding that wage scales be controlled by their
union. Employers have the brilliant idea of. uniting in an
employers' centre in order to oppose the movement; th:-ir
. first action is to send the strikers' working tools to a
public warehouse; many of these shoemakers worked at home
and, as was well-analysed by the working-class press,
 74

"factory owners felt sure that their employees did not have
the necessary means for surviving without working". The
arbitration attempted by the Chief of Police and later by a
Masonic committee was reported, but factory owners remained
adamant in their position. The shoemakers persisted,
abandoned attempts at mediation, promoted large-scale
demonstrations of support, and ended up winning acceptance
for their wage scale in all factories(74). Rio de Janeiro.
April 1906: a report in the Novo Rumo newspaper on four
larqe textile factories shows the way labour relations are
handled there. A 12-years old girl .is sexually abused by the
foremen when trying to find out something about her jOb; the
foreman mere1y receives a reprimand from management. A
worker who refused to pay a fine was dismissed along with
his whole family who also worked in the factory; the same
types of abuses occur at Carioca and Corcovado factories, on
account of the most varied forms of insubordination:
refusing to play in the factory band, refusing to re-do
tasks which the workers considered adequately done already;
..
in short, any lack of discipline and the whole family is
dismissed from work. If there was any defect in the fabric,
the worker will be forced to buy the entire roll at an
exorbitant price. At the Andarai factory there are no wage
~c~les, the work is paid after the completion of the job and
at prices set by the bosses(75). Ri~_deJaneiro, December
1906: hatters from the Meyer factory go on strike; the owner
closes down the factory for two months, no more, no less.
 75

Coachmen, trolley drivers and "related categories" go on

strike for better wages and working hours, demanding a wage
scale based on their differentiated loads: only 4 companies
accepted. The strike fails due to police action (76). Rio
Grande do SuI, October 1906: Simultaneous strikes by
..
bricklayers, workers in shoe factories and weavers for an 8-
hour working day; employers grant only 9 hours for day work;
at first workers refuse, but 'in the end they have no
alternative. Recife, November 1906: strike on the docks.
Firstly, for better wages; their claim accepted, dockers
return to work. Later on, the employers fail to honour the
aqreernent; a new strike follows. "Krumiros" arrive frc:n
other parts of the state, and are persuaded by strikers to
go back. Solidarity from trolley drivers, railwaymen of the
Great western Co., workers in refineries and soap factories,
bakers, stonemasons,
., besides all the longshoremen and other
dock workers. The police put an end to the movement(77).
In 1907, the first big strike for the 8-hour workday
occurred. It was suggested by the First Workers'Congress and
precipitated by a public demonstration headed by the Sao
Paulo Workers' Federation (FOSP). What is particularly
important about the growing wave of strikes that year and
its likely coordination bythe FOSP (in Sao Paulo) is that
each of these strikes had its ow~.·specific characteristics,
in keeping with demands stemming from the daily work
experience of those involved. In each of these strikes, a
"small" event acts as the last drop which causes an overflow
 76

of a number of other lesser demands, which in turn are part

of allthe lesser submissiveness that the workers have to put
up with daily. Sao Paulo, January 1907: two steel workers
are dismissed from Craig & Martins' shop for having
requested an unpaid half holiday. Revolting against this,
the others workers stopped working "after furnaces were
already hot" and demanded better treatment by their foremen,
plus a wage increase. They wbn two hours after the work
stoppage began(78). Nova Lima,Minas Gerais, March 1907: in
the famous Morro Velho mines, in the state of Minas Gerais,
workers demand a more humane treatment and better salaries.
Employers, Englishmen from the st.John Del Rey Mining
Company, respond by sending armed police. Miners denouce the
English system for managing the mines as one using "slave
labour", referring particularly to work at the bottom of
the mines. Employers
., called "krumiros" from Rio, advertising
high wages: on the first payday, they do not get what they
had been promised. Army cavalry is sent to control the
strike; the Chief of Police comes, makes arrests, beats the
workers, pulling off their pants 'buttons , just to see them
go back to their homes as undesirable bandits, holding their
pants up so as not to appear naked in front of
everyb~Y(79).Sao Paulo, March 1907: 45 workers of the
~oolen section in a factory belonging to Count Alvares
Penteado requested that they be given wages equivalent to
the increased price of the blankets they manufacture. The
Count calls them into his office for a talk: when they
 77

arrive, the police are also present. Sao Paulo, April 1907:
workers from the Matarazzo Mills demand a wage raise,
additional pay for the night shift, two days off per month
without any wage cut, and better treatment on the part of
their foremen. They lose because they can be easily
replaced. The FOSP appeals for a boycott of Matarazzo
products. Sao Paulo, May 1907: Avanti!, socialist newspaper,
reports on conditions in textile factories. In the threading
sector at one factory, deafening noise goes on during the 13
hours of daily work by men and boys who have to be
constantly attentive so as not to be injured by the
machines. Thick dust and small cotton fibres suspended by
the action of fans, make it difficult for workers to breath
and to see. ~so in the carding operations, the same noise
and the same dust are present throughout the 13-hour day of
the men who work there. On the threading benches, women and
I

girls stand for eleven and a half hours of their work day,
paying attention to 50 or more spindles, mending broken
threads and fixing defects in the machinery. In the ring
spindles, boys and men, working the same long hours, are
severely disciplined by foremen if they are caught
inattentive; there is also a night shift that includes child
labour. In the area where the material is prepared for the
wea~~ng op~ration, chemicals let out a bad smell. In this
closed environment where 30 people should work for eleven
and a half hours, "but frequently, a laconic note is posted,
that working time will be extended to thirteen hours,
 78

without any right to an extra bonus". People who stay out of

the room for too long are fined. Girls are in charge of the
warpers. In the large weaving room, one hundred people work,
pying attention "to the cloth, the woof, the speed of the
weaving shuttle, the warp, and finally paying attention not
..
to let the spools fallon the floor, so as not to be subject
to fines". By the end of the working day, in the summer, the
workers's sweat fuses with the stench of lubricants and
acids, and there are not enough fans. All production is
recorded, all defects are charged to the worker, even when
those are due to the looms'bad condition, to extremely bad
weaving or to badly-made warping. Only those who produce a
qreat deal may have their errors ignored, and are used as
examples to be followed by others. Trusting their eyesight,
the women manually improve the fabrics: if they let any
defect pass, they are fined. At the finishing machine, the
worker does not follow a precribed schedule; but the young
women who supervise the passing of bolts work 5 hours
without any extra bonus. Children work on the final
processing machines and in the packing sections(80).
At each new strike, during this year of 1907, details of
workers' submission within the factory, the permanent
stealing of their time, the intensive and brutal control of
their gestures are discl~sed. The tex~ile industry seems to
be the leader in this process, and an article in Avanti!
showed textile workers as the "pariahs of the proletariat",
working in difficult and unhealthy jobs, during the longest
 79

work days, subject to a "strict, slave-like discipline,

unbearable to anyone who feels a little bit of human
diqnity"(80). Pariahs, not only because their wages were the
lowest, and the fines they had to pay for defects in the
cloth itself and in threads, blankets, knitted goods, were
.
actual extortions, but also because of the exploitation of
the work of women and children. Their strikes show how all
textile workers, men and women, had to bargain for
everything: from the quality of the thread used - reflected
by the fines charged (strike l.n
•
Cia Emporio Industrial do
Norte, Bahia ) and the operation of machines (strike in the

Penteado factory, Sao Paulo) through the- insanity of the

production-rate demanded. (All strikes in the textile
industry make reference to the brutal methods employed by
supervisors and foremen). Moreover, textile workers had to
pay close attention
., to how they were being blatantly robbed
by their employers, beyond the stipulated wage amounts:
paying by the bolt and not by the meter of cloth (Companhia
Industrial da Bahia, Cia. Emporio Industrial) giving
vouchers instead of money and paying by the week instead of
by the hour. Above all, they had to bargain against
excessive working hours, subject to extensions according to
the company~s production fluctuations, rather than what had
been stipulated by contract. Metalwor~~ers, who also went on
strike this same year in Sao Paulo and later elsewhere, were
being forced to work 10 to 11 hours per day, working
overtime without extra pay, both in large and in small
 80

shops. Even more skilled personnel - such as printers,

artisan shoemakers, craftsmen, bricklayers, and painters in
construction (who owned their work tools), some carpernters,
machinists, polishers and gilders in the woodcraft industry,
goldsmiths and watchmakers - all of them knew what long
working hours and the demand for intensive productivity
meant. At the same time that the workers were being extorted
to the maximum of their work capacity, they also saw the
unemployment around them; one of the arguments they used in
their fight for 8-hour working days was that this measure
would increase job opportunities because of the need for a
larger number of people to perform the work being done by
one worker alone(82).
And what about employers? Challenged within what Azis Simao
has called "the privatism of economic management", i.e., the
unilateral statement of their .right to determine the buying
J

and selling of the labour force(83) , they responded with

surprise and bargained unevenly, based on the strict
calculation of their profit possibilities. The large iron
and steel plants won this fight in 1907, preventing their
workers from making any gains. Construction contractors
yielded totally, for lack of economic margin and because of
their almost exclusive dependence on the technical skills of
their employees. In a more uneven way, as this depe~ded on
each business, both machine and craft shoemakers, joiners,
printers, seamstresses, some hatters, and marble cutters
also succeeded in obtaining the 8-hour working-day(84).
 81

However, the men and women working in the textile industry

lost; their employers united, replaced strikers, dissolved
-
,
meetings with the help of the police and various kinds of
threats. Nevertheless, the 9 1/2-hour day was formally
accepted by employers in Sao Paulo only, to be disregarded'
soon thereafter.

By the end of the year and during 1908, employers returned

to the old work schedules and: dismissed the activists,
claiming it was not economically feasible to maintain the
work schedules and wages demanded by workers(85).
The events described during the movements of 1906 and 1907,
even if small and fragmented (86) , are an indication of
certain essential features in the forming of the Brazilian
working class. Moreover, it is important to note that these
features are basically related to daily experience in the
work place, which emerged publicly as the collective
J

movements of differentiated workers.

Two different levels should be distinguished here, even
though they were very close in this period. On the one hand,
at the level of defined political representations are the
.
anarco-syndicalists, socialists and others who led the first
fighting organizations and made explicit the similarities in
" that
working conditions. On the other hand, are movementes
include workers who differ deeply among themse:ves, whether
by their origin, the area in which they live, the companies
they work for, or the nature of the local demonstrations
they organize. Deep differences and deep similarities mark
 82

the emergence of this collective subject, the working class,

and here lies the vital significance o.f these first years of

,
the century. These differences and similarities were to
become deeper during the following years, and the working-
class presence vis-a-vis state intervention after 1930 can
only be understood if placed back into the history of
interwoven people and groups, whose ways of being part of
the working-class condition dld not necessarily converge,
but who had in common the attempt to open their own space _
beyond the limits imposed by an authoritarian and closed
society. The space for their rights,for their identity,
thei~ political space, would be kept in these heterogeneous
forms as a class space.

III - The sources of working-class heterogeneity

J

It is obvious that this heterogeneity stemmed from different

work processes involved in a form of industrial production
in which the technical division of labour seems to link, in
an uneven manner, all the qualification and skill levels.
Many of the workers who were organizing at that time and who
took part in the strikes reported, as one can see, could be
referred to as "artisans", both in the sense of their
knowledge about their own craft and because of the fact that
they owned their work tools: here included are artisan
shoemakers, bdcklayers and painters in the building trades,
 83

g.oldsmiths and watchmakers, and some tailors., skilled

joiners and cabinet makers, and those producing leather
goods and musical instruments. There is also evidence that
they thought of their work as an art, for the name of their
unions and centres frequently included that term:"Uniao dos
Artistas Operarios de Campos", "Centro Artistico Cearense",
"Liga dos Artistas Alfaiates", "Uniao dos Corrieiros e Artes
Correlatas" , "Liga dos Artist'as Graficos", "Uniao dos
Artistas Sapateiros"{S7). I believe, however, that it is
difficult to understand them as artisans. Shoemakers, for
instance, could be better considered as home workers,
.
unquestionably owners of their work in~truments and
knowledgeable about the process, but without the autonomy
they would need to select and determine their products,
i.e., they were already directly and formally submitted to
capital. Moreover, many of them were already working for .
"' .
shoe factories, some of which were quite large in terms of
capital, production value and personnel, such as Clark Ltda
(Sao Paulo, Irish capital, with 200 million 'reis' of
produced value and 300 workers), Lameirao Marciano (Rio,with
the same produced value and lSO workers), Elias Farhat
(SaoPaulo, 1,000,000 reis and 450 workers), Carvalho
Andrade (Rio, idem, 350 workers) (SS). These, of course,
operate alongside =ountless shoe-making shops, based on
. craft work, and many of which undoubtely counted on home
labour, all of which were already subordinated to, and
dependent on capital from an industrial standpoint. Another
 84

important example is the printers, who were less-artisans

than highly skilled workers in this industry, as a result of
the tednological basis, unique to this type of production.
By that time, new equipment was being introduced in some
printing shops in Sao Paulo and their owners took the
opportunity to start employing children (as "apprentices")
and to change certJan composition and pagination procedures,
thus concentrating the work of the compositors and lowering
their wages - and even though the division of printing work
was reproducing the hierarchical productive organization of
the skills involved in the trade, certainly there was
nothing that allowed printers to organize their work for
themselves. What actually existed were differently
categorized labour processes, that relied on significant
previous experience, and as such, provided its holders some
bargaining power(89).
., Actually,
. all factories at the time
must have included different types of workers, as a result
of labour process fragmentation, according to the
technological basis of each specific industrial sector, and
all of them were already subordinated to the capitalist use
of the available labour force. What is striking about this
industrialization process (still more impressive when one
considers that it continued for many years) is the use of
the wide~t variety of qualifications and skills, ar~iculated

in all types of industrial activities and in different sized

factories, even within the same productive sector. In
addition to the regional differences and isolation
 85

throughout the country, this heterogeneity of work processes

points immediately to the dissimilarities in the
proletarianization experiences taking place simultaneously
f
within the borders of a national society.
In 1907 there were 3,246 manufacturing firms in the country,
employing some 153,100 workers(90). Of these, only 127 had
capital amounting to 1,000 or more 'contos de reis'(91),
produced 35.7% of the total value of industrial production
and employed 56,309 workers. These were integrated
industries, producing the eierqy they consumed (hydroeletric ~
and steam-qenerate), highly capital intensive per worker
employed ~nd with a higher production value. According to
estimates by Wilson Cano, these large factories were in
textiles (the major manufactruring industries in the
country, which had reached the highest technological
complexity of the period), lime and cement, paper, matches,
J

metallurgy, oil extraction, glass and sugar mills sectors.

But these industrial sectors were not always organized in
the form of a large business alone: there were also a number
of small textile factories in the country, for instance,
that had simple equipment for preparing the raw material,
for weaving, combined with a reduced number of looms. Also
in the metallurgical sector, there were innumerable small
machine shops. Certai~.l_y, most of the so-QIlled manufacturing
"companies" in 1907 would not even deserve consideration as
such: these were actually workshops, inserted into the
division of industrial labour, even though they were
 86

operating with a sort of handicraft labour (in the same

sense as discussed above). Judging from information
collected from the period(92) , they sUpplied the needs of
the small towns in which they were located; they were often
installed in the backyard of their owners' homes, and
operated as family business - i.e., working with family
members and only hiring a very small number of outside
employees. According to Cano,:business of this type
accounted for the majority of those in the areas of sawmills
and wood furniture manufacturing, mechanical repair shops,
brickyards, leather goods (except shoes), clothing and
knitwear, cookery, grain mills (except wheat), soft drinks
and alcoholic beverages, cosmetics, soaps and clandles,
pharmaceuticals and chemicals. Scarcely concentrated, then,
these small business prevailed in regions where landholding
was divided into small and medium properties (as in the
country's extreme South) even though they could be found all
over the country wherever they could feel sure of local
market, in view of the scarcity of transportation. Or their
feasibility was assured as they complemented the locally
prevailing agricultural activities - namely, repair shops
for tools and equipment used in sugar mills, metal
instruments for rubber extraction, sacks for use by rural
local producers. Cano ~lso shows th~~ whenever these small
companies divided their market share with medium and large-
sized companies in the same big cities, they did so in a
particular way, producing different kinds of the same
 87

products: for instance, in the shoe industry, there were

factories that made only slippers and wooden clogs; or
factories producing only men's shoes, others just women's
shoes; the same with hats. Among metalwork manufacturers,
there were different kinds of establishments such as boiler
factories, foundries, blacksmith shops, repair shops,
machine building shops. In the textile field production was
subdivided into spinning operations on the one hand, and
weaving on the other; jute bags, wool mills, knitwear, silk
mills and even cotton products were subdivided by factories:
canvas, dungaree, cheesecloth exclusevely, in each
installation.
Many of these characteristics were also present in what Cano
classified as an "intermediate group": factories
characterized by low technological flexibility, low energy
consumption or a reduced level of mechanization. These
conditions prevailed in shoe production, tanneries, hat
manufacturing, dried meat, cigarettes, transportation
equipment, ironsmith shops, and in the capital goods
industry. In the state of Sao Paulo, among 326 companies
included in the 1907 census, 226 had fewer than 50
workers(93). Adding regional variations to the size
differentiations, one can note the highly uneven
distribution of industrial production in the cou!'tr.f.
Actually, the industrialization process(94)during the whole
period before 1930 was effectively felt only in large
 88

companies, especially those belonging to the textile sector,

found mainly in Sao Paulo and in Rio.

They concentrated the labour force, equipment, and capital;

after 1907, it was in these regions that a significant
labour market was generated, reaching the highest production
levels in the country - especially the State of Sao Paulo,
which, between 1907 and 1919 increased its share in the
whole of Brazilian industry from 15.9% to 31.5%, with a
higher concentration still during the 1920s. Rio retained
20.8% of that same production in 1919, despite some set-
backs, though in 1907 in had been responsible for 30.2% of
industrial production. Rio Grande do SuI and Pernambuco,
which in 1907 held a significant share of industrial
production, gradually reduced their performance(95).
Nevertheless, these regions did not cease being important,
esecially as they continue to have large integrated and
highly productive plants which, in spite of losing in
productivity to Sao Paulo, and to a lesser degree to Rio,_
were able to maintain their regional significance.
Within this unequal industrial world, where large companies
coexisted with the widest variety of manufacturing plants, a
large number of which were isolated regionaD¥ - not to
mention that factories were installed in a country whose
economy was primarily oriented to export-agriculture - how
could one expect labour relations not to be heterogeneous in
all those different factories, mines, docks, railways, and
construction firms? The degree of uneven development of the
 89

technical division of labour must have had a significant

impact on the internal relations in the workplace and on the
creation of immediate solidarities, antagonisms and
identifications. Certainly the social distance between
employer and employees was less in the small companies, as
Boris Fausto indicates, and possibly provided more job
satisfaction, depending upon the production sector
involved(96). However, the small or medium-sized businesses
did not always maintain milder "management" relations; there
is evidence showeing the opposite for the small blacksmith
shops, the small and medium-sized textile-mills,
construction contractors, the few middle-sized glassworks,
the small and medium-sized printing shops, bakeries and
confectioners, and even for specialized and craft sections
of many trades, such as upholsterers (furniture) and
seamstresses (clothing), both working either in workshops or
at home. From 1907 to the 1914 depression - a period of
continuous industrial growth - there were persistent and
specific daily struggles in every region of the country(97).
They involved particularly the medium and small companies,
although the most important struggles (as well as the
workers' greatest organizational capacity) were to be found
primarily in the large integrated entreprises and factories
(mainly in the textile sec~Jr) and in the larger cities and
regional capitals, among dock and railway workers.
The actual split separating ski]ed workers from the others -
determined by the technical division of labour in the
 90

factories - began to become evident in the 1907-1914 period.

The former are workers whose knowledge about the machines
and processes used made them so indispensable in key jobs of
the production process that factory operation (and
consequentely employers) seem to have depended on their
work. Thus, they were to a certain extent "priviledged" by a
paternalistic factory management policy. Such skilled
workers had access to the workers' housing built by some
factories, to social and medical care if there was any, as
well as receiving higher wages than other workers.It seems
that once politicized, these were the workers who would
take the movement forward, not only inside their factories
but also outside, to other companies, through their
organizations and professional unions; they would be
associated in these efforts with self-employed or task-
workers who were also specialized and, as such, more secure
in the labour market(9a). In certain sectors such as
construction, their employers (contractors) depended almost
entirely on their skills because of existing level of
technology; this explains why their demands were accepted so
quickly (they were the first to obtains the a-hour day as
consequence of their strikes in 1907). Nevertheless, they
were forced to go on fighting tenaciously in order to
maintain this achievement: there were strikes, every year,
by bricklayers, carpenters, granite and marble cutters for
the a-hours working day to be respected. Skilled workers
were also found in printing shops; the mechanics, tool-
 91

makers, molders and casters in the metalworking shops(large,

medium and small); glass-blowers in glassworks; weavers and
"production controllers in textile mills: supervisori-
personnel and foremen in mines: finishing personnel in the
furniture industry. Above all, workers who were familiar
with machine .maintenance and adaptation to production
requirements seem to have been essential for all industries;
employers' ignorance was such: that they had to trust the
routine learning of these workers, who after a few years
wG~ld have a perfect knowledge of how their work instruments

',operated. stein notes , for instance, that businessmen in

the textile industry, "had little knowledge and even less
interest about cloth manufacturinq", to such an extent that
one of them, in an attempt to improve the quality of the
thread produced in his factory, "found out that his Enqlish
machines had been., designed for workinq with lonq-fiber
cotton, the most appropriate for producinq high-quality
yarn"(99).
In contrast, all Brazilian factories employed the so-called
"non-specialized" workers - in reality, those workers who
had shown themselves to be multi-skilled since they could
adapt themselves perfectly to different jobs and sustain the
;

required productivity- Intensive explaoitation of women and

~hildr~n in the textile industry is the best example of the
multi-skilled character of their labour force - as this is
an industry which could have productive workers at a very
low cost, by the simultaneous use of gender and age stigma
 92

combined with more intensive labour, during long, closely-

supervised work-hours. In 1912, researchers from the state
Department of Labour in Sao Paulo visited textiles factories
(29 in Sao Paulo, one in Santos and another in ~ao
Bernardo), and found 11,642 people employed in them, of whom
,.
6,801 were women: of these, 1,885 were under age 16 and 127
under 12 (100). In 1917, the entrepreneur Jorge Street (then
President of the Brazilian In~ustrial Centre and owner of a
cotton textile factory in Sao Paulo) stated that he
employed 300 children between the ages of 10 and 13, of both
sexes, workinq in his factories 10 hours per day; he also
employed 1,100 younq women between 10 and 16, who "wl)uld
compete favourably with many of the men". He also admitted
that "around 50% of factory workers in Brazil were under 18
years of age", and that if any leqal regulations for shorter
workinq-hours were enacted (reduction to 8 hours, then an
open discussion which had been raised by the giant strike of
1917) "the disruption of factory work would be fatal and
have extremely serious consequences"(101). In 1919,
Brazilian textile mills employed 51% women workers in their
labour force; clothinq and cosmetic industries 40%; chemical
plants 31% and the food industry 28% (102).
Besides the technical division of industrial labour which
made the working class so hete~~q~neous (divisions of sex
and age being articulated in order to assure their
profitability) Brazilian factories were also differentiated
according to the regions in which they were located. There
 93

is, for instance, a clear distintion between the men and

women workers in textile factories spread throughout the
states of Minas Gerais or Santa Catarina, as compared to
large factories such as Paulista (state of Pernambuco) or
Rio Tinto (state of Paraiba), and to workers of all large
and concentrated textile factories in Rio de Janeiro or many
of the medium sized-factories in Sao Paulo. I am not
referring here only to ethnic~or cultural differences or to
the different experiences discussed above, but also to
differences in everyday labour relations, even between
labour processes that can be quite similar. There remains
another basic issue of differentiation: the question of
discipline in the workplace: that is, the control measures
adopted by different factories to ensure the required
productivity.
Differences in discipline depended in large part on the
degree of urbanization, which means in this case the
universalization of wage labour ready to be mobilized for
factory work. On the one hand, in small towns, former
peasants experience a continuity in their personal
relationships through the way their work in the factory is
managed, for their boss is still the same "coronel" - the
. local plantation owner, belonging to a socially and
politically powerful family, who ~n~ the factory as a
"fief", as the working-class press denounced so often. His
employees are submitted to his personal rule, helped by
their family-based recruitment for factory work.
 94

Furthermore, family control is guaranteed via a concrete

bribe, represented by company housing, as well as by the
--
supp~y system especially for the labour force. This kind of

discipline, or "bourgeois submission" as Leite Lopes called

it, immobilizes workers by manipulating their reproduction
needs. Nevertheless, this dos not mean that these factories
did not have a kind of specific factory discipline, i.e.,
directly referring to the labour process and mainly
concentrated in the hands of foremen and supervisors, who
were turned into quasi-policemen, maintaining surveillance
and ~ontrolling gestures and the time spent within the
factory. In this respect, workers in factories in remote
Brazilian regions must have undergone the same experiences
as their coUnterparts working in the large cities, judging
from the countless small strikes recorded allover the
country each year •
.I

On the other hand, workers in large cities were to accept

the condittons for factory work through the imposition of
this sort of extremely harsh discipline, without having
anything specified in their contracts regarding working-
hours and productivity required. Astonishing incidents are
reported throughout these years by the working-class
newspapers: aggressive foremen and arbitrary bosses;
d~scipline based on threats and repression; pr~du~tivity

obtained through coercion; quality and production reached on

the basis of fines and penalties; wage manipulation via
payment by the piece (let alone delays of payment and frauds
 95

by employers); workers kept from leaving the factory by

threatening them with unemployment (this included the
families, a mechanism also -used in large cities) (103) ; and,
finally, the use and abuse of the police to prevent any
protests.

During the pre-war years, the country's exchange rate and

means of payment were stabilizing, the capacity to import
increasing, profits had been high (even reaching 25% per
year in some textile companies), significant growth was
taking place in the physical volume of production and in the
employment rate(104). There was als'O an increase in the
number of hours worked, apparently throughout all sector~ of
production(105). There were strikes protesting and fighting
against the long working hours, together with complaints
about payment practices and discipline in factories, in
various production sections (106). Each one of these uneven
stoppages and strikes, from Pernambuco to Rio Grande do SuI,
shows a type of labour relations where everyday repression
is carried to minute detail, supported by a kind of
differentiated exploitation which - combined in the
technical forms of labour process organization - tends
literally to plunder workers, on behalf of the viability of
the industrial enterprise. Examples of this are the large
textile factories, which employed th-;: J..atest equipment
recently imported from England (1913-1914), but whose
production process included management procedures that made
workers feel "the same slaves as ever"(107). Neither the
 96

crisis nor the slowdown affecting industry in 1914 and 1915

had any impact upon this form of factory operation - on the
contrary, it was made even worse, through the ability of
employers to manipulate unemployment, the high cost of
living and credit retraction in order to gain the
..
Government's support; as a result, industral production
grew, new companies were opened (5,936) and factory jobs
increased significantly between 1915 and 1919, on the same
operational basis (108).
The experience of proletarianization of these men, women and
children , with quite different backgrounds, under such
diverse conditions of exploitation, affected by the
different technological and regional forms which the labour
process assumed, subjected to the factories' use of gender,
age, colour, ethnic stigmas to worsen their exploitation, in
a society in which acceptance of private authority appeared
as normal and obvious, which combined family and factory
control in order to obtain the "rationalization" of
industrial production, which 'bribed' and penalized workers
in order to keep them on their jobs while manipulating the
hunger and misery of others - all this would hardly generate
a social class that would "deserve being referred to as
such", i.e., including all the theoterical requirements we
expect to find so as to be able to recognize the emergence
of a class within the scenario of a society. Even working-
class militants deplored the existence of "a class which so
absurdly welcomed different people ... ranging from Japanese
 97

to coloured , from an unprepared peasant extemporaneously

turned into a bricklayer or anything else ••• to the average
worker who is forced to accept a manual job ••• a clear
definition of class is lacking • Active and clever people
choose to work in one of the many self-employed
..
jobs ••• "(109).Nevertheless, within a society such as this
one, unequal in every way, the working-class was actually
formed. ..

The class was formed exactly within the workplace, on the

qrounds of a shared recognition of concrete experiences of
proletarianization. Based on the factory relations they have
lived through, workers created their associations, leagues
and later on their resistance unions, as they were called in
the terminology of the period. From these experiences,
workers structured their demands, some of which were
successful and not., only in the factory where some working-
class people fought and negotiated the dismissal of a boss,
the loosening of a certain di~ciplinary rule, the extension
of the lunch break, shifts, the right of women workers to be
treated with dignity. Beyond the factory walls,the issues of
working-hours amd wages became general demands referring
directly to the miserable conditions of their social
reproduction. The not always successful "small battles",
certair:y more frequent because of extremely violent
repression, do not invalidate the significance of this
battleground in the historical development of class
conflicts. These conflicts (whether raised or not by
 98

anarchists} turned into a political practice which attempted

to express the day-to-day existence of a class, at the same

,
that they clarified to working-class people the meaning of
common exeriences and mutual recognition; that is, "small"
and daily conflicts posed the interpretation o'f their own
domination.

All this may be small, fragmented, irregular, but it is

certainly not banal. And it is not banal in at least two
significant ways. First, while one can see a class being
formed from such "small conflicts", these shared experiences
were the basis of a common and collective time for
interpreting a common condition: a time in which workers
could see themselves as subjects of a specific domination as
they opposed other social classes - in their discrete,
diverging, parallel and even converging class struggles.
Secondly, the very heterogeneity of these working-class
.I

worlds (made up of different class conflicts) was ultimately

to create a multiple working class, nevertheless expressing
itself and becoming visible in this way. This would become
evident through the mobilization which occurred between 1917
and 1919, when - on the same thematic and organizational
bases - the movements succeed in spreading. In doing so,
they laid down the grounds for a political dialogue among
work~rs, employers and the state.
 99

IV. The emergence of the class (1917-1929)

Another critical historical moment were the years between

1917 and 1929. They were preceded by a setback for the
movements, which began in 1914, because of the (economic)
crisis and its effects on workers' jobs and wages
(llO).Nevertheless, in 1917 a period of mobilization and
collective struggle began, with an obvious impact on society
as a whole; and it is exactly for that reason that it stands
out as the first moment of popular urban and political
struqqle, with a working-class basis.
The July, 1917, general strike in Sao P.aulo exploded with
violence and intransigence around the right to survival,
which the authoritarian and closed powers of the First
Republic were no longer able to maintain in entirely the
same form. The strike
., started in a textile factory
(Cotonificio Crespi) around the eternal features of
industrial management,as manifested in the daily oppression
exerted on workers: fines, disciplinary measures, working-
hours, the condition of women and child workers, unpaid
overtime (111). Soon, the 2,000 workers in this factory
began to be joined by others from smaller textile plants,
and later on from other industries; public demonstrations
and rallies followed in protest against arrests of strikers;
the movement was based mainly in the industra1 and workers '
residential districts of Bras and Mooca, but groups were
formed throughout the city and gained increasing sympathy.
 100

In a demonstration, the police opened fire and charged on

lhorseback against the crowd: a young anarchist shoemaker
was killed. His funeral, as Boris Fausto stressed, took
place in the midst of intense and violent emotional
communication, where the 10,000 people who followed the
coffin became the symbol of a revolt that stopped the whole
city beyond the 15,000 employees from 35 companies who were
already on strike. On the fol~owing days, trams stopped
running as did trains; grocers and bakeries were looted;
vehicles were stopped and destroyed on the streets, some
daring actions were attempted, as for instance, the assault
on police stations, shooting in the streets, and small
fights between entrenched groups of policemen and ordinary
people. With an increase in mobilization and consequent
police and military repression, a Proletarian Defense
Committee was formed, whose members were the major anarcho-
J

syndicalist leaders; on the other side, the larger textile

manufacturers began to unite. The fight for better working
conditions was expanded by incorporating other issues as
well, such as the cost of living, the rising cost of food
and rents, the poor quality of food: these were demands that
involved the whole popUlation. An agreement was finally
signed, together with promises of a wage raise (20%), rights
of free aSi~ciation and surveillance over the quality of of
food supplies. Employers negotiated individually, the
Government (both the Mayor and the police) offered broad
 101

guarantees. The strike declined toward the end of the month,

and workers gradually returned to work in the factories.
The impact of the Sao Paulo movement was immediate. In
August, in Rio de Janeiro, workers went on strike in a
union-directed movement which was preceded by campaigns and
rallies against the high costs of living. In November,
repression increased in both cities, together with the
closing of working-class associations, the banning of street
demonstrations, as well as arrests and deportations of
anarchist leaders (112). A wave of nationalism seems to have
been generated when Brazil entered World War ~ in October,
and the police took advantage of that for further repression
of the movement. Even part of public opinion (represented by
intellectuals and better-informed members of the middle
class) changed their attitude of sympathy regarding working-
class movements - J as Fausto put it, this happened-because
"the as yet unorganized mass threatens to go beyond the
limits and turn into a social class"(113). Allover the
country, during the second half of 1917, frequently violent
demonstrations occurred, involving people on the streets and
workers; such incidents were reported in the press as "true
insurrections". Also, local and isolated one-day strikes
broke out, certainly badly organized and badly conducted.
Rallies, attacks on trams and power-stations took place in
Curitiba; railway workers in Minas Gerais, Parana and Bahia
stopped trains from running; the strikes reached even
Joinville (Santa Catarina). In Porto Alegre, a Civil Defense
 102

League was organized, articulating the complaints of the

working-class with those relative to the cost of living; the
strikers literally took over the city, were people could
,
only move about if they had a special permit (August 1917).
stronger still was the railway workers' movement in Santa
...
Maria, state of Rio Grande do Sul, against the English
railway company which operated in that area; strikers,
resentful of arrogant treatment by the company, destroyed
materials, blew up a bridge, tried to invade the local hotel
to kill the manager; finally, they closed the town, not
allowing any representative of the company to ,enter. In
Re~;fe, strikes were also widespread, reaching neighbouring
states such as Alagoas, Paraiba and Rio Grande do Norte
through the railwaymen. In each of these events, employers
beqan to create local associations to cope with the
situation, strongly
., supported by the Government's
repression(ll4).
In 1918 and 1919, new protests broke out. In 1918 - in the
second half of a year with many factories on strike against
the endless exploitation by employers - a stoppage organized
.
by the textile workers' union of Rio de Janeiro was intended
to be the basis for a revolutionary (anarchist) uprising.
The attempt did not succeed, but the strike went on. Twenty
thousand Rio workers resisted strong repression, brought O~

by their supposed early connections with the insurrectionary

movement; even so, and against the union's resolution to end
the strike, workers went on with it, using factory
 103

committees as their base(115).

. In 1919 , a May 1st rally in
Sao Paulo had brought ten thousand people together in a
climactic event; a general strike followed, similar in all
respects to the 1917 movement, and reinforcing the rank and
file committes created at local and trade union levels to
support the conflict. In Rio, a rally reportedly brought
60,000 people to a public square. In Pernambuco and Bahia
there were general strikes; mQvements occurred once again in
Porto Alegre, Santos, Minas Gerais (the reilwaymen),
CUritiba, Belem do Para. The 1918/1919 total figures for the
two largest cities were: 109 strikes in Sao Paulo, 32
elsewhere in the state of Sao Paulo l 63 in Rio de Janeiro.
There is no systematic record of regional numbers for this
same period(116).
The years from 1917 to 1919 are thus marked by generalized
working-class protest, whereby the struggle for better
living and working conditions is an attempt to create a new
political attitude in Brazilian society toward the workers'
presence and participation. Boris Fausto shows quite
appropriately that, during those years, relations among
different classes underwent a "change in degree" and that
the outcome of mobilization in the same period was to have a
critical weight "on parametres defining those class
relations in later periods". Fausto, like all other
historians of the period, makes reference to the consequence
of the 1917-1919 events on the organization and dynamics of
the working-class movement felt during the 1920s. As is
 104

often noted, these consequences point to the inability of

the anarchists to organize the working class politically _
whether as a matter of ideological principal (by rejecting
state power) or by refusing to allow a political party to be
created from the factory and trade union conflicts the
anarchists led.

While this might be a basic issue, it nevertheless seems

more interesting to consider the effects of a conjuncture
such as this beyond the classical model of evaluation (in
which the historical condition of the working class links it
.
to a political conflict which is immedia~ely maie synonymous
with organization and theory). If the working class emerged
from these events, and if such emergence bypassed the
institutional political issue (party and the state), it
centered on another, no less fundamental issue: the fight
for a political solution to the prevailing mode of
industrial capitalist development. This is a basic meaning
of the repeated working-class mobilizations because the
sense of workers'rights and place in society was born from
struggles against this mode of capital accumUlation. That is
why the politicization of working conditions and
workers'reproduction is not a narrowly economic approach to
politics, but touched upon something that was thus far
virtually unpoliticized: the frail and precariou~ basis of
Brazilian industrialization, which wholly depended upon
savage forms of exploitation of the labour force. From this
point of view, the fluctuating and "insurrectional"
 105

discourse of anarchists leaders •~s less ~mportant

. than their
actual point of departure in organizing workers: this was,
de facto, based on and maintained within the world of
working-class experience.
,
Conflict by conflict, the labour movement had shown on what
basis industrial capitalism was being established: on the
extensive exploitation of surplus work (long working-hours);
in the intensive utilization of labour capacity (no breaks
during the day); in unorganized collective work, which makes
production strictly dependent upon discipline imposed on
workers (aggressive foremen, arbitrary management,
production obtained on the basis of threats and repression);
in the poor quality of raw materials, which made production
depend exclusively on the workers' ability, as with the lack
of knowledge of the equipment (hence payment by production
obtained and not .,by work-time); in the all-purp~se use of
the so-called "unskilled" labourer, for that reason the
worst paid and utilized whenever possible (intensive
exploitation of women and children and the stigmas falling
upon them, as well as on blacks and older people); in the
degree of- 'the bosses' dependence on working-class knowledge
of the labour process, thus negotiating their permanence
and their work performance (with housing, medical care,
bett~r pay as compared to others); and, most of all, a kind
of exploitation which counts on a large industrial reserve
army (easier dismissals, labour turnover). Actually, in
practice, working-class mobilizations openly protested
 106

against the "slave-based" organization of capital and the

lack of political intelligence of employers, pressuring them

towards reorganizing the production process by raising the

opposite image of colle.ctive and cooperatively self-managed
production. Here politics no doubt was a power relationship
between workers and employers and this was not just a short-
sighted view of a movement seeking only to remain at the
"economic level" of the labour question; given the
conditions of Brazilian industrial capitalism, this had de
facto a clear social and political meaning.
After 1917-1919, it seems to have remained clear that the
battle being fought· was directly caused by the rights
conceived in the workplace itself; workers were interested
in participating in the determination of their working
schedule and in receiving remuneration compatible wi~ the
energy they spent, and with their skills and their dignity.
I •

Perhaps that is why anarchism won such acceptance in this

class, even if its discourse poin~ed towards another
direction. Its forms of organization originated in the
substantive content of conflicts, thus accepting differences
in the experience of factory oppression; moreover, after
mass mobilizations supplied the basis for the similarities
existing among differentiated workers·, it was possible to
consider the possib~lities of communication among them
through rank and file committes, commissions and councils
formed by and for the conflicts. It is precisely there,
however, that the anarchists' weakness lies: the
 107

articulation of the movements was too loose to give

continuity to those different rank and file councils and
committees beyond the impassioned moment of struggle, no
matter what the mechanism utilized for that purpose was
(articulated trade-unions, CGT). Much more than the
political shape of organization, the real issue of the
movement was the kind of recognition that Brazilian society
(employers, state, public opinion) could give to a working-
class political movement which dared to question the
workplace and to project workers's rights from their own
workinq conditions.
Beyond ideology, the critical consequence of mobilizations
durinq the period 1917-1919 was a change in the field of
political contacts established among workers, employers and
the state. The latter two were in fact called upon by the
~abour movement to take up their roles and positions on a
more universal basis of conflict and legitimacy, in spite of
their resistance to this. They were called to the same
extent that workers, with irregular, specific and persistent
strikes, were beqinninq to make visible the possibility of
the labour market and labour relations inside the factories
beinq shared by trade unions. In this sense, the conflicts
between 1917 and 1919 represented a means of self-awareness
by employers, who were forced t~ face their opponents and to
explain their own version of economic power to society. In
that same sense, Congress and Government started to think
about establishing a form of conciliation, based on the
 108

actual threat of the trade-union presence in the labour

market. The issue in question would henceforth be the
possibility of capital accepting (collective) work contracts
as a dimension of workers's political affirmation in
society. The change promised as a result of these conflicts
was not small: at issue was the recognition o.f the trade
union's representative power in negotiating and controlling
labour relations, something uhheard of previously.
Some of the strikes in this period illustrate the change. In
Rio de Janeiro, strikes on the docks took place one after
the other, intermittently during these three years. Workers
were under the leadership of the "Uniao de Resistencia dos
Trabalhadores em Trapiches" (Union of Pier and Warehouse
Workers), which apparently had incereasinq control of
services on the docks and of the mobilization of workers.
Their complaints were the same as usual: wages and working
conditions, time schedule, weekly day-off, strict
discipline, work overload and the situation of child
workers. Their form of struggle however, prevented strike-
breakers from working and impeded the hiring of extra
personnel, so as to immobilize employers in one of their
classical means of weakening strike movements. According to
Castro Gomes (117), it is at this moment that employers
united in discussing these and other striyes in which trade-
unions controlled labour (shoemakers in Rio, textile workers
in Sao Paulo and Rio). Employers prepared themselves for
battle, much the same way as workers did: by organizing
 '0'1- 110

their opinion, this was a social issue and not just a

working-class one, because it envolved overall tensions
within a society which was facing poverty as a consequence
of a government policy which favoured "artificial"industries
and speculative trade. In this sense, some deputies
"
suggested state intervention in negotiations between factory
owners and their labour force, through labour laws and
specific entities for their implementation. These latter
would be conciliation and arbitration boards, and a special
department for guaranteeing the enforcement of laws was to
be voted by the Congress.
Even though the action-of the above mentioned deputies was
in favour of the working class and they were adressing a
state which ignored workers' minimum rights, their bills
were far from the trade-unions' objectives of controlling
and directly supervising labour relations. The deputies'
J

proposals were also far from the goals of the employers, who
aimed to keep intact their authority in the factories and
their "contractual" freedom. The bills submitted by the
deputies brought a third force into the battle between
capital and labour, and not one with mere power of
arbitration: the state would ensure and regulate the right
to unionize and, in this way, guarantee orderly and peaceful
negotiations. with that, they thought, the whole of
Brazilian society would be organized so as to proceed toward

a modern economy (121).

 111

In 1917, the Senate resumed the debate on a bill dealing

with work accidents submitted in 1915, which would establish
employers' liability regarding compensation; in this same
year, other bills discussed the a-hour working-day, the
conditions of women and child workers, the opening of
nurseries in factories with more than 10 women workers, the
regulation of the condition of apprentices, the creation of
conciliation and arbitration comissions for dealing with
disputes between employers and workers, with representatives
from both qroups(122). In 1918, the Congress approved the
creation of a National Department of Labour, and created a
Social Legislation Committee in the Chamber of Deputies. In
1919, the Labour Accidents law was voted and approved, the
only concrete result of this whole activity(123 ). Even with
such poor results - to which were added in the following
years the defeats of the labour movement - the relations
among labour, social rights and society had been established
as a political battleground.
The 1920s represented at the same time the solution and the
crisis of the working-class issue at the level of
articulation between factory and society. On the one hand,
the defeat of organized leadership came through intensive
repression against the. whole movement; the days of fear had
~Ol1e, an now government tried to isolate popular and
workers' movements from public opinion, and also to break
them up from inside. Trade unions and associations were
closed, militants arrested and sent to inhospitable regions
 112

of the country, workers'leaders of foreign origin were

deported. In 1922, the lieutenants' rebellion led to a state
of siege decree, which lasted until 1926. On the other
,hand, .
~t became clear that this was no longer the same
society nor the same disorganized-workingclass. The 1920s
..
slowly saw changes in capital's self-awareness, already
recognizing workers (and their movement) as opponents who
could put in check its domination, and who raised, at least
obliquely, the demands for their own sphere of power.
The organizational weakness of the labour movement itself
became obvious to the movement's remaining leaders, who had
survived the intensive repression. They came close to .
defining a more centralized form of struggle, which would
leave unchanged the advantages of articulating autonomous
factory and trade-union battles. In an extremely short
period of time, those who founded the "Communist Anarchist
Party of Brazil", in 1919, tackled only the weakest aspect
of the movement - the coordination of conflicts - without,
however, touching the autonomy of the different factory
conflicts, as always occurred within the movement(124). In
any case, strikes did not cease in the factories, even
though they had decreased in intensity and impact; in a
"chain of movements and violence " , as Edgar Rodrigues puts
it, there was picketing, rioting, 3zrests, union closures,
deportations, observation of important dates in the history
of the movement(125).
 113

The workers' rights issue linked to the issue of the

recognition of trade-union action in the labour market, were
raised once again in the midst of intense political activity
between 1922 and 1926. For instance, in their strike in Sao
Paulo, painters were fighting for their trade-union's right
to define and control levels of the wage scale (126).
Another example, also from 1923, was the shoemakers' strike
in Sao Paulo, where the trade~union kept their delegates
inside the factories to supervise the contracts and prevent
non-associates from filling vacancies; this trade-union
maintained a placement centre registering workers and
controlling their access to factories(127). This also had a
further meaning, because the period from 1923 to 1928 did
not favour industry (on account of the high exchange rates
adopted as part of a policy which overvalued coffee, making
foreign products less expansive) • This policy led to a
crisis from which industry was only able to emerge through
low wage payments. These could be kept low because of
internal migration during those years - thus contributing to
an abundant supply of labour - and because of the permanent
repression directed against the labour movement. (The
country was also under a state of siege for most of the
decade). The meaning of the struggle to control the labour
market became doubly significant.
Employers, for their part, responded effectively and not
only by their support of repression. They adopted the
government's arguments for attracting public opinion into
 114

the web of anti-communist threats, by discrediting the

labour movement as being the work of foreign agitators. They
also tried to influence the Congress, which was then
discussing a bill to create Retirement and Pension Funds for
railwaymen, enacted into law in 1923 as the country's second
labour law(128). Medical assistance, retirement pay,
pensions for dependents and funeral assistence prescribed by
the 1923 law, were already traditional practices in some
railways. The law, however, brought something entirely new
with it: a proposal of a job guarantee after ten years of
work. At the time this was regarded favourably by railway
companies, because of their high degree of dependence upon
labour (129); as a law, however, the measure would have had
a great impact on workers as a whole, since it could be
extended to other professional categories as a general
benefit. (This in fact happened in 1935). As Evaristo de
Moraes Filho emphasizes, the 1923 law (extended in 1926 to
include longshoremen) contained the seed of all legislation
on job stability that was adopted after 1930(130).
In April, 1923, the National Labour Council (CNT) was
established to study the introduction of labour legislation.
According to Castro Gomes, the CNT was a victory for
employers, as it postponed the formation of an executive and
cont~~lling state body in labour relations, which had
originally been proposed in 1917 but never established. The
CNT was to be only a consultative body, which would
elaborate the draft bills to be approved, and it operated as
 115

such during the 1920s. Employers would have a great

influence in it and this was basically felt in terms ot
blocking and delaying state interference in conflicts
between capital and labour(131).Thus, as in 1917, the
,
planned Labour Code was never approved; perhaps this is why
9

only two social laws were enacted during the 1920s, in

constrast to the relative public acceptance ot legal
guarantees in labour relations.
The need for such legal guarantees to change fundamentally
the way labour relations were conducted and also to solve
the question of popular political participati~n was on the .
agenda of all social forces mobilized during the 1920s.
These issues were also part of workers' struggles, despite
their explicit ideological denial of state intervention in
labour matters. As Munakata pointed out, the working-class
struggles "were going
., beyond the limits.of individual
companies and categories. The more generic and generalized
claims became, the more they ended" up having the state as
their tarqet"(132).A State guarantee at social peace through
collective contract equality which would limit privileges
and impose social rights at the public level·.'was debated in
the newspapers, in essays by inte1lectuals,in
politicians'draft bills, in the military rebellions, and in
employers' cautious warnings •. The sit·'at:iol1 in the 1920s was
unique and ambiguous: everyone demanded a type ot broad
initiative which might involve the reorganization of
society, but the political prospects for putting this into
 116

practice were impregnated with a deeply authoritarian

formula, one of the imposition of "social democratization"
by a centralized power. This was a one-way option in the
general struggle against liberal
,
capitalism;that is way
such formally diverging projects as those of the communist,
y

fascist and military movements of that time adhere to it.

This dimension became quite clear in the course of even'ts at
the end of the decade, and not only in the conspiracies of
coups and contercoups which preceded the seizure of power by
force in 1930. A power structure which could work as an up-
to-date mediator in the conflicts between capital and labour
can be seen, for instance, in the 1929 printers' strike in
Sao Paulo. Six thousand printers organized themselves in an
exemplary fashion for 72 days to demand that the Holidays
Act be enforced. (It had been voted by Congress in December
1925, and implemented in October 1926, both workers and
employers having participated in the discussions). with this
demand, printers wanted primarily to achieve the recognition
of the union's authority for setting wage scales,
controlling the access to factory jobs and supervising the
enforcement of those laws that had already been voted
(dealing with minors, work accidents and holidays) (133).
Through the recently-created CIESP(l34), employers united,
taking a stand against the political recognition of trade
union participation in negotiations. The Uniao dos .
Trabalhadores Graficos (UTG) quite efficently coordinated
the strike, by creating not only easy mechanisms for
 117

controlling strikers and their actions, but also trying to

include it under the large banners of movements for workers'
social rights(135). The movement managed to clarify the
impotence of the Government apparatus in guaranteeing law
enforcement, and gained the support of public opinion; it
also obtained the strengthening of trade unions through
separate agreements with printing companies, taking
advantage of the differences between large and small
companies, thus being able to break employers' unity; it
effectively gained the solidarity of the whole labour
.
movement(136). In s~ary, this was one of the events in
which factories, society and politics were related to each
other in such a way that it can be taken as an example of
the kind of conflicts occurring at- that moment: it started
from working conditions and from there approached the issue
of the rights of the working class; it appeared organized,
.,
forcing the opponents to act collectively; it explored the
legal weakness of the government and was thus able to gain
reasonable support from public opinion. And finially, it
left the road open for solving the "social question",
keeping in mind, however, that this presupposed a
confrontation with the then current forms of management by
capital.
Revoluti'"'!lwas in the air in 1929 and 1930. In 1933,
Virginia Santa Rosa recalled the climate preceding October,
1930, as one of "general malaise. Everybody shouted,
everybody complained. An unknown and oppressive atmosphere
 118

hung over tbe population. The lack of interest in political

issues, the grumbling against public figures, the spirit of
systematic opposition, the rejection of measures taken by
,
the government were the revealing indicators of a deep and
indelible divergence between our government and the
•
population in the most significant urban centres"(137).
Evaristo de Moraes Filho refers to the "great generalized
weariness" and to "deep disgust within the nation"(138). The
press used metaphors such as that of the volcano about to
exlode without the "sordid mentality" of "professional
politicians" ever noticing. During the weeks precedinq
presidential elections in 1930,' the party platform of the
opposition Liberal Alliance included, in its own terms, all
the debates which had occurred since 1917. These terms were
to be acclaimed throughout Vargas' 15 long years of
government. Such terms were then, as they continue to be,
the recognition of rights to social and political
participation only as an administrative and legal problem.
Thus formulated, the social question under state aegis
incorporates working-class demands, while eliminating any
connotation of conquest and struggle; it incorporates the
employers' demands for limiting workers' actions, but takes
away their private power to discipline the labour force; and
it incorporates parliamentary debate but C~CS not allow the
existence of representative politics.
Thus, the new state, taking over the relation the labour
movement had created among factory, social rights and
 119

society, would eliminate the demands for power existing

within it. The memory however, would be kept alive as the
factory constantly replenished it. This would be the
working-class history of industrial capitalism in Brazilian
society

NOTES
1. Fausto, Boris, Trabalho Urbano e Conflito Social, Sao
Paulo, 1976, chaps. VI an VII~
2.There was no census in 1930.
3.Figures taken from Paulo Singer, Forca de Traba1ho e
emprego no Brasil. 1920-1969.Sao Paulo, 1971.Singer's
calculations are very different from those found in most
other work, where the industrial workers employed in factory
work in 1920 are estimated to have totalled 275,512 people.
Singer's criteria would seem, however, to be more,
appropriate since they include factory workers, artisans,
workers in repair shops, mines, building, gas and
electricity utilities, etc. This broadens the
conceptualization of class to include the heterogeneity of
its members and the simultaneity of their experiences as
they moved about from one occupation to another. This
heterogeneity is one of the most important points conc~rning
the makeup of th~Brazilian working class and will be
discussed further below.
4. Villela, Anibal and Suzigan, Wilson, Po1itica do Governo
e Crescimento aa Economia Brasiieira, 1889-1945.Rio de
Janeiro, 1973.
5. Quoted by Foot Hardman, Francisco and Leonardi, Victor,
Historia da Industria e do Trabalho no Brasil, Sao
Paulo,1982, p. 185.
6. Villela and Suzigan, op.cit.,p.268
7. Hall, Michael, ·The origins of maSs immigration in Brazil «

1871-1914. Columbia University, Ph.D. thesis, 1969, chap. V

8. Hall, idem.
9. Hall, idem.
10. Martins, Jose de Souza, A Imigracao e a crise do Brasil
agrario. Sao Paulo, 1973.
 120

11. Ville~a and Suzi~an, op.cit., p.272; Rodrigues, Leoncio

M., Confllto Industrlal e Sindicalismo no Brasil, Sao Paulo,
1966; Simao, Aziz, Sindicato e Estado Sao Paulo, 1966, pp.
31-32. '
12. Simao, Aziz, idem.

13. Dias, Everardo, Historia das Lutas Sociais no Brasil.

sao Paulo, 1962, pp 40-41 •
...
14. ,Quoted in Ma:am, Sh71d~m, Anarchistas. imigrantes e 0
mOVlmento operarlO brasllelro. Sao Paulo, 1979, p.3
lS.Piccarolo, Antonio, "II so~ialismo in Brasile". Quoted in
Everardo Dias, op.cit.,p. 18 '
16. Dias, Ev., idem, p. 19.
17. Idem, p. 50.
18. Maram, S., op.cit.,p. 33.
19. Foot Hardman and Leonardi, op.cit.,p. 186
20. Martins, Jose de s.op.cit., p. 63-79.
21. Martins, idem; Foot Hardman and Leonardi, op.cit., p.
185
22. Dias, Eduardo, Um Imigrante e a Revolucao: memorias de
um militante operario (1934-1951). Sao Paulo, 1983, p. 18
J

23. Martins, op.cit., p.76

24. According to Martins, the main flow of emigrants from
Italy to Brazil came from the Veneto, a very backward
agricultural region characterized by vestiges of feudalism.
Hardman and Leonardi refer to the 1azzaroni from the south
of Italy, in the years preceding the great influx of
immigrants to Brazil, marginalized by unemployment and poor
harvests, and forced to become virtual tramps through the
countryside.
25. Balhana, Altiva; Pinheiro-Machado, Brasil; Westphallen,
Cecilia, "Alguns aspectos relativos ao estudo da imiqrayao e
colonizayao" in .Colonizacao e Migrac;ao. APUH, IV Simposio
Nacional, 19€~. Immigratiorr ~~ soathern Brazil took the form
of settlement colonies of smallholders, although these
received little encouragement and in fact considerable
hindrance from the landowners, who were more interested in
subjecting the immigrants families to wage labour. For Sao
Paulo state, see Martins, op.cit, 1973.
 121

26. Edmundo, Luiz, 0 Rio de Janeiro do Meu T~mpo. Rio de

Janeiro, 1967, 2nd ed., chapt III.
27. Hall, Michael, op.cit, 1969
28. Balhana et alii, op.cit.

29. Werner, Helena Pignatari, "0 artesanato no municipio de

os~sco": An~is do I~I Simposio dos Professores
Unlversltarlos de Hlstoria. Franca, 1966, pp.268-270.
30. Dea~, Warren, "A industrializac;:ao durante a republica
Velh~" ~n Fausto (e~.) Historia Geral da Civilizacao
Brasl1elra - 0 Brasl1 Republi,cano III. Vol. I, pp. 255-256.'
31. Diegues Jr., Manuel, Imigrac;ao', Urbanizac;ao e
industrializac;ao. Rio de Janeiro, 1964.
32. Dias, Everardo, op.cit., p. 40
33. idem, p. 47
34. Maram, op.cit.,p. 57-58
35. Martins, op.cit.
36. Dias, Eduardo, op.cit, p.77
37. Foot Hardman, Francisco, Nem Patria Nem Patrao: Vida
Operaria e CUltura Anarguista no Brasil. Sao Paulo, 1983.
38. According to karam, "the immigrant communities were
divided among themselves. The regional division which
afflicted Italy extended to Italian workers in Sao
Paulo •.• still more important were the ethnic tensions
between foreign groups, mainly Italian and Portuguese ••. "
Maram, op.cit , p. 31; see also Michael M. Hall, II On
Widening the Scope of Latin American Working-Class History:
Some General Considerations and a Brazilian Case Satudy",
stencilled paper, p.4 ff.
39. Dias, Everardo, op.cit., p. 48; Dias, Eduardo, op.cit.
p.45
40. The local urban worker inherits the image from the
"caboclo", the rural workers who lived isolated and disperse
throughout the country. During slavery, tl.~se ~ere poor
workers with some property who did not have a defined place
in the social scale of that period, but who had a
significant role in the process of occupation of the
Brazilian territory. See Balhana et alii, op.cit; Franco,
Maria Silvia Carvalho, Homens Livres na Sociedade
Escravocrata, Sao Paulo, IEB, 1968.
 122

~l. Acc~rding ~o ~tein, Stanley, Origens e evolucao da

~nd~str~a text~l no Brasil. 1850-1950, Rio de Janeiro, 1979.
Ste~n shows that "regarding the unfavourable comments (about
local workers) the basic error was the absence of a broad
industrial movement, involving especially the creation of an
engineering industry ••• and also in the absence of trade
schools and of manuals translated into Portuguese, which has
prevented the development of competent specialized workers
in significant numbers". stein also quotes the opinion of an
English superintendent of a textile factory, around 1890,
according to whom some of the "half-breeds" became good·
foremen and could learn quickly; they would not go much
further ahead for lack of training in machine calculation,
as there was not anything published in Portuguese on
practical factory work. The English superintendents did not
teach them anything more than necessary "for fear of being
replaced by native, less expansive labour". Idem, p. 73.
42. Quoted by Ianni, otavio, "0 progresso economico e 0
trabalhador livre", in Sergio Buarque de Hollanda (ed.)
Historia Geral da civilizacao Brasileira. a Brasil
Monarguico II, 3rd. vol, p. 314.
43. For instance, an article from A Terra Livre, June 1st
1907, entitled "Do Escravocrata ao Patrao". Reprinted in
Pinheiro, Paulo Sergio and Michael Hall, A Classe Operaria
no Brasil: 1888-1930 (documents). Sao Paulo, 2 vols., 1981,
p. 169-171.
44. Luta Pro1etaria, 1908. Reprinted in Pinheiro and Hall,
1981.
45. Maram, Sheldom, op.cit, p. 31. Dias, Everardo, op.cit,
p.209.
46. Fernandes Florestan, A Integrayao do Negro a sociedade
de Classes. B~lletin no. 301, Sociologia I, Universidade de
Sao Paulo, 1964, p. 56.
47. Idem, p. 17
48. Fernandes, p.66-67. The expressions between comas are
taken from statements collected by Florestan Ferna~des,
common expressions of the prejudice toward Blacks ~n
Brazilian society.
49. Fernandes, op.cit, p. 125
50. idem, p. 121
51. For the state of Santa catarina, see seyferth, Gira1da,
A Co1oniza y ao A1ema no Vale do Itajai, Porto A1eg:e,
monumento, 1974; Piazza, Walter, "Mig~a96:s e mc;>v~met;tos
migratorios em Sta.Catarina" in Co1onlzacao e Mlgracao,
 123

op.cit.; ~inger, Paul, Desenvolvimento Economico e evolucao

urban~, :ao Paulo, 1969. For R~o Grande do SuI, see Singer,
op. c1t., Roche, Jean, A Colon1zacao Alema e 0 Rio Grande do
SuI, ,Sao Paulo, 1967; Limeira Tejo, Estatistica Industrial
do R~o Grande do SuI, n.d.
52. Singer, idem, p.4; Tejo, idem, p. 3.
53. Ibidem.

54. Andrade, Manuel Correia de, A Terra e 0 Homem do

Nordeste, Sao , Paulo, 1~63; Singer, op.cit., chapt IV;
Fonseca, Cel~a A., "S~stema Economico-Social e Migrac;ao" in
Colonizacao e Migracao, 1967.,
55. See novels by Jose Lins do Rego.
56. Fonseca, op.cit., p. 314
57. In Minas Gerais, there were a large number of small
textile factories whose market was purely local; the only
exception was Juiz de Fora, a town which already in the
first decade of this century had_ a well diversified industry
(producing hosiery, shoes, wood and furniture, candles and
soaps, carts and wagons). These factories in Juiz de Fora
were installed by German immigrants during the nineteenth
century. In the Rio das Velhas Valley, textile production
benefitted from the proximity of raw material (cotton) and
of rural labour which was turned into factory labour. The
mining activities developed in Nova Lima and Lafaiete (gold
and manganese), which also grew into important production
centres. In the post-World War I period, the steel industry
bacame important in the region around the iron ore deposits
of the central part of the state - Itabira Iron are Co.,
Belgo-Mineira, Usina Esperanc;a. In the state of Santa
Catarina, what explains the autonomy of the producing
centres is the local economic integration, putting relations
of exchange into- monetary terms, even for the immigrant
peasants, and letting the small properties exist at the same
time as the large ones. In all cases, workers were directly
recruited from the countryside.
58. Cf. Leite Lopes, Jose Sergio, "Fabrica e vila operaria:
Considerac;oes sobre uma forma de servidao burguesa" in Leite
Lopes et alii, Mudanca Social no Nordeste, Rio de Janeiro,
1979; Alvim, Maria RIJsilene B., "Notas sobre a familia num
grupo de operario~ texteis", idem.
59. stein, S, op. cit., chapter III
60. idem, chapt. V. What was most surprising for,th 7 .
businessmen was that workers were apparently sat1sf1ed w1th
a wage sufficient enough to provide for thei~ ba~i~ needs,
and did not have any ambition to improve the1r l1v1ng
 124

conditi~ns. This i~ a constant complaint and a permanent

accusat~on by the ~ndustrialists whose factories were
located in ~e Brazilian hinterland; but it also served as
the foundat~on for the urban image of the Brazilian worker
at least until the 1930s. '

61. According to an American observer, fo'r instance, who

wrote around 1925, "it is easy to live in Brazil maybe too
easy " , repea t·~ng an argument which appears even in
, Everardo
Dias: "Brazil used to be the land of bountifulness, of
~undance, where no ~ne wOU~d starve: it was enough to go
~nto the woods and f~nd fru~t, game and fish at one's will".
Dias, OPe cit., p. 41. The American also regrets that "a
large portion of the energy shown by immigrants right after
their arrival is lost later on, especially if they settle
down in the warmer regions of the country". See James Rowan,
"Trade union movement and Wages in Brazil", reprinted in
Pinheiro and Hall, op.cit., pp. 280-281.
62. Boletim do Departamento Estadual do Trabalho, "Condiyoes
de Trabalho na Industria Textil do Estado de Sao Paulo". Sao
Paulo, 1912.
63. Plataforma de governo apresentada pelo Dr. Artur
Bernardes, 9 de junho de 1921. Reprinted in Pinheiro and
Hall, op.cit, p. 299.
64. Centro das Industrias de Fiayao e Tecelagem do Estado de
Sao Paulo. Relatorio 1926-1927, p. 5.
65. villela and Suzigan, Ope cit, p. 289.
"
66. Idem, p. 276-286.
67. Dean, Warren, op.cit, p. 277.
68. Cano, Wilson, Raizes da Concentracao Industrial em Sao
Paulo. Sao Paulo, 1977. According to Cano, there was at that
time a direct determination of industrial wages by the wages
paid to coffee plantat~on wo:-k7 rs: "At th7 beg~nning of the
railroad expansion, th~s act~v~ty was pay~~g h~gh wages.
When the expansion rate dropped, and espec~ally when a
labour market started to exist, the wages of railroad
workers tended to shrink, getting closer to rural and
factory wages"
69. Cf. Cano, idem; stein, Ope cit.; Dean, Ope cit~ Even
though the exact rates are controversial, the authors agree
that this was an excellent period for incr 7 asing both .
production and the productive <:=apa<:=ity of ~ndustry. Th~s
applies escecially to the text~le ~ndustry, as spools,
looms installed power and the number of workers d~ubled; as
stein'stated those were the "golden years" for th~s
industry, with extremely high profits rates.
 125

70. Edg~r Rodrigues, Socialismo e Sindicalismo no Brasil.Rio

de ~ane1ro, ~969, pp. 115-130, where the theses debated
dur1ng the F1rst Workers's Congress ara reprinted.
,.
71. A Terra Livre, Sao Paulo, Mrch 24th 1906. Reprinted in
Carone, 1979, pp. 51-53.

72. ¥anife~to dos.Trabalhadores Graficos, April, 5th 1906.

<
Repr1nted 1n Rodr1gues, Edgar, op.cit, pp. 76-78.
•

73. Cf. E~gar Rodrigues, op.cit, pp. 85-93; there is also a

reproduct10n of documents about the strike on pp. 93-106.
Also Edgar Carone, OPe cit., pp. 220-221; Foot Hardman and
Leonardi, OPe cit., pp. 339-3~0. The quotation from A Terra
Livre is in Carone, idem, pp. 92-95. The President of the
Paulista Railway Co. was Count Antonio Prado, a large
plantation owner and pro-slavery businessmen durinq the
Empire, who also owned a bottle and qlass factory, a tannery
and a meat packing plant. As a Minister of the Second
Empire, he had had an important role in promoting
immiqration and the developed of railroads. For the
Positivist Church and Apostolate, see Teixeira Mendes
speeches and articles. He was one of the great positivists
republican theorists.
74. Edgar Rodrigues, Ope cit., pp. 80-82.
75. Novo Rumo, issue n. 7, April 5th 1906. Reprinted in
Pinheiro and Hall, op.cit, pp. 43-46.
, J

76. Edgar Rodr1gues, idem, p. 82 and 84; Carone, Edgar,

idem, p. 222.
77. Carone, idem, p. 222
78. A Terra Livre, February 5th 1907. Reprinted in Edgar
Rodrigues, idem, p. 110.
79. The description is from Luz Social and from a manifesto
distributed by the "Junta Operaria Auxiliadora de Vila Nova
Lima" , Minas Gerais. Quoted by Edgar Rodrigues,. .op. cit. ,
p. Ill. The English Company, st. John del Rey M1n1ng Co.,
exploited gold mining in Morro Velho f~om 1834 .to 196~ • For
a ceentury, while operated ,by Eng11sh cap1t~1, 1t was
considered the deepest mine 1n the world. Unt1l 1988, it
oparated with slave labour, which seems to have adapted to
the production processes required. Three large collaJ?ses
inside the caves up to 1886 had been the cause for cr1 7es
and technological innovations and also for workers be1~g
buried alive. The company enjoyed fiscal privileges, and 1n
the twentieth century hired foreign immigrants (Spanish and
English, but local workers were still the majority.
 126

Information from Ione Grossi, A Extracao do Homem: As Minas

de Morro Velho, Rio de Janeiro, 1981
80. "Attraverso uno stabilimento di tessitura", Avanti! May
25th and 28th 1907. Reprinted in Pinheiro and Hall op ~it
pp.162 to 168. Articles signed by ¥Um Rebelde Expl~rad~" (A;"
Exploited Rebel).
81. "Lo sciopero nella fabbrica Penteado". Avanti!
April,8th 1907. Reprinted in Pinheiro and Hall, op:cit.,
p.47.
82. According to Silvia Magnani, " A Classe Operaria Vai a
Luta: A Greve de 1907 em Sao Paulo". Cara a Cara, n. 1, May
1978. ~

83. Aziz Simao, Sindicato e Estado, Sao Paulo, p.63.

84. Edgar Rodrigues, op.cit., and Magnani, op.cit_ ••
85. Edgard Rodrigues, op.cit., p.132.
86. The importance given here to the movements of this
period is less political than an example of the character of
the emerging forms of labour relations and collective
mobilization. The features then characterizing the working-
class (and which would be reproduced for a long time
thereafter) are exemplified point by point in the movements
of those years.
87. According to Edgard Rodrigues, op.cit., Partial list of
working-class organizations which took part in the 1906
Workers' Congress.
88. According to Warren Dean, 1975, who mentions the 100
largest companies of that time.
89. According to document reprinted by Edgar Carone,
Movimento Operario no Brasil 1877-1944, Sao Paulo, 1979,
pp.85 to 91.
90. Wilson Cano, op.cit., p. 299. Information on size and
concentration of industrial concerns which follow are from
this book.
91. One "conto de reis" was equivalent to 1.000 reis.
92. For example, Antonio Francisco Bandeira Jr., A Industria
no Estado de Sao Paulo, Sao Paulo, 1901. Also Bo1etim do
Departamento Estadual do Trabalho, Sao Paulo, 1912
93. Cano, op.cit., p.310 (table 62).
 127

94. The term "industrialization process" is taken here in

its broad sense; if taken strictly , the expression would
not appl~ to those years ( nor even to the 1930s and 1940s).
only dur~n~ the 1950s did Brazil start poducing capital
goods, lay~ng a sound foundation for industrial production.
95. Data from Cano, op.cit •• According to Cano the reazons
which explain industrial concentration in Sao Paulo, a
relative decline in Rio de Janeiro and the subordination of
important industrial region as Minas Gerais, Rio Grande do
SuI and Pernambuco were the economic importance of coffee,
to which are added the effects of immigration, that finally
created a large labour and food market; the integrated
growth, along with coffee production, of transportation,
trading, finance and industry" activi ties; conversely, other
regions declined industrial activity for not having changed
the structure of land ownership, for not making their
previous production more dynamic and for not promoting real
chanqes based on the industrial experience they had
initiated. Hence Sao Paulo finally gained the market at the
national level, curtailinq the possibilities of expansion in
other reqions. . .
96. Boris Fausto, op.cit., p. 106-107
97 For descriptions of strikes and workinq-class movements
in those years, see Edgar Carone, op.cit.; Edqar Rodrigues,
Trabalho e Conflito 1906-1937, Rio de Janeiro,1975.
98. Accordinq to Everardo Dias, op.cit., on "ideologically
emancipated individuals" from the workinq.-glass; these were
also immigrants usually. Edgar Rodrigues also refers to the
role of skilled workers in building class associations.
Rodrigues, op.cit ••
. .
99. Stanley stein, op.cit., p. 126.
100. Boletim do Departamento Estadual do Trabalho, op.cit ..
101. "Jomal do Comercio", September loth 1917. Reprinted in
Pinheiro and Hall, op.cit., pp. 176-186.
102. Maria Valeria Pena, Mulheres e Trabalhadoras: PresenQa
Feminina na Constituiyao do sistema Fabril, Rio de Janeiro,
1981.
·
103. According to Jorge Street's t7st~mony:. " Th ese g~r
. 1 s,are
part of countless fami~y groups wh~ch work ~n the fact~r7~s
belonging to the company I run in Sao Paulo. These fam~l~es
have 4.5 or more members each, father, mothe~, one, two an~
sometimes three girls, or o~e or tw~ male ~h~ldre? ... (the~
are) protected aginst any k~nd of m~7behav~or ... •
Reprinted in Pinheiro and Hall, Op.Clt ..
 128

104. According to ~tanley stein, op.cit., p.110 and 238,

n~te 11. In 1913, .Ju~t before the War, over 13 thousand
k~logrammes o~ Sp~nn~ng and weaving machines were imported
plus accessor~es, looms and printing machines. '
105. According to Stein, op.cit., chap. 8 (Os Anos
Dourados). Also Cano, op.cit, pp. 153 to 174.
106. For an extensive list of strikes during this period,
see Edgar Rodrigues, Ope cit., 1975.
107. A Plateia, 1915.
108. stein, op.cit., ibidem.
109 Giovanni Scala, "Organizzazione operaia e confusionismo
di classe" in Avanti!, Nov.28th 1914. Reprint in Pinheiro
and Hall, « op.cit., pp.224-226.
110. According to Boris Fausto, Trabalho Urbanbo e Conflito
Social, Sao Paulo, 1976. Fausto reports wage cuts between 15
and 20% by the end of 1913, the suspension of public works
projects, the "temporary closure of factories in Sao Paulo
and in Rio; people dismissed from factories and public
services in both cities; widespread hunger and misery.
Ill. The report of events is base on Fausto, op.cit.
112. The Aliens' Deportation law, passed in 1907 (following
the movement that occurred that year) was frequently used in
1917. Anarquist leaders and "suspect" workers were deported,
mostly through procedures of dubious legality. Many of them
had come to Brazil as childres and some were not even
foreigners.
113. Boris Fausto, op.cit ••
114. According to Moniz Bandeira, Clovis Mello and
A.T.Andrade, 0 Ano Vermelho, Rio, 1967; Boris Fausto,
op.cit.; Edgar Rodrigues, op.cit.; on the employers'
response, Angela Maria Castro Gomes, Burquesia e Trabalho.
Politica e Legislacao Social no Brasil 1917-1939, Rio de
Janeiro, 1979, chap. 4 •
115. Fausto, op.cit., and Rodrigues, op.cit ••
116. Idem, Ibidem.
117. Angela Maria de Castro Gomes, op.cit .. In this
excellent work Castro Gomes show employers' associations
were founded a~d revitalized during this period. The "Centro
Industrial do Brasil"(CIB) was reactivated in 19~7 and.
became the most representative entity formed by lndustrlal
employers. The CIFTA (the Ceentro das Industrias de Fi a 9 ao e
 129

Tecelagem de Algodao) was founded in 1919. The Sao Paulo

Trade Association was active in 1917 also representing
industry. CIFGRS (Rio Grande do SuI) 'was founded in 1920 as
well as the Trade Associations of Parana, Minas Gerais, '
Peernambuco and Bahia. These associations henceforth at the
national level, maintaining contact among themselves for the
exc~ange,of.inf<?rmat~on and points of view, showing a "non-
reg~onal~st~c d~mens~on of the mode of action of industia1
and comercial employers in the country"; and this because,
according to the?author, "strike movements influenced each
other very much. Thus, if something was granted to workers
in Sao Paulo, it probably would be also claimed in Rio, and
for that reason, employers in both cities felt the need of
keeping informed, and so being able to adopt common
proceedures" (p.129).
118. Employers were directly involved in repression of
workers, having organized a special police force for the
port area. Castro Gomes, op.cit., p.136.
119. Among such measures is the idea of creatinf their
transportation company in order to put an end to the trade-
unions "monopoly" over labour, putting an end to "this
permanent offence against free labour" according to the
wording of a report by the Trade and Industry Centre. Castro
Gomes, op.cit., p. 132.
120. According to Edgar Rodrigues, op.cit., p. 189.
121. This seems to have the first formulation of a point
which would win out in the Government that took power as a
result of 1930 Revolution. It is not original, however and
had been formulated in large part by Evaristo de Morais in
1905,who, in fast was tobecome legal advisor to the future
Cabinet which would implement State intervention in labour
conflits. See Evaristo de Morais, Apontamentos do Direito
Operario, Sao Paulo, 1971.
122. All were bills submitted by Mauricio de Lacerd and not
approved.
123. This law seems to have been passed because it result in
advantages for employers. Insurance companies were formed
which workers depended on to receive benefits. Castro Gomes
shows the form of indemnities control over funds and the
setting of amounts paid as premiuns. According to casttr.o
Gomes, op.cit., p. 175.
124. As is already know, in 1920 the leaders and militants
of this attempt were informed of the political-ideological
differences between Bolshevism and Anarchism. From then on,
the split was inevitable and a new communist,party was
created, organizationally foll~wing the Rus~~an mod 7l. But
the communist-anarchist party ~s much more ~nterest~ng, in
 130

its search for a way to continue anarchist practice in' a new

form of political organization. The enthusiasm felt by
Astrogildo Pereira (Who founded the PCB in 1922 and who was
a former anarchist militant - though by then distant from
it) towards the American IWW experience is certanly
significant. For indications of the reading by Astrojildo of
this American experience, see "Nada de precipitacroes", A
Plebe, June 4,1921; "Pela reorganizacrao proletaria", A
Plebe, June 4, 1921. According to Edgar Rodrigues,
Astrojildo's proposals were not welcomed by the movement.
Rodrigues, op.cit., pp.322-323.
125. There were approximately 30 strikes between 1912 and
1926 over the same basic issu~s of working conditions, the
years 1924 and 1925 represent· the low point in terms of
movements. The labour press remained active in spite of
newspapers being closed from time to time; and it also went
on with accusations regarding woking conditions in the
factories. The major newspapers protested against the most
striking instances of workers' exploitation especially of
minors. The anarchist movement conducted some memorable
. campaigns, outstanding among them the rallies on behalf of
Sacco and Vanzetti. May Day celebrations also went on, even
though in 1924 and 1925 public demonstrations were
interrupted. On the other hand, new parties and associations
concentrating on the working class or willing to speak on
their behalf emerged, as those of Catholic or Populist
origin; regionally well-known personalities became mediators
of workers' rights before state governments, as Joaquim
Pimenta in Pernambuco and Aqripino Nazareth in Bahia.
Leftist intellectualists founded literary groups engaged
with the major national and international causes, as the
"Clarte" movement in 1922. In 1924, the first manifestations
of f~ism and anti-f~ism began to appear. In all these
movements, the working-class condition was directly or
indirectly discussed an in almost all of them, the solution
for guaranteeing people's and workers' presence in the
determination of their social rights pointed towards the
intervention by a strong state or by a central power with
enough authority for being able to give such a guarantee.
There is, finally, the foundation of the Communist Party of
Brazil in 1922, which became illegal two months later, but
already outlining its entry in the syndicalist movement to
become visible after 1925. Workers' participation in all
these movements seems to have been sporadic, except for the
military uprising of Isidoro Dias Lopes in Sao Paulo in
1924, which had also the sympathy of anarchists.
12~. According to Edgar Rodrigues, op.cit.; and Leila Blass,
Imprimindo a propria historia:o movimento dos traba1hadores
graficos no final dos anos 20, master's degree thesis,USP,
1982.
127. According to Edgar Rodrigues, op.cit., p. 185.
 131

128. This measure, suggested to its author, state

representative E10y Chaves, by the management of the
Cia.Pau1ista de Estradas de Ferro, referred to a well-
organized category of workers, who had promoted several
famous strikes since the beginning of the century. Over the
years, the struggle between the Sao Paulo railwaymen and the
management of the various companies had been quite
impressive, in a way: the company would appropriate any
initiatives taken by workers to collectively manage mutual
assistance. This had happened to the Workers' League in
1906, appropriated and changed by the company into a benefit
society run by management, which caused a large railway
strike in Sao Paulo that year,. The same thing also happened
to the railway association when creating family savings plan
to support families in case of the death of their head, to
the centre of locomotive engineers and firemen as well as to
the comsumer-coperatives and the housing plan for
railwaymen. This was also the case with the Special Pension
Fund, changed into Retirement and Pension Banks, also
profitably managed by the company.
129. Liliana R.P. segnini, Ferrovia e Ferroviarios, Sao
Paulo, 1982
130. Evaristo de Morais Filho," Prefacio" to the book by
castro Gomes, op.cit., p. 17
131. Castro Gomes, op.cit., chap. 5 •
132. Kazumi Munakata, A Legis1aQao Traba1hista no Brasil,
J

Sao Paulo, 1981, p. 28

133. This account is based on Leila Blass, op.cit. •
134. CIESP had been separated from the Trade Association and
had become a specifically industrial institution in 1928.

135. Leila Blass, op.cit. •

136. Idem.
137. Virginio Santa Rosa, a sentido do Tenentismo, Sao
Paulo, 1976, p.28
138. Evaristo de Moraes Fi1ho Ced.), a socia1ismo
Brasileiro, Brasilia, 1981, ~. 30.
 132

CHAPTER II. A RIGHT TO THE SUN: THE WORLD OF LABOUR AND THE
STRUGGLE FOR JUSTICE (1930-1934)

"In truth, it is only in the. abstract that

economic solutions can be counted on to
resolve all the problems of our society. Far
more pressing than economic reform, in fact,
is the necessity of social reform, the need
to build a more just social order. Let us
look with compassion at labour conditions in
Brazil, and we shall see that the Brazilian
working class peeds and deserves our help and
protection •.• Where are the guarantees of fair
and decent wages? Where, the sense of
security essential for the sucess of all
human endeavour? Where, the protective
regulation for the special needs of working ---
------~ -
women, children and adults? Where, the social
structure of retirement benefits, clean and
inexpensive housing, schools, and
rec::-eational facilities, to mention only a
few of the things to which everyman should
have a right, as he has a right to the sun?"
(Lindolfo Collor, First Labour Minister:
Inaugural Speech, December, 1930.)

1. Privileges and Inequality

~e platform of the Liberal' Alliance, publicly

revealed in January 1930 by the party's opposition
candidate, Getulio Vargas, promised social justice and
.
modernAtization. It was a propitious moment for talk of
change, for the atmosphere was filled with a feeling of
discontent and rebellion. In every major city in Brazil,

riots, lootings, and massive, emotionally-charged

demonstrations followed the assasination of Vargas's running

mate, Joao Pessoa. (1) The popular reaction to Pessoa' s

 133

death put revolution "in the air, or rather,in everyone's

mouths", to use the words of Elias Chaves, an eyewitness to
the events (2). But underlying what Chaves called "the
orators 'good rhetoric and healthy lungs" (3) ,was the
eloquent reality.. of popular and working-class discontent •
Violent confrontations between workers and management had
become common by the end of the 1920s, and the tone and
.
tempo of the working-class offensive intensified, so did the
speed and ruthlessness of the repression. And this was to
continue into 1930. In July of that year, for example, the
manager of the Docas Company in the port of Salvador (Bahia)
was confronted by a- furious crowd of workers who demanded·
wage increases and an end to the company's arbitrary
interference in their daily working lives. Frightened, his
clothes in tatters, the manager later told police that
"only a winged ~gel could have escaped the fury of the
crowd" (4). Three months later, on the very day the military
movement against the federal government began, the town's
police chief and mayor both discovered how little they
resembled winged angels, when they were being chased by an
infuriated mob during the worst riot the town had ever
known. According to Leoncio Basbaum, another contemporary of
the period, these were days when "the rebellious people in
":.11e streets set fire toevery thing that wasn't human and
moved" (5). The October 1930 military movement also became
very popular in Recife (Pernambuco), as workers,shop-keepers
and people on their way to work joined in,forming "popular
 134

groups" who attacked local government buildings,pillaged and

set fire to the homes of city government officials,
.
plundered newspaper offices and opened-up the prisons (6).
In Sao Paulo,work halted and, to the eyes of one young
immigrant, the m~rching workers seemed to be "partying". But
the "party" could also involve taking justice into their own
hands --as the director of Cambuci prison was to find out
when workers invaded his prison (7). Scenes of shop and
warehouse lootings, prison assaul ts , and the stoning of
government-controlled newspaper offices were also repeated
in the Northeast'and in Rio de Janeiro (8).

While many people argued that these mass'

disturbances had no direction or aim, others noted that "the
plunderinq,assaults and looting arose as a legitimate
franchise of new rights guaranteed by the triumph of the
.I

revolution"(9). Relatively common during the First Republic,

popular riots typically focused on government symbols, such
as commercial establishments, food warehouses and public
service franchises, especially transportation and

electricity companies. It is relativ~ easy to explain the

logic of these riots as struggles for social justice, for
better standards of living, if we consider the frustration
and despair of working class life during the period. The
bonds of the moral economy had been strained by the
favouritism the government showed merchants, industrialists,

an d .
f ore1gn · t eres t s
1n an d , to a lesser extent, by the

privileges on which the First Republic's political system

 135

rested. The riots were, in large part, motivated by moral

indignation against the poverty and restricted opportunity

which had resulted from the liberal economic policies of the

government. Thus, the popular sectors who joined the
revolutionary movement of 1930, joined not only out of
desperation but also because the government had excluded

them from the market, negating their rights through

.
covetous , arbitrary and, tlterefore , illegitimate powers.
Although the participation of workers in the revolutionary
struggle was limited to sporadic and emotive acts which came
on the heels of the military conspiracies (10), the fact
remains that their living conditions (and the social protest
movements these engendered) made social inequality and

privilege, crucial issues in the demands for change in the

power structure.

This was apparent even before the 1929 crisis made

the situation worse through unemployment. Between 1920 and

1928, the cost of living rose, primarily affecting the price

of basic foods.Moreover,in 1923 and 1924, the peak years of

these increases inflation and speculation caused severe

shortages in the availability of essential foodstuffs. These

cost-of-living increases and shortages greatly affected the

.j
working class in the large capital r:ities, making mere

subsistence evermore difficult. Around 1925, the average

monthly wage was 200 thousand reis in Sao Paulo and Rio de

Janeiro, while a basic list of foodstuffs for a family of

four (as defined in the working-class press) cost around 310

 136

thousand reis(ll). For the more underpaid workers -- such as

garbagemen, assistants in food, textile and steel
industries, women workers (especially seamstresses and
maids), dockworkers and unskilled printers, clerks employees
and office boys solutions to the growing problem of
survival began with living in the corticos (12). By living
in the corticos, workers escaped the perpetual housing
.
shortages and high rents ot the city, but they did not
escape the horro~ of urban life. In 1926, a boy from a
recently-arrived, immigrant working-class family described
the corticos in Sao Paulo as being "Real human hornet nests,
spread out over the T.;;b.ole of lower Mooca, Bras, Pari,
Belemzinho ••• Each door led to an immense corridor which
had ten, twenty rooms in a row, where families piled up in
filthy tenements. The size of our room was 3 by 4 meters and
in it, six people
., --my parents, my two young sisters, my
grandmother and I-- slept, ate, talked ...• did everything,
except relieve ourselves. The latrine was right at th~ end
of the corridor, shared by the eight other families who
lived there. Near it, at the end of the corridor, was the
.
kitchen where my mother cooked with three other wom'en. Each
had a coal stove in a 3 x 3 meter area. Five women shared
the kitchen next to it in the same way. So this was a
for~ress for nine families: one room each, one la~rine and

two collective kitchens (13). Some corticos were even

worse, improvised as they were from large decaying

mansions , divided and subdivided into small cubicles; in

 137

some cases, basements too were turned into dark and airless
working class living quarters.

Better-paid workers could live in small housing

complexes, built specifically for them to rent. Some
factories in th~ large cities also built worker housing
complexes to rent or let to their skilled labour. In this
way, management could better retain and discipline their
employees while, at the same time, turning a profit for the
few entrepreneurs who built them (14). As Nabil Bonduki has
explained, in Sao Paulo, popular housing was only thought of
in terms of rentals, because workers could rarely afford to
buy their own homes. This seems to have been the case in Rio
as well, although the hills surrounding the city provided
open spaces for the labouring classes to squat in favelas
as an alternative to the cortico.(15)

Corti90S could also be found in the oceanside

capital city of Recife. But here, in addition to the slums,

a distinctive form of lower-class housing sprung-up in the

tidewaters the mocambo. "At high tide l . , an observer

reported, "they were merely separate huts, isolated from one

another by the sea surrounding them from all sides .•• The

mocambos barely had any furniture --at most a table and a

bed. The rest were made from boards and old wooden boxes.

Mud and bloated children were everywhere. Boys were rickety

children of 15 years looked 12 years old. They didn't work

because there were no jobs, they didn't study because there

 138

were no schools. They talked as if they had no future, and

all they hoped for was to grow a little and get strong
--
enough to carry a 60-kilo sugar sack on their backs'so they
could become dockworkers, apprentices in the Navy, or join
the military police-force. (16).
y

Due to the over-crowded conditions, life in the

corticos, favelas and mocambos was intense and ~otic.
Countless public health and sanitation reports denounced
the slums as hubs of infectious diseases, such as
tuberculosis and small-pox,l- and they layed the biame on
•
dark, damp, badly-ventilated housing, damaged sanitary
fittings, and water supply systems which allowed water to
stagnate and thus serve as host - to various diseases. They
also denounced the dusty roads and the mud and dirt the
rainleft behind, the accumulated rubbish on the streets and,
.
f~nally, undernour~shment.
-~
But only
.
~n the rarest case was
any action taken to put an end to these hazards. Throughout
this century, descriptive accounts of these dwellings
narrate the promiscuity bred of life in tight quarters ,the
children's early awareness of the "facts of life", the
women's overwhelming work-load and their unkempt and
poverty-stricken countenance, the men's famished and drained
appearance, the children covered with sores, the young girls
turned aged by the weight of existence. They also show the

liveliness of relationships, the expressive, emotive

character of life in slums , as revealed in fights between

women, violence between couples, and th{children's playful
 139

conquest of the streets (17) · Workers' h ous~ng

. complexes
also seem to have had many of these characteristics, though

,
having a private bathroom and kitchen in each house did make
living conditions healthier --as long as they did not adopt
the common practice of sublet a part of the house to
•
another family (18).

For workers, food vas often hard to come by, and

while some observers blamed the poor nourishment of working-
class families on scarcity, others pointed to the lack of
protein in a diet of rice and beans, manioc flour and, only
rarely, a little meat (19). But quantity, rather than
quality, was the principle problem --a direct reflection
of their poverty. According to the communist deputy and
writer Paulo Cavalcanti, people living in the mocambos of
Recife considered the sporadic floods that left them
., .
homeless, a blessl.ng, because then the government had to
shelter them and "it gave them the chance to eat three times
a day, and to receive second-hand clothing as well as sacks
of beans, flour and meat(20)." Most workers in the cities
were hungry when they left their homes at dawn, and the
little tin of beans and manioc flour,carefully wrapped in

newspaper,that they carried for their lunch hardly

alleviated their hunger. Their wages also had to cover

tramway-fare, the main form of transportation in the 1920s

and 1930s. In spite of the high fares of the trams,

everyone except those living near the workplace used the

trams to get to work. Additionally, there was no room in the

 140

workers budget for certain basic public services, for the

costs of formal education (only 10% of the public schools
were in the cities),or for medical care, dentists or
medicine (21). Leisure, if any, consisted of community
street life, or of family outings to public spaces. Movies
•
seem to have been the most accessible form of commercial
entertainment (22) • Working class life in the large cities
was above all unstable, with a total lack of security on the
job, in the home, and for future improvement. In
contemporary descriptions of the period, one is struck by
sudden changes in the standard of living. of a family,
brought on by the injury or death of the head of the
family, by marriage or the dispersal of family members, or
by the illness or death of the mother. As these examples
suggest, over-work and under-nourishment brought many
families to early rui~ and turn fragile the reproductive

process of the working class.

To the other extreme, those in the dominant class,

the industrialists, bankers, high government officials,
businessmen and successful liberal professionals, lived in
extraordinary comfort and security. In sharp contrast to the
dismal poverty of the c~rticos, the elite lived in the best
parts of the cities. In Sao Paulo,their gran~ homes could be

found ,in' the higher elevations of the different

neighbourhoods, and along the refined Paulista and

··
Hl.ql.enopo 1 l.S
. avenues: In R'l.0, the wealthy lived on the

ci ty' s ocean front avenues: in Recife, in neighbourhoods

 141

separated from the downtown area by the Capiberiba River.

T~pically , their homes were many-roomed mansions, cut-off

,
from the street by high walls and large gardens. The more
sophisticated the cultural pretension of these regional
elites, the moreylibraries, bathrooms, shower-rooms, garages
and coachhouses occupied their estates. No matter their
level of sophistication, all of them had servants -- whether
they were gardeners, chauffeurs, butlers or, in some cases,
European nursemaids and private tutors for their children.
For these live-in servants, of course, the elite provided
dank basements, dark back rooms, or rustic annexes for their
t!se (23).

Manufacturing entrepreneurs were always seen as

"businessmen" --perhaps due to the way they viewed
production as to.j:ally surbordinated to profit, which they
defined in strictly commercial terms. Some of them were late
19th century immigrants, who had arrived in Brazil, with
enough resources to invest in the incipient industries.
Matarazzo is a notorious case-in-point(24). Other were
native-born members of the local or regional elites,

descendants of powerful colonial and imperial Brazilian

families. These men diversified their investments using the

capital they had accumulated from their coffee fazendas (in
the States of Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo) their sugar

mills (in the North East) or the cotton mills and cattle

ranches (in the Southern region).

 142

Whatever their origins, these large entrepreneurs

were simultaneously fazendeiros, financiers, merchants and

entrepreneurs -- refined, wealthy people who were profoundly

conscious of their position as members of a dominant and

privileged class... This was the world-view they adopted to

manage their businesses, using a rigid, prestige-based

hierarchy of abilities to discipline their employees from a
.
distance, placing themselves at the top of the social

structure as the highest authori ty • The entrepreneurs saw

the factory as their exclusive dominium. Their proprietary
vision fused the notion of an idealized bourgeois world with

remnants of the paternal culture of slave domination. The

working-class press constantly expressed its exasperation
with the entrepreneurs' "class pride" and ignorance of
modern industrial relations, an ignorance which led them to

deny their work~rs even minimal rights of decent labour

conditions. And it documents the industrial elite's mixture

of paternalism and intransigence in the face of workers

demands (25). This attitude~ unified the entrepreneurs from

North to South, despite their obvious regional differences.

Although the world of the dominant classes in the

1920s and 1930s Brazil was very distant from that of the

popular sectors, they could not quite escape the reality of

their time. Even in the cities, spatial segregation was not

SUfficient enough to turn the workers invisible, despite the

longing of the elites for a white and homogeneous population

that resembled the European more than the Bahian population.

 143

They thus blamed the ignorance, dirt and poverty of this

"weak race , " on the "horrible miscegination" which
persistently produced a more dark-complected people than

light. There was no lack of intellectuals supporting their

racist views (26) -- although, once the elite graduated
..
from the university (and perhaps with the exception of the
politicians),they probably ceased to read writers' works.

The industrialists and merchants of the era seem

to have been incapable of making a link between their rising
profits and consequent business success, and the
exploitation of their ~orkers. They were, by and large,
completely ignorant of the socialist and labour debates
being waged in Europe and, on their doorstep, by the leaders
and theorists of the Brazilian working-class. Thus, at least
until the worldwide upheaval (and the Brazilian strikes) of

1917, they attributed their success to the power positions

they had conquered in the state's decision-making spheres --
in other words, to their ability to make the alliances and
negotiations necessary for them to define the course of the
economic policies. These factors certainlY contributed to
the success of their factories, but in their excessive

dependence on state credit and protective tariffS, the

entrepreneurs turned insensitive to otherwis'1 rational

business practices. Thus, these self-described "businessmen"

seemed as disinteres~ in the nature and growth of the

internal market as they were blind to the needs and

conditions or their workers and factories labour processes.
 144

The textile industry provides a prime example of

the industrialist's dependence on the state over all other
means of improving their profits and workers productivity.
For most of the 1920s, the textile mills continued to
monopolize the internal market they had dominated since
•
World War I, producing 85% of the medium and lower quality
cloths consumed by Brazilians. Rather than establish prices
in relation to real production costs, however, they set
them on the basis of their import costs -- which were high
due to protective tariffs. But the textile manufacturers did
not worry about scaring off their buyers, for ,so long as the
coffGe economy prospered, their market among rural and urban
workers continue to grow. As a consequence, the large
textile mills realized extremely high profits during the
1920s, and thereby enhanced the attractions of the business
to anyone with .,enough capital to start their own small
factory. As one business magazine sarcastically remarked,
these novices entered the sector "with the same ease,
purpose and background they would have had if they had been
...
installing a hydroelectric plant, a transportation company,
a food warehouse or a bar" (27). Although production only
grew 8% between 1920 and 1926, its value increased 120%,

creating price speculation which inflated the value of

consumer. And when, toward the end of the decade,the
,
purchasing power of consumers could no longer meet these
price increases, the textile entrepreneurs continued to try

to maintain their high rate of return -- without ever

 145

considering a reduction in price~. To make matters worse,

retailers and wholesalers joined forces with the
manufacturers, fighting among themselves for a share of the
profits. According to stanley stein, there were "more than
six or seven middlemen" operating between the cotton
planters and the spinning and textile mills (28).

Given the blatant. disregard of mill owners for

•
consumers, it is not surprising that the public at large
turned against them, just as the politicized public opinion
had turned against the rural oligarchy's "coroneis". In the
~orking class press, to be sure, industrialists and
merchants were consistently accused of being
privileqed,insensitive and greedy. But neither did the
general press mince words, when it came discussing the new
industrial elite. Large newspapers like the Correio da
J
Manha in Rio de Janeiro or the Diarios Associados,
campaigned against the way the entrepreneurs developed their
companies, frequently using derogatory terms as "magnates",

"sharks" and "capitalist pirates"(29) certainly, as

businessmen, the Brazilian industrialists were far from

being the innovative class their counterparts in Europe
could claim to be. They were well-organized and equipped to
exploit the resources of state power, but as for things
social and technical, they lacked both interest and
knowledge. Most of the entrepreneurs had no interest or

knowledge of the production process.

 146

As stein shows for the textile industry, "Most of

the textile entrepreneurs only had eyes for the kinds of
products that had provided them with 'liberal' profits prior
to 1925 .••• The people in charge of production details were
the foremen ••• with rare exceptions, those empiricist
entrepreneurs believed that running a factory consisted of
putting the raw cotton in one end and drawing the finished
.
cloth out the other ••• " (30) •. They were not familiar with
the accounting involved in the costs , and thus limited
themselves to constricting the workers' wages as possible in
order to reduce production costs. They by-passed taxes, used
poor-quality materials and fought the few legislative
proposals introduced to limit worker exploitation. According
to Warren Dean, "Illegality seems to have been the strong
point of both workshops and factories; and while the
latter's violationJ
might have been more obvious to the
observer's eye, it was also easier for them to hire
lawyers, accountants and politicians to cover their

operations" (31). Although there were exceptions, most

industrialists had no notion of factory management or of
business administration and they kept their family members,
however incompetent, in top management positions.

Although it was the most important industry of the

era, the textile manufacturers were unable to form a

cartel association, even during periods of crisis and,

instead, remained divided on the issue until the mid-1940s.
Most of industrialists did not control their products'
 147

distribution, selling it instead to importers and

wholesalers. In order to enhance their own profits, they
speculated with market prices or took basic goods from the

internal market, and sold them at higher prices as exports,

a practice they had adopted during the war. They apparently

.
had to get frightened (as they had in 1917-1919) by working
class upheaval and vehement public criticism, before they
.
could be made to realize that there was a limit to the
tolerance of workers and consumers. Even so, they continued
to keep an almost aristocratic distance from the desire and
demands of the urban masses. The entrepreneurial elite

under-estimated the poplI-lation socially, politically,

cuI turally and ethnically, avoiding at all costs, direct
contact with the workers --even if and when they were forced
to the bargaining table.

-'
In the extremely skewed social structure of late

1920s and early 1930s Brazil, miMing social sectors also

had a role to play. Influencing events at times, at others
merely standing-by, the so-called "urban, middle classes1.

qenerally lacked a distinct political presence. As a qroup,

they were hiqhly differentiated and deeply divided in their

interests and ideology. During the First Republic, their

numbers expanded in the nations's capital as a result of

the qrowth of civil and military bureaucracies. In Sao

Paulo, they filled the entire job structure created by the

coffee business, including all of the administrative,

commercial and financial services on which the agricultural

 148

export economy depended. According to their origins,members

of the middle sectors differed as to their cultural and
ideological ties to the dominant class. Those who came from
decadent rural groups, those once proud owners of now-
impoverished soils, protected themselves from
proletarization . through public posts granted to them as a
result of their close or vague kinship with the dominant
.
oligarchy. Those ties, in turn, made them ideologically
faithful and politically subject to the oligarchy and its
values. Penniless and in social decline, they clung to
prestiqious surnames, kinship ties and compadhio (or
patronage) in order to forestall. their o~~ decadence (32).

Another middle group was made up of poor

immigrants and Brazilians who worked in the urban tertiary
sector, as low-rankinq civil servants, badly-paid commercial
.,
and office employees, bankclerks, elementary school
teachers, in short, in jobs which did not require manual
labour. What united them was precisely their horror of the
latter, which they saw as synonimous with moral degradation
and as fit only for society's lowest sectors. In the
preconceptions of a society so recently emerged from
slavery, manual labourers were branded with the stigma of
Slaves, no matter thei:r:- status as free labourers, their
race, origins and income. In this social context, it
mattered little that their wages were "slightly higher than
in the factories, because their main reward was actually
psycho-social: by accepting service sector posts, they
 149

managed to escape the stigma of manual labour and to

overcome the isolation and social marginality" (33) of the
proletariat. Thus, even though they shared
,with the
proletarians the same low wages, sub-standard housing, and
unfulfilled needs, the low-ranking civil servants, clerks,
.
and junior grade army officers nevertheless refused to
identify themselves politically with the working class .
.
Their political presence seems to have been marked more by a
diffused indignation against entrepreneurs, who they put on
the same level as the greedy speculators and bad public
administrators who were scandalously increasing their
earnings through the exchange crisis,inflationary currency-
issues and industrial protectionism (34). Hence, they emerge
more as consumers, making up a significant part of the
public which turned against the "artificial nature" of
national industries,
J
at times demanding foreign
imports,which were cheaper than national ones (35).

These sectors often made their presence strongly

felt,particularly regarding such matters as housing

availability, cost and quality, by organizing

demonstrations, pressuring members of parliament and, in

1920, even founding a Tenant and Consumers League.
Throughout the First Republic, they frequent~y participated
in lootings and demonstrations against the rising cost of
living (1904, 1912,1913, 1917, 1924, 1928) as well as
against the inadequacy inefficiency of the transportation
system (1901, 1909, 1928) (36). The military, students and
 150

low-ranking civil servants were actively present in all

these demonstrations, together with the workers and "popular
sectors". Indeed, despite their loathing for manual labour

and the proletariat, these groups could not escape the

dramatic changes of the period. Like the masses, they too

•
were affected by ongoing alteration in the urban landscape,
by the intensification of time schedules and the
.
disorienting expansion and crowding density of urban life.In
short, each day, they became more a part of the masses. Like
the heroes in Lima Barreto's novels, which narrate the big
and small tragedies of this changing urban world, they were
forced to confront tedious jobs, expensive and inefficient
trams, an invasion of roaring and threatening imported Fords
running on the streets, the rising costs of food, clothing,
shoes, furniture and household objects, the solitude of tight
spaces in remote., family boarding houses, and the clash qf
strange urban mores shaped by the cities' growth itself, In

such an environment, it took heroic efforts to maintain an

orderly and dignified moral sensibility (37).

Thus, what is important to emphasize is

the growing convergence of dissatisfaction with the social

and cultural inequalities of Brazilian society and the

rebellious acts of protest which became more fre~lent as the

decade of the 1920s was played out. In9reasingly, members of

every social class grew indignant at the monopoly of social

and political power held in the hands of the elite. This

sense of moral outrage enveloped the ranks of junior

 151

military officers, who felt humilated by the incorporation

of the army hierarchy under orders of the oligarchy's
civilian- governors. Likewise, political indignation swept
the small regional states, which felt slighted by a federal
government who mobilized all the public resources for the
benefit of the coffee sector. Social indignation also move
the workers, who confronted constricted material living
standards and hopeless future. Seen in these terms, the
widespread discontent and mobilization of the period were
not merely random acts of regionally discreet protest.
Indeed, "there was a generalized sense of inferiority and
humiliation which generated an entirely new public morality,
one which demanded more equalitarian governing principles
from the prevailing power structure. Thus, what is
significant here is that a new understanding of power was
introduced into the existing symbolic framework. As a
result, the demand for power was raised in the name of
justice which, in turn, opened the path for new ways of
formulating social and political rights against privilege.

These movements did not determine in advance the

political form that this demand would take. Some understood
their movement as demands for the full restoration of
promises inco't"porated in the 1891 constitution and over-

looked by successive , irresponsible governments. For

others, the struggle meant the establishment of a strong

central power, which would formulate and guarantee what was

or was not just. still others thought in terms of free

 152

organizational development, beyond the state's sphere (38).

In actuality, the demands and expectations of the different

, rebel groups and mobs were formed in distinct isolation from

one another. The lack of a common ground of understanding
and communication between' the rebels in itself made
undistinguishable the similarities between various
mobilizations. Had the sense of the different actions been
.
better understood by each rebel group, a more democratic and
representative government might have emerged. As it was, the
implications of the popular call for social justice, in
essence a cry for fundamental citizenship rights, went on
ignored and forgotten by those who eventually dominated the
movement. The process of generalizing the appeal for social
justice would be left to the new government which, through
its actions, was to entirely invert the latent significance
of the discovery .,of social rights •

Realizing that the debate over social rights,

collective dignity and justice had entered the social arena
is crucial for clarifying the role workers and their
struggles played in the events of the 1920s and 1930s. On
the one hand, there was no desire to participate in the
state's power structure in an organized way; as is well
known, most of the workers showed thems:lves to be

poli1;ically apathetic and uninformed about government

decision-making processes (38). This does not seem to be at
all related to their organizational abilities -- although
active union life had been sevettly damaged by repression
 153

during the 1920s. Furthermore, contrary to the then recent

communist Party theoretical debates, not wanting to take

power is not
tJft1
necessarily ,a shortcoming. Even this party
seemed un\fortable with the idea that a new political
culture was indeed being generated from small factory and

social struggles, even though it was not what they expected.

(39) •

Thus, it is as if two different histories were

being acted out in 1930. One, around the issue of taking
state power which involved lieutenants, politicians, and the
dissident factions of the oligarchy. The other, around the
issue of building a more just social order, absorbed the
attentions of small volunteer associations, trade unions,
factory struggles, tenant organizations, student entities,
black cultural associations, immigrant clubs, the incipient
.
suffragettes, the sporadic and spontaneous consumer

protests, the urban riots. The makers of this second history

.
were not inclined to fuse their aims with those of the power
structure. And their invisibility as historical agents can
be seen precisely in this very refusal to reflect on the

political forms required for the equality and dignity so

all. still, despite their invisibility in

institutional .politics, these movements undoubtedly

challenged the leg~timacy of those groups who were active

in formal politics. ~ The very words used by those who did

take control of the state power structure are proof of this

-- couched as they are in terms of the demands for justice.

 154

~he victors spoke of establishing a just government, just in

the sense that it would establish social regulations as a
means of restricting the powerful and putting an end to
their privileges. In other words,the inequality that these
popular movements exposed became, in the discourse of the
victors, a defect of the over-thrown government.A new type
of state was called for, one which would correct the
.
imbalances, reestablish social justice, stimulate the
economy, end the petty charades of the "professional
politicians", and terminate the profiteering of businessmen
and entrepreneurs (40). Thus, by removing the revolt from
the social sphere and appropriatinq its main themes; the new
government adopted a corporative version of justice, in
which all social questions fell within the sphere of the
state.

In the authoritarian imagination of the new

government, the best solutions to the climate of social
demands, gradually built over a long period of workers'
social struggle, was an administrative, juri~ical one. Thus,
in hopes of depoliticizing the demand for social justice,
the new government in its first concrete act, established a
new ministry, of Labour, Industry and Commerce. This

Ministry was to m~ke the state a required reference-point in

the class struggle, redefining its scenario, recasting its
actors and setting limits on its range of action. From 1930-
39, each new labour law played its part in modifying the

capitalist organization of the factories and redefining the

 155

daily struggles within them. From that point onwards, the

factory entered the public sphere, becoming, at one and same
time, an area of state control and the arena of a struggle
for better working and living standards. Every one of the
workers' platforms -- for better working conditions, the
right to organize, shorter working days, the guarantee of
jobs and fair wages -- were to be projected to society in a
paradigmatic way, in a gradual process of spelling out and
changing previously-held conceptions of rights. One by one,
the laws of the state formed a process where
domination, inequality and stigmas were built on new
foundations. In this setting, the central theme of the
actors in the struggle centered on the question of how their
interests would be expressed --and hence, on the issue of
social and political participation.

2. The Redeeml.ng
. -'
Power: The Ministry of Labour and
Workers'Rights

The new partner in the game, the Ministry of

Labour,Industry and Commerce (MTIC) , had an ambiguous
political face -- beginning with the way it was formed from
alliances between the victors of 1930 for the share-out of
power (41). The new Ministry was not a consensus among the
victors. And whila the concept of labour legi~.lation was,
the revolutionary's platform did not include a state
apparatus specialized in the "social question". The speed
with which the Ministry was set up (only one month after the
 156

new government took office) was apparently a result of the

need to provide political positions in the government for
those who had participated in the Revolution.

Although entirely dependent on the Frente Gaucha,

having little political influence within the government, and

with the lowest budget of all the ministries, MTIC slowly

began to impose itself on 1;he world of labour relations,
.
defining its sphere o~action and incorporating the conflict
between employers and employees under its control. In order

to succeed in this by no means easy task, the new Ministry

recruited "the technocracy of the rabour movement", as Rosa

M.B. Araujo explains (42). They included people such as

Joaquim Pimenta, Agripino Nazareth and Evaristo de Moraes
(43), who had been directly involved in the struggle for

workers' rights -- both in leading mass demonstrations and

in representing workers i~ wage negotiations. There were also

former congressmen such as Deodato Maia and Salles Filho,

who had fought for the regulation of labour "relations in

Congress since 1917. Advisory positions went to lawyers,

familiar with international labour laws. Industrial councils

and departments were run by former CNT (National Labour

Council, see chapt I) members, including Jorge Street, a

dynamic -and controversial personality in industrial circles.

Besides the entrepreneurs, congressmen ,and representatives

of the labour movement, the Ministry employed two women as

consultants for female labour issues, as well as

 157

statisticians, health and welfare personnel, journalists and

immigration specialists (44).

Thus equipped, the new Ministry made its debut ,

calling itself "the Ministry of the Revolution", a term
coined by Lindolfo Collor, first minister of labour, in his
inaugural speech. And, at least in its intentions, the
Ministry of Labour was 'J:he 1930 government's major
innovation. The rest of the administrative state apparatus
was almost entirely taken up with coping with the financial
crisis, particularly the coffee crisis resulting from the
collapse of the international market after the 1929

depression. In one specific sense, it was the Ministry of

Labour that announced to society the emergence of a
political power that aimed to centralize and administrate
its conflicts. Minister Collor and his chief aides had many
opportunities in Jwhich to elaborate the ministry's proposed
policies and priorities, and the various social groups
showed interest in hearing them. In speeches to

entrepreneurs, frequent newspapers interviews and cerimonies

.
and rallies organized by the new government (which often
attracted mass audiences), the new managers of the social
question explained their plans and ideas. For them, state
intervention was essel"tial in order to responti immediately
to the necessity of social justice and to form long-term
strategies. The Ministry personnel considered the lack of
social justice in the country to be a result of "the evils
of the disorganization of labour" caused by the absence of
 158

limits on the, ambitions of both capital and labour. Once

regulated by the state, the "relationship of conflict"
between employers and employees would become "relationships
of cooperation" and "class collaboration". For workers, state
administration W~Uld provide the guarantees of decent living
standarts (including wages, a career structure,·· social
welfare, housing, schooling, and leisure). For employers,
.
it would mean governmentincentives for healthy and non-
dependent industrialization. Moreover, the ministry's
policies would be put into action by an administrative
apparatus totally free of party politics: the state would
interact directly with capital and labour's class
associations without needing "the useless and harmful
mediators" of politics. In the logic of the ministry, the
entrepreneurial and working classes were not political
forces, but "economic factors" which were to give expression
.'
I'

to their needs through organized associations managed by

"the administrative apparatus of the state". Thus, the state
would no longer be a "police state" but a "socially

supportive State •
servl.ng the aspiration of social

justice". The government, via MTIC, would support, defend,

supply, provide, resolve, facilitate, shelter and protect.

As Collor proudly explained: "The triumphant revolution has

integrated workers' rights into Brazil's social equatl.on und

must be sorted out through this equation" (45).

Although incorporating some of the ideas already

familiar to those who had taken part in the debate on the

 159

"social question" during the 1920s, th ese speeche,s came as a

surprise to both entrepreneurs and workers, not to mention

the reactions of those seeking to consolidate their
positions of power in the new government (46). Both
capitalists and workers faced an immediate problem: the
impact of the 1929 crisis, causing bankruptcies, factory
closures, reduction of production capacity and volume -and
.
rising unemployment.' Although reliable statistics are not
available, it is estimated that there were 100,000
unemployed in Sao Paulo alone in 1930; and 2 million
unemployed throughout the country in 1931 (47)..

These very rough estimates include both urban

and rural workers, since agricultural production was also in
crisis. Rural unemployment reflected the near-paralysis of
the coffee plantatios, forbidden to plant and obliged to
reduce their act!vities to aminimum (48). Waves of hungry
and disoriented rural workers fled to the cities, where they
were lucky to find work even at the reduced wages which
...
urban workers had been obliged to accept ~n order to rema~n
. .
in employment.

The 1929 crisis belied the basic instability of

industry as a whole and the need for various types of
government support for its maintenance and expansion. This
was especially true for the textile industry, the most

important at the time, which, even before 1929, had been in

crisis -- due to the government I s exchange and monetary
 160

policies, the price of raw material, the inefficient

distribution system a nd , not least, the greed of the
entrepreneurs bent on reaping huge profits in a market
characterized by great demand but little purchasing power
(49). The prob1 7m, according to textile manufacture, was
"the gap between domestic consumption and productive
capacity" , a si tuation which they chose to term
.
"overproduction" despite the enormous slice of the Brazilian
population who barely had clothing. Nevertheless, .vast
stock piles of cloth indicated a high level of production
for the textile industry as a whole, despite the varying
technological levels and capacities of the different
factorie within the industry.

In some factories, high productivity was a result

of new machinery which had been imported during the years of
favourable exchange rates (1923-26). But in other factories
it came from what the workers called "dragging the product
out" from old, worn-out machinery and poor quality raw
material. In both cases, maintaining the various combined
types of labour power was essential in order to continue the
kind of exploitation which made these undertakings viable.
As before, the factory owners did not understand the
manufacturing process. Thprefore, in 1930, many factories
invented ways of surviving the crisis without risking the
loss of the workforce needed to their exploitive methods -
that is, to quote from Sao Paulo entrepreneur's association,
"keeping our doors open in order not to lose the skilled
 161

workforce" - which gives a measure of the importance of

these workers (50). Thus, factory owners cut the real and
nominal salaries of their workers, reduced aays of work and
fired staff considered to be non-essential. As a
consequence, the remaining workers had to look after more
9

looms per man than before. Some factories also thought to

slightly reduce their prices as much as 20% •
.•
The reaction of the workers, despite the
frightening prospect of unemployment, was to call
intermittent stoppages during the second h~if of the year.
The principal motives were the reduction of salaries and
loss of hours of work, strategies employed by the
entrepreneurs together with an increase in hours on the days
worked without any comensurate increase •
l.n wages. The
strikes were generally restricted to single factories,
.,
although in a few cases they spread to neighbouring

factories in the same district. Between August 1930 and the

beginning of 1932, workers mobilized intensely, protesting
against fewer jobs, more work and lower wages -- that is,
protesting the fact that they were the ones to pay the price
of the crisis. There were approximately 24 stoppages

registered during this period in Sao Paulo and 16 in Rio de

Janeiro, mostly sparked by the cutting of working days

combined with 15 to 20% wage cuts. There were also two big

district strikes, one in Sao Paulo and one in Rio. In

November 1930, one Sao Paulo strike, for the same motives,

spread to textile mills in other areas of the state. In

 162

1931,another major strike involving the textile-making

districts of Sao Paulo showed that the cuts in staff and

,
salaries had not reduced textile production levels because
the remaining workers were forced to work an extra loom,
overtime hours unpaid, and night shifts were added.
Furthermore, besides the skilled workers, the factories also
preferred to keep women and children on the payroll,
.
primarily because they were cheaper. At this strike, as in
others, the workers put forward suggestions for avoiding
more lay-offs: a work day composed of 6-hour with shifts;
one loom per weaver; no night work for women and children
(an old demand, which acquired a new meaning during the
crisis); the abolition of overtime; preference for male
labour in fillinq vacancies and, finally, a daily
~employment benefit to be paid by the government to those

out of work (Sl).J

The textile mill-owners do not seem to have taken

any notice of the workers' program of demands.They were too
busy turning the crisis to their own advantage. They
pressured the government for credit facilities, tariff

protection and subsidies for getting rid of their

accumulated stocks. Furthermore, Sao Paulo entrepreneurs

had been ordered to pay their workers a 5% wage increase and

guarantee a minimum of 40 hours work weekly by the State-

appointed Gavernor(interventor). The unemployment crisis

reached its peak in 1931 and workers mobilized in intense
partial and full stoppages. The main textiles factories in
 163

Rio were paralysed. In Sao Paulo,40,OOO workers -- most by

textile workers -- carried out agressive demonstrations with

A"

rallies in the streets, factory take-overs and city service

stoppages. Although the strikes focused on specific
demands, the mov 7ment was unwittingly envolved by political
regional fights (52) which made it easier for the factory
owners to justify their disregard of the workers' demands •
.•
But what was the significance of these strikes?
Were they merely a protest against the fact that the workers

were bearing the burden of the crisis? undoubtf'lY not, for,

time and again, the strikers returned to the sam$ specific
demands they had made since long before the crisis. In
thirty . years, workers had struggled against a brutal
exploitation and thus their demands continued to include
such items as the dismissal of foremen who abused their
~ .
disciplinary powers; the abolition of the factories' various

systems of fines, which lowered salaries even further; the

demanding and poorly-paid workload of women and children;

the fact that workers did not control piece work payment
levels; the length of the working day and the lack of rest
breaks, having to work standing up; the unpaid overtime; the

excessive production demands. Above all, the strikers

demanded recognition for their rank and file factory

committees, for it. was through them their list of demands

was formed. Although the early 1930 strikes had been

channeled principally by the unions -- especially Uniao dos

Operarios de Fiac.;ao e Tecelagem (UOFT -- textile workers

 164

union) in Sao Paulo textiles strikes mobilization

occurred within the very factory space itself. While the
dimensions of these strikes may seem insignificant to us
today (partial victories were obtained differentially in
each factory) it . is only through their voices that we know
the social context of industrialization and to what extent
the rights demanded by workers were compatible wi th the
.
program of their bosses - and, later, with those of the
state (53).

In setting out their "major" and "minor" demands,

both male and female workers were also articulating their
understanding of the prevailing mode of exploitation that
factory owners had reactivated to deal with the crisis: to
maximize production an yet avoid the risks of the
depression. To
do this, they relegated the risks to
.,
different spheres: to the state, on the one hand, ~n the~r
. .
demands for subsidies; to workers, on the other hand, through
outright exploitation. The State was asked to guarantee the
profitability of a growing industrialization in a domestic
market of low-income consumers, without endangering the
profits margins and the intensive and extensive exploitation
of labour. It is in this last respect that the workers'
detailed denunciation of their living and working conditions
becomes significant. Both lived and expressed as the

struggle for dignified working conditions, these

denunciations go beyond their local reference-points and

become inscribed in the daily register of this mode of
 165

accumulation. Small but numerous and insistent, these

denunciations built up everywhere a symbolic and political

resistence against this model.

-And it was at the height of this drama that the

state, through ?labour and union legislation, made its
appearance on stage. After a short period in which the MTIC
introduced itself and improv.ised a variety of short term
actions (54), it issued its first "social" labour law. The
law, taking effect in mid-December 1930, was designed to
reconcile the fight against unemployment, by enhancing the
state's control over the labour market through the so-called
"nationalization" of the labour force and the elimination of
militant union leaderships, most of which came from the
European immigrant community. Decree 19, 482, of 12-12-1930,
or the Law of Two-Thirds recommended "protecting " Brazilian
workers from "foreign competition", requiring companies to
ensure that two-thirds of their workforce were Brazilian-
born. At the same time, it restricted the immigration of
third-class passengers. Requests for immigration had to go
through the state-appointed regional governors, followed by

the Ministry itself, which judged its conditions and

convenience (55).

The Two-Thirds Law primarily served to mak__ the

lives of immigrant workers even more difficult in a already

dismal period. As Araujo points out, their fate depended on

the sector in which they worked: if the sector already had a
 166

high percentage of foreign labour, such as the hotel and

restaurant trade, its workers were forced to change their
profession. But some employers also realized that they would
not be able to substitute the largely-immigrant skilled
labour force on which they depended. Pressured by factory
owners, the government extended the law's grace period and,
in successive ammendments throughout 1931, made exceptions
.
for foreigners who were married to Brazilians, who had
Brazilian-born children or who had lived in the country for
over 10 years. These immigrants were granted the same legal
rights as Brazilian workers. Later, agricultural activities
were exempted.

The moderation of the Law did not, however,

disguise the government's two-fold purpose. In the first
place, the ministry wanted to demonstrate its power to
J • •
control the labour market and set l~m~ts on the spheres of
action of both employers and workers. Second, it waited to
create the image of the "national worker", a disciplined and
productive role model to which all workers would have to
conform in return for the State's promotion of their rights.
Thus, the labour minister gave a newspaper interview in
which he claimed that many immigrants only came to Brazil
because it was "an unpol iced coun"':ry, in many respects a
, paradise for vagabonds • • • increasing the difficulties of
life in the urban centres and infecting the Brazilian worker

with subversive ideas ... " ( 5 6). These ideas on immigrants

were not very far from those held by the industrialists:
 167

" ... the human dregs which other nations repudiate as dangers
to the future of their race and dissolvers of the social
order .•• the scum from other metropoies"are "the strategists
in the war between labour and capital" (57). Perhaps it was
not by chance that the labour minister threatened the
unemployed that if they did not submit to his policies for
rural resettlement, they would be charged with "vagrancy."
.•
In flexing its muscles, the labour ministry
clearly intended not only to restrict the labour movement
but, also, to legislate on what' went on inside the
factories. Alarmed by this., the entrepreneurs felt threatened
when they realized that Collor seriously intended to enact
the long-delayed Labour Code before the end of 1931. The
original welcome entrepreneurs had extended to the ministry
turned into fierce opposition. As many historians have
.,
noted, the opposition by Sao Paulo entrepreneurs to the
series of enacted laws was reactionary in nature and, by
modern standards, quite ridiculous.Above all, historians
have stressed the entrepreneurs "total ignorance" of the
fact that the Ministry's acts represented a safeguard for
their interests in the face of growing working-class
mobilization (58). Some of these writers, however, have
perhaps paid less attention to the arguments used by the
entrepreneurs to support their protest against the "spurious
interference" of the state in a matter which concerned them
alone. The arguments put forward in every response to the
recommended labour law centered around one fundamental
 168

point:that Brazilian industry would become unviable if the

current form of exploitation were changed, and this, they
argued, would be the inevitable result of the proposed
Labour Code. In other words, the state was now threatening
that which the labour movement itself had attacked as an
?

unviable model of industrial accumulation through more than

30 years of struggle. Most of the entrepreneurs feared --
.
and not without reason -- that the costs of compliance with
the law would be extremely high. They would have to change
the outdated and precarious machinery and equipment; they
would have to reorqanize the labour process; and they would
have to find some other way to maintain their high profits
with no access to combined forms of labour exploitation.
They feared a shorter working-day, obligatory rest breaks
during the workday, and limits on the use of female and
child labour. ~ey could not conceive of a disciplined
worker without fines, threats and repression, nor a
motivated one without obligatory high production rates. In
setting up such condi tions they had displayed their
arbitrarity and irrespons;,JJility, breaking the health of
men, women and children and thinking only of their immediate
profits. But this does not mean that they were talking hot
air: the labour laws really did threaten forms of
acc"-'lulation which could not disguise their dependence on
this mode of exploitation. Thus, attitudes which have often
been interpreted as mere narrow-mindedness, that is, as the

reactionary ignorance of employers (and the "small"

 169

struggles of the workers), in fact, revealed that what was

actually at st~a~ in the so-called social question was the
prevailing course of industrial production. What
entrepreneurs and workers said during run-of-the-mill
disputes pointed ,. to a political battlegound with profound
repercussions for society as a whole. This is why the space
of the factory, as the sphere where the social relations
.
underlying Brazilian industrialization were forged, . was
appropriated by the state and transformed into a public
sphere which was to become the paradigm of its
"modernizing", "technical" and "just" policies. The
political expression of this process --which was to emeZge
openly at the union level-- necessarily had to revolve
around a dispute for the control of the factory.

The entrepreneurs' assertions about the workers'

J
"amoral character", the "favour" the entreprenurs were doing
for them, and their "surprise" at the fact that the state
"had created the class struggle, something that we did not
have and did not even know how to pronounce in this tranquil
backwater (Brazilian society)" --to quote the general
secretary of the Sao Paulo textile producers association--
sound hollow and ridiculous. But their arguments supporting
their claims t.hat "the interference of the State will
inevitably result in the disorganization of factory work"
was, beyond doubt, a concrete and serious concern. (59) As
they saw it, entrepreneurs were the only ones who really
understood factories and therefore labour. The members of
 170

the labour ministry staff were "theoreticians and dreamers

who are on the sidelines of the world of labour" .The same

,
text sets out the situation as they saw it: "For national
workers, the main issue is wages. For entrepreneurs, the
main issue is the
. abundant supply of workers and these
workers' stability and skill ••• These are the only relevant

issues,despite what the press and impertinent theoreticians

.
who do notunderstand our factory life might say" (60).

The battle surrounding the Holidays Law clearly

the •
illustrates moment l.n which the state absorbed the
dynamics of the class struggle. •
Ever Sl.nce the law was
enacted, in 1926, it had generated heated debate and intense
mobilization by workers who demanded, above all,inspection
procedures to ensure its enforcement. In reality, many
companies deliberately refused to grant employees holiday
JI
leave as the law requested. The entrepreneurs'main arguments

against the law were that, holidays represented a loss of 5%

against production costs, and that holidays would divert
workers I attention from the factory , interrupt their

"training" and leave factories without entrepreneurs had no

enough workers to operate. "In the big factories," protested

Pupo Noqeira, spokesman for CIFTSP, "there is an enormous

mass of irreplaceable laboux:. These are men who carry out

highly specialized tasks .•. even the small and medium

factories have a certain number of indispensible workers.

What will we do when a worker, the only worker who knows how

to operate a certain machine, which is the heart of the

 171

factory, asks to go on holiday? Many, very many factories

will be paralized because of the absence of just one man!

And the absence of that man --an annual absence, a regular

absence, an absence which cannot be punished because it is

upheld by law-- ~ill mean the ruin of promissing companies,

(61) • "

Pupo Nogueira wrote. this originally in 1927 but

when he published it in 1935 he asserted, "my arguments
remain valid after eight years." During those years,
according to Castro Gomes, this law "was the only one to be
opposed frontally and fully by industrial entrepreneurs"
(62). Workers called at least 15 strikes demanding that the
Holidays Law be respected,denouncing the tricks
entrepreneurs used to bypass it and calling for effective
inspection.In March, 1931, the labour ministry suspended
.,
the Law temporarily, but required employers to pay the15

days of holidays for 1930 --which, judging by

workers 'protests , was rarely obeyed.

The labour ministry then set up a commission to

reexamine the Holidays Law, made up of 5 employers (two from

industry and two from trade) 3 workers (two factory workers

and one Merchant Marine seaman) and one member of the

ministr}. The entrepreneurs rejected the law in its entirety

and wanted to replace it with social security benefits: sick

pay, compensationfor permanent injury, assistance to the

aged and to pregnancy. Some Sao Paulo entrepreneurs also
 172

proposed a fund for the construction of low-rent workers'

housing, health cooperatives, nurseries and foodstores. In
order to shift the theme of discussion from holidays to
social securi ty , they argued that holidays had never been
part of workers' demands and that the union movement had
included them for purely political reasons. Proof of this,
they said, lay in the fact that workers preferred to take
.
their holidays in money, ratHer than in days off. This,they
continued, showed that the workers did not get tired and had
good working conditions. Once again, entrepreneurs chose to
ignore their workers' real conditions of misery and once
more, insist on reasserting their authority within the
factory (63).

These discussions dragged on for several years.

Meanwhile workers held meetings, "issued manifestos and
included holidays in their strike demands. Eventually the
entrepreneurs were defeated by the firm opposition of the
workers' representatives and by the ministry's staff. The
Holidays Law was enacted on January 18, 1934 and was
extended to bank workers and workers in trade anQ commerce.
The Law's enactment did not, however, bring an immediate
truce to the holidays battle. Repeating the same arguments,
employers managed to obtain a major concession which allowed
them to split holidays up into periods of not less than five

days. But even this did not stem their complaints, which
continued for a few more years despite the fact that
 173

splitting holidays had been decided by them alone, and not

by workers (64).

The long battle over the Holidays Law was in many

ways a paradigm of the type of negotiation possible between
entrepreneurs and workers in the immediate post-
revolucionary period period. In other words, it exemplified
how society responded to a ne~ type of domination, different
•
from the aristocratic, patrimonial state of affairs during
the earlier period. Both the dominant and the dominated
began to realize that the state bureaucracy that intervened
in their struggle was not a mere chimera, but an instrument
of contention that reduced the "excesses" of bourgeois
domination and kept workers' protest in its proper place.
The process which began to make state bureaucracy a power
independent of social struggle which would be seen
.I

clearly after 1937, with the creation of the Estado Novo --

was built on the new experience of power exercised as a

practical instrument of conflict control. The capacity of

the state to intervene in society clearly seems to have come

more from what it learnt out of trial and error in its

bargaining with capital and labour,than from previously-held

ideas. Between 1930 and 1937, the state apparatus

constituted its authority as it learnt to dislodge the ~wo

sides from their positions in the conflict, and transform

this knowledge into norms.

 174

Because the society in which this new power sought

to establish itself was fragmented and heterogeneous, the
Ministry of Labour learnt how to deal with the
f
particularities of the interests involved with each round of
negotiations that followed the issue of a new law. What is
?

notable is how widely different situations and issues

produced similar dispute proceedings over the
.
conceptualization of legal rights. The Labour Ministry would
start out with a reasonably well-defined text of its bills

-- having already incorporated all the most controversial

points. The affected entrepreneurial sector would then start
pressuring against the bill, using the same strategies it
had resorted to against the old CNT, that is, tactics to
delay the law's enactment for as long as possible (65) while
they came up with. a counter-bill. The organized labour
movement had little faith in the ministry's actions,. since
J

it had repressed the use of strikes as an instrument of

pressure. The ministry had also threatened the autonomy of
the unions, and thus unionists often did not bother to
attend the commissions set up by the ministry to debate
proposed laws. Nevertheless, the labour movement insisted on

making itself heard through outbursts of protest. Subject to

such different forms of pressure, the Labour Ministry

solved conl-roversial issues in whatever manner was most

convenient to itself, maintaining only the minimum formal

Obligation of respecting already-recognized rights. This

practice showed that the workers/disbelief in the real

 175

course of labour legislation was not unfounded. As was to be

partially proved later, the employers'pressure succeeded not
only in delaying the enactment of laws but also their
f
effective enforcement; even though a law might be issued,
its effectiveness. depended on a vigilance which the Labour
Ministry was unwilling or unable toimplement. Thus, edging
and corruption --not to mention out-right disregard of the
law-- were frequently-adopted strategies by business and
government officials alike.

3. Women and Children

Each of the laws introduced by the Ministry of

Labour was based on a specific sphere of interest and
differentially affected both labour's conditions and the
specific entrepreneurial sector involved. As described
.,
above, it was important for entrepreneurs to maintain
exclusi ve authority wi thin the factory, so as to preserve
the prevailing forms of industrial accumulation. At one
point, when they could not manage without the knowledge of
their skilled workers, they had positioned themselves
against the Holidays Law. NOW, they were to position
themselves once again -- only this time, it would be against
the threat they saw in the laws regulating -the labour
regimen of women and children. As they saw.it, they could
not do without the combined use of this so-called
"unskilled" labour force, precisely because of its versatile

jack-of-all-trades utility.
 176

The labour of women and children was used when and

where it could be, and usually in the operation of tedious
and detailed task-work which required constant attention.
Generally speaking, women workers were directly affected by
a stigma of in~eriori ty, which stemmed not only from
traditional conceptions of gender and age but, also, from
the symbolic matrix of the very notion of manual labour •
.
These stigmas encompassed· the nature of "unskilled"
productive labour and permeated the exploitation to which it
was submitted --whether in the form of low wages and routine
tasks for women (insofar as the machine world was not theirs
and they were only "passing through" to"reinforce" the
domestic income) or whether it was children's extremely low
wages, long work-days and repressive treatment (insofar as
they were there "to learn" and to become disciplined for
life and labour).J

When a bill to regulate women's labour was

introduced, the entrepreneurs turned against wi th the same
arguments they had used in the 1920s. since they no longer
had the moral ground continue the extensive and intensive
exploitation of mothers and pregnant women, they stressed
instead, the argumen:t that young female adolescents were
fully fit for factory work (66). Arguments based on the
.working 'class family's own interes~ in keeping its members
active were also used. similarly, blatant lies as to what
actually took place within the average factory using women
were told to the effect that long work-days,nightshifts and
 177

precarious health and security conditions were the exception

rather than the rule and thus , being "abuses" , were not

truly representative of the prevailing labour conditions.

still, by 1931, entrepreneurs already knew that they could
no longer count on freely using the sexual (as well as
age)division of labour, insofar as the cultural climate
tended to support materni ty and good family reproduction
.
"for the benefit of the race itself" (67).

Using a different kind of argument, the workinq-

class movement reinforced the view that the place of women
and children was indeed outside the factories. That place
was the family, from which their position was defined and on
the basis of which the demands to requlate their work were
put forth (68). This may, perhaps, be why women and minors
are always viewed as a unit, for they were seen more
J •
commonly as mothers and ch~ldren than as actual workers.
Nevertheless, the male-dominated labour movement was very
conscious of the profitable use made of the labour power of
women and children--particularly when it was pitted against~

its own interests in the most classical way possible: that

is, as a means of lowering wages and replacing workers who
were fired during crisis periods. As such, labour movement
practices were directed toward struggling persistently

against the entrepreneurs'exploitation of women and

children's labour. What is unfortunate is that the male

workers' world from which these struggles emerged, shared
the employers' assumptions. Both saw women and children's
 178

labour as complimentary, temporary and subordinated, while

also considering women's real sphere to be the home and
reproduction of family. In 1931 , th e work ers' press
denounced the entrepreneurs, stating that they "only hired
women, who do n~t belong to the profession, (even though]
there are many unemployed [male] professionals to whom the
entrepreneurs steadfastly refuse employment" (69). In 1932,
several factories came to a'· halt, in compliance with the
UOFT: the fifth of their twelve demands centered on
preferential use of male labour (70).

The discussion between entrepreneurs and the

labour movement itself seems to point to the strategic
importance of women's presence in the 1930s factories. A
high percentage of women (around 33%) had already entered
the country's overall factory labour force during- the
• J
prev10us decade. They had been forced to the market to
support the domestic income, which was constantly being
reduced by the low wage-levels. Yet, husbands insisted that
factory work should not alter the order of domestic tasks,so
that the family values centering on the woman's role as wife
and mother could remain intact (71). Thus, women's lives
were forcefully organized by double work-day. Following the
same assumption, employers utilized women's labour 'C'S much
as theycould: they paid them the lowest wages, scorned their
abilities with machines, over-burdened them with work and

refused to recognize them as skilled professionals.

 179

There is another sense in which the entrepreneurs.'

interest in women and children's labour emerges. within the
context of industrialization in thel920s and 1930s,
entrepreneurs considered their main problem to be their

available labour .. force's "lack of discipline". It is rather

shocking that what they called their workers' "amoral

character" -- which according to the former, predisposed
.
them to be "work nomads"' with "primitive moral and
intellectual faculties"-- was to become the basis for their
complaints about workers' lack of interest in their jobs, of
obedience to the forms of factory control, their excessive
absenteeism, and reluctance to accept the prevailing.
conditions of systematic labour (72). Besides the
entrepreneurs'intensive and extensive appropriation of their
workers' time,what also becomes immediately apparent is that
the very conditj,.on of factory work itself had not been

improved, in any way, by the relative technological

modernisation of some factories. Furthermore, improvisation

rather than modernisation in other factories seems to have

made conditions worse.

Thus, for many workers, poverty, physical and

verbal mistreatment, the unhealthy rhythm of a production

.
process that could not be interrupted, in short, the brutal

discipline of work life continued to be very real. How could

they help but have a "lack of interest" or give up this fate

intermittently, if they had not been moved by hunger? This

seems to be precisely where the importance of women's labour

 180

was rooted. The recruitment and training was basically a

question of obeisance and of adapting to these conditions.
In spite of the existing large army of unskilled, surplus
labour, there must have been a relative shortage of people
who could confront these conditions with a certain degree of
stability. Women fullfilled these conditions both as
unskilled and task-oriented labour at every possible step of
.
the labour process. They Held positions which required
little or no "technical" know-how, but which called for
enormous attention to detail, delicate handling and patience
to endure the never-ending monotony of the tasks.

Child labourers found themselves in almost the

same situation, and were also used intensively in the
textile industry. Insofar as they worked together with adult
labourers, minors were not spared the same harsh factory
J

conditions, and, thus, they too were subjected to the same

shifts and schedules. The intensity of the labour rhythm
demanded of them was based on often-brutal forms of school
discipline. The labour movement tenaciously raised the issue
of child labour --at first demanding the abolition of the
nightshift, the softening of the forms of discipline and
better wages, followed later by the abolition of child

labour itself.

The press published some data on child factory

labour in the first and second decades of this century which

led the government to issue certain protective policies -
 IS. - 182

establishing 14 as the minimum age for factory work and 6

hours as its maximum work-day. Telegrams, letters, newspaper
articles - all manipulated the economic-crisis argument, and
angrily attacked the decrees issued by the Minors' Court of
Justice, which they consider to be "real libels against the
industry" (75). Once again they implicitly charged that
there was an extraneous interference in what was the private
.
domain of those who "worked" in it: in other words,
factories was the exclusive domain of entrepreneurs.

The reason why women and children were brought

together in the same discussion was not only because they
shared the family sphere. They were also put together
because entrepreneurs, particularly textile mill owners,
were interested in the labour of young women, aged from 14
to 18 year. It is precisely these adolescents which the law
J • •
protected from a long work-day. And wh~le th~s seems to have
often been the case in Sao Paulo and Rio, it was even more
so in factories established in scarcely-urbanized areas
around the country, and which used the family to mediate
their proletarianization process. The Paulista Factory in
the State of Pernambuco does not seem to have been an
exception to this. As Alvim has shown, "Daughters were the
prime target of the factories .•. Although they were thrown
into the labour market on the same terms as males, because

of the importance of female labour for this type of

industry, they were actually employed before the men" (76).
This suggests the important mediating role of the family as
 183

a labour recruitment and control arm of the factory.It was

only through the approval of the male head of household that
these daughters (and minors as a whole)would be employed in
the first place. As such, the family was instrumental both
for capital and for the workers' own survival.

All family members were compelled, by poverty and

the income needs' of the family, to enter a labour market
•
characteristically controlled by the logic of industry
productivity. Responding to this control, families seem to
have differentially adapted their own forms of organization
in response to the requirements of the regional labour
market. What is surprising is that, in every case, the
reorganization of family roles does not seem to have altered
the internal representations of the place, the rights and
duties of each family member. This had contradictory
.,
implications. On the one hand, capital's control and
discipling of the workers was eased because the traditional
family form was maintained. On the other,working class
families used these very same traditional representations of
authority and reciprocity to maintain an active collective
identity -- reminding the workers that their dignity was
being threatened by the market.

The clearest example of this duality was to be

found in the worker'S housing complexes which were built

around some factories. Due to the peasant family's

reproduction crisis (i.e. to the closure of traditional

 184

survival means), its fragmentation was a constant threat.

Thus, the factory put the head of the family in charge of

,
bringing his family's women, youths and children to the ....

factory according to its own labour needs. In the Paulista

case mentioned above, what fathers actually gave the factory
?

was "their free labour , maintaining working-class family

morals and stability." Together with the labour process
domination, this ensured a' form of proletarianism that
"spilled over the factory walls ,penetrating into the
working-class home and family (77)."

still, this is not the only kind of factory where

family-capital relations could be found. Labour recruitment
in most of the Rio and Sao Paulo textile factories was also
based on the family, beginning with one member who, having
become a worker him or herself, gradually brought the rest
of the .
f am.l.l y ." .
.l.n Unfortunately, there is no data that
reveal the the implications of this for wage payments
rates.However, it would be seen from the labour movement's
denunciations of the practice of hiring women and children
that the latters' pay was determined in the relation to the
income of adult male relatives, the husband or father. As

heads of families, fathers may have received a "family"

wage, which covered the wages of all working family

members (78). Some punishments were also visibly family-

based. Rio de Janeiro's carioca and Corcovado factories, for

example, would immediately fire the entire family, if any

one of its members challenged the factory's management in

 185

any way (79). This was particularly enforced when the head
of the family himself defied the factory rules. There was
more "tolerance" when women or children were at fault -- the'
,
foremen would simply warn the head of the family by
threatening to dismiss the entire family. During the first
two decades of the century, there were many cries of protest
against the mistreatment of working children. At first,
.
criticism centered on the' abusive actions of factory
foremen, but later, the parents themselves were also
implicated. Not only had the factory's use of the family
hierarchy reinforced male parental authority, but the
reverse was also true (80).

At the same time, maintaining paternal authority

as well as the gender division of labour may have been seen
within the working-class family as being a kind of education
J

for work, a device to strenthen one against the misery of

life. The childhood reminiscence of some older immigrant
workers'in Sao Paulo ( during the 20s and 30s) refer to
family roles in this way. For them, both paternal authority
and the typical maternal roles were valued as signs of
belonging to a safe familiar world. Fathers are invariably
described as violent but not severily so. Mothers are

descr.ibed as ensuring the good beha~i~ur of the children as

well as managing household resources well and, as such, they
emerge as sternly demanding about the chores that children
had to fullfill. Even violence used as disciplinary
punishment is valued by the informants and memories of "good
 186

childhoods" and "united families" include the strict

policing of the children's whims as well as whippings and
beatings (81). Something similar seems to have taken place
among migrant families, who were once small, rural owners.
An ex-domestic ~ervant, for example, comparing childhood
between 1910 and 1930 said that her life's prospects had
revolved around work since her early childhood. "Everyone
.
worked, my father didn't let "anyone get away with it. Today
I try to get everyone at home to work, but I can't( ••• )
Children aren't able like they used to be. They would get up
~n the morning, light the fire, make the coffee ••• then each
had a chore ••• At 7:30 or 8:00 in the morning we would all
leave to go work at the bosses' house ( ••• ) We would get up
at dawn and work all day,since we were eight years old ••• "
(82). The hard-work ethic stayed with her throughout her
life and she sti~ saw it positively, as being a strength.

In different ways, the working-class families in

.
Brazilian interior similarly met capital by internalizing
proletarian habits and by working hard to produce both their
subsistence and more profits for regional industries.
Anthropologist Giralda Seyferth tells how workers-peasants
families in Itajai Valley (state of Santa catar~na)

developed a relationship with fac~ory labour that was

adapted to their rural life (83) eo By maintaining control
over the family as a singular unit of production, peasants
in the valley learned to integrate their material and
cultural forms of organization with the labour needs of
 187

nearby textile mills. The mills were particularly interested

in women and children's labour, although men were also
-'
employed. According to Seyferth, "For the peasant family,

having one or two women or children doing factory work meant

above all a smal~ increase in the family income, at hardly
any significant cost to agricultural activities." It was not
unusal for peasant couples to have ten or twelve children,
and in these larger domestic' units, even the absence of an
adult male did not disrupt the pace of farm work. Through a
cultural and material nexus, the family guaranteed its self-
preservati<?n: land was valued as the family patrimony,
individual wage earnings became general family income;
family bonds were strengthened as different generations
mature; individual labour acquired family-based
implications; inheritance and land division were thought out
·in a way that di~not destroy the sense of family patrimony;

fathers had absolute authority over their children until

they got married. And yet all of family members could be
factory workers as well. Obviously, the family's advantage
use of the wage-employment offered by the mills must also
have been extremely advantageous for the factories. Insofar

as the proletarianizing process was lived by the family as a

supplementary means of reproducing itself as a peasant
domestic unit, factory could thus justify minimum wage
payments on these very same terms. In other words, the

factory owner could represent his workers' work as

"supplementary labour." At the same time, everything the

 188

'colonos'needed but not produce, was sold to them by a

factory store, where the workers pawn-away their wages. Not
only did the worker peasants readily assist their own
f
proletarianization, but they also seemed untroubled by the
industrial time ~emands of mill work. As Seyferth has noted,
even today "the 16-hour workday is seen in a positive
light, not as being over-burdening but as the means of
.
maintaining a dignified standard of living" (84). Thus, the
peasant family's goal of self-preservation imposed a self-
disciplinee which must have served as an excellent means for
capital to control workers.

What all the above cases rather strikingly

illustrate is that the proletarianizing process of men,
women and children took place with the family having a
central and participatory role. During the period of early
.,
industrialization in Brazil, the family was so important
that it somehow managed to supress one of the classical pre-
conditions of the formation of a capitalist labour market
the individualization of labour force. Regardless of the
size and extent of an industrial concern, its viability
continued to depend on the extensive and intensive
exploitation, and thus, the physical destruction of workers.
In this context, the family was essential for resisting this
annihilation. Thus, the family was simultaneously reinforced
as an essential class space, insofar as it is in and through
it that life-decisions are made and that the proletarian
destiny was affirmed. In other words, the family emerged as
 f{p 190

return to the role of mothers and to the responsability of

overseeing the domestic chores of labour reproduction. It

protected women's bodies and, as Maria Valeria Pena has
shown, it primarily protected them so that they could exert
a reproductive role. (8S)

The law forbade women from night shifts as well as

from working in dangerous areas where accidents could occur

and heavy labour was required. Pregnant women were granted

four to six month leaves before and after childbirth and
were paid according to the average earnings over their prior
six active months period. In the case of factories employing
more than 30 women over the age of 16, the law also decreed

the availabili ty of nurseries at the workplace and work-

breaks for breastfeeding up to six-month old babies(86).All

of this implied not only unexpected expenses for the
J
entrepreneurs but also, a flexibility which factory

production did not have. Not surprisingly, industrialists

used their lack of preparedness as an argument to justify

threats to fire women if the state woul~ not agree to pay

the expenses of the legislated maternity-leave requirements.

(87) •

Secondly, the law decreed equal pay for equal

work, regardless of gender, such that there would be no

advantage, at least in principle, to hiring women for

factory work. As Pena shows, this was a strong incentive to

remove women from factories as well as from the labour

 191

market itself. As she says, "State intervention" in women's

work ultimately defended the family, that is, a particular

type of family which depended on male wages and female

domestic services. There was an attempt to preserve women in
that family as an often-unemployed labour reserve and, when
it actually was needed, to ensure that it was used under

particular conditions which were very different from those

for men "(SS).The law also intlirectly addressed the working-
class movements' complaints about the preferential choice
given to male labour,which was a constant textile strike-
demand. As such, the labour movement must have read the
leqislation as referrinq to temporary ~abour rather than as
rights conquered by a specific and permanent labour force.

Children under 14, for their part, had their work

schedule regulated to an S-hour day, like that of the
-'
adults. While the bosses may have lost on the issue of the
age-limit (they wanted to set the limit at 12 years old),
they won on the question of the work-day itself. They also

won a small-print article in the Minors Law: 12 year-olds

were allowed to work in those factories where other family

members were already employed. Since this seems to have been

precisely the case of the majority of the working minors,

one can easily imagine that child labour exploitation

practices in the factories remained largely unchanged.

Thus, protect e b
d y th
e law , women and children

became the focus of a particular entrepreneurial discourse

 192

and practice. In the case of women, entrepreneurs declared

that there would not be any serious problems in regulating

women's work for, as the secretary-general of the employers'

textile association put it, "in an era in which everyone is
preaching women's-equality in the struggle for life, in
which women's liberation is raised as an issue it would be
monstrous to deprive female workers from the chance to earn
.
their livelihoods honestly, at the side of and inequal terms
as the men." His only written objection was against the
burden of paying for the maternity leaves of working
mothers, suggesting that the state should take over the
costs. Otherwise, he threatened "the preventive exclusion of
each and every married woman," due to "the legal requirement
to keep factory women workers in a state of inactivity(89)."

More eloquent than the entrepreneurs' discourse,

J

however, was their practice. The strikes following the

enactment of the law and newspaper denunciations of

industrialists leave no doubt that the entrepreneurs did not

respect the prohibition of nightshifts, failed to install

nurseries, refused to provide safe and adequate working

conditions for mothers, ignored the two-hour overtime limit

for pregnant women and, above all, manipulated the wage

tables for women and children on ~he basis of th~ stigmas

attributed to both respectively. All the feminine.delicacY

attributed to the image of women in the arguments of the

. the face of the
bosses and the government dissolves ~n

managers and foremen's disciplinary practices.The latter

 193

not only enforced, as they always had, high productivity

through fines and piece-work payment schedules, but they
also practiced harrassed women sexually. All of these issues

were constant themes in the 1932 and 1934 strikes. Thus, the
1500 women who struck against Sao Paulo's Mariangela Factory
in 1934, demanded the suspension of fines,'fortnightly wage-
payments and the abolition the forced cleaning of grease
.
from the weaving looms. Having been fired for their
participation in the strike, the women workers demonstrated
and their demands were met. In 1935, another textile strike
in Sao Paulo was called by women to protest the bad quality
of the raw material they had to use, which prevented them

from ful1filling production quotas, thus reducing their

level of income (90).

Some contemporary observers of working class

families in Sao Paulo and Rio, have left somber descriptions

of women and children's labour (91). The passing of the law

was little more than an empty gesture --especially

considering the fact that the government did not oversee

their implementation and enforcement.

4. The Eight-Hour day: the oldest demand

In May, 1932, a new law limited the hours of work

.
1n industry to .
e1ght h ours a day , regulated the night

and required weekly days-off for all industrial

shifts,
.
workers (92). As d1scusse d '1n Chapter One above, the eight-
 194

hour day w~s one of the oldest and most important working-
class demands. It was raised in every strike whether in the

professional sectors or in general strikes. Responding to

this pressure, similar laws had been introduced as
legislation from.the early 1920, but they had never been put
to a vote, due to the strident opposition of the· employers
association, the Centro Industrial do Brasil. At that time,
.
the employers had proposed a'lO-hour workday, but one which
could be extended through individual arrangements with
workers.

In December 1930, the Labour Ministry put CIFTA

(textile entrepreneurial association) in charge of surveying
the opinion of textile entrepreneurs regarding the eight-
hour workday. All of the respondents opposed the idea
(thus, the unanimity of the textile entrepreneurs finally
emerged: against ~a fundamental workers right) (93). The Sao

Paulo entrepreneurs argued that for "technical and economic

reasons" the duration of the workday could be no less than
nine hours, and at that, they continue to demand the right
to extend the hours according to company criterium.
Furthermore, they argued that given high production costs,

the work process had to be intensified in order to lower the

product's cost. They suggested that the workday could be

extended for two or more hours against a 20% wage increase.

In their opinion, due to "the soft standards adopted in

Brazil", one hour per day was being already lost in the

time devoted to start-up, lunch and wind-down.

 195

Entrepreneurs in the North East accused their

col_~eagues in Rio de Janeiro of what they saw as "wanting to
."
force the rest of the country's factories to adopt the local
workday ••. [of Rio,that is of] imposing regional interests
on the collective.. class interests." They argued that insofar
as the "lifestyles, customs, transportation need and
schedules of workers in the interior were different from
those of workers in the capital", the various work schedules
and criterium of each industrial company had to be
respected. ~ermore, they suggested that the lO-hour
minimum that the Rio entrepreneurs proposed could be
increased to 12-hours in their region. Because northeastern
workers were not " competent " like their southern
counterparts, but, rather, were"slow", "lazy", "ignorant and
blessed by the ease of life they enjoyed" ("life in the
North and Northeast,"
., they argued, " is monotonous"), and
thus "they prefer to work in order to earn higher salaries."
The Lundgrens, leaders of the Northern entrepreneurs and
owners of the Paulista Factory in Pernambuco and Rio Tinto
in Paraiba, relentlessly maintained that "all the advantages
of the IO-hours day regulation would be to the benefit of
the factories in the capital".

Industrialists from north to south constt.ntly

warned about the unemployment that such a measure would

unleash. Articles, in dramatic language,were written about

those "who would end up homeless, wi th no jobs, no bread;
the countless workers with their respective families [who
 196

would] demand [more work] from their old employers and the
latter's inability to help them •.. (95)." Those in the far
south also argued that the "distance from major consumer
markets, the deficiency of transportation and the many taxes
they were made to pay, already overburdened their
enterprises. In their opinion, labour was neither
"productive nor effective" during more than nine of the 11-
hour workday adopted in the region, for two hours each day
were spent preparing and cleaning machines. For the mill
owners, these two hours entailed "work which was not
productive," and as such, they do not seem. to have been
paid. Paradoxically, entrepreneurs in Joinville declared
that they were. "in evolution" and "not mature enough to
adopt the legislation". They also claimed that the 9-hour
workday would be a bad example for rural workers when they
saw that "their fpctory colleagues had leisure hours." They
asserted that hard and demanding work was heal thy, and to
support this claim, they pointed to the presence of 60 year-
old workers in the textile factories of the Itaj ai Valley
(state of Santa Catarina) (96).

The entrepreneurs' resistance to the State's legal

interference in establishing a limit of duration of the
workday was so strong that, just before the law was decreed,
they managed to get the eight-hour limit workday extended to

10 hours, by conceding that extra two hours would be paid.

Even so, some factories, ( in Sergipe and Rio Grande do
SuI, for instance) were disatisfied with the new law and,
 197

thus, they simply ignore it. others factories in other parts

of Brazil responded to the new regulations by lowering
wages, as in the case of the Fabricas Patilistas, or, as in
the case of fabrica de tecidos Mageense, in the state of Rio
de Janeiro, they.,. decided to interpret the distribution of
the eight-hours liberally through the nightshift(97). In
almost every case, the Labour Ministry ei ther interfered
.
directly, or requested that· CIFTA act as a mediator to
ensure that the factories comply with the articles stated in
the decree. It is important to note that the reason this
cases appeared in the newspapers at al:l was because the
workers targetted their strikes and demands- directly at the
Labour Ministry, calling not only for the observation of the
eight-hours limit but, also, denouncing the suspension of
their lunch break (98). The entrepreneurs'resistance and
hedging were suc~ that the new Minister of Labour, Salgado
Filho, was forced to address them, saying, "Those who, as
employers, should be the strongest defenders of the decree
regulating the relations between capital and labour have
instead been the ones Who, because of their lack of

understanding, have most fought 't "

~ . He asserted that

reducing the working hours was in the interest of the

"physiological conditions necessary to preserve entire
classes" , and that "iii protecting the worker, capital is
guaranteed a stability which can only emerge through order."
The Minister further denounced that (some) "large companies

and employers' associations had established advertising

 198

funds to launch a systematic attack on the legislation,

trying to discredit its overall concept, in common cause
with the persistent destroyers
, of the prevailing social
organization". And he ended with a warning: "Think about
how unreasonable this action is • These are new times and it
is forcefully necessary to adapt your procedures to the
world's new conditions ••• Employers and capitalists,
cooperate by respecting the law and the authorities" (99).

The workers, for their part, continued to push for

an 8-hour workday, a demand which was present in almost
every strike, in every part of Brazil, between 1932 and
1935. Sometimes, however, the demand for a limited workday
was stated in different terms. In Sao Paulo, for example,
the demand appears under the title of "payment for overtime I.
because most of the factories at least claimed to adher to
.,
the eight hours limit, while in fact scorning the law, by
adding unrenumerated overtime hours (100). In the meantime,
factories in the country's interior openly disobeyed the
decree. It is important to note that most of the strikes for
an eight-hour day also demanded wage tables and regulations
affecting the intensity of the work process. This shows
that labour's experience in factory relations articulated a
series of points that the state (and entrepreneurs;
separated into bureaucratic parts when they put them into
legal terms. Thus, labour demanded the eight-hour day along
with the additional payments for overtime. This usually led

to a struggle to revise various wage tables in each

 199

factory, which in turn led to debate on productivity (i.e.

the relationship between output and h~urly, daily or piece
work wages). And this demand led to those on discipline,
that is the firing of oppressive and arbitrary foremen and
the abolition of fines. ?
For example, the 1932 Sao Paulo
weavers I strike, ini tially centered on the length of the
workday but eventually the issue of wages and piece-work was
raised. During the negotiations, workers complain of the
system of "rewards" which employers used to force great
production from piece-rate workers. This genera~ed a debate·
•
over the payment schedules, wh~ch had been• established
according to que quality of the material produced -a measure
that according to the movement,would also benefit the
employers by eliminating their competitors. The negotiations
also grappled with the weavers' labour conditions, and the
workers demanded., a reduction of the pace of the labour
process(lOI). That same year, bakers in Sao Paulo also went
on strike, articulating their demands in similar terms.
Along with limiting the hours of labour, they demanded the
hiring of more bakers to make the dough, a more clearly
defined division of labour, wage increases for the oven
assitants and improved living conditions for those who lived
on the worksite(102). strikes by shoemakers followed similar
lines, beginning with the workday schedule, and moving on to
protest the enormous disparities between what factory
machine-workers earned and the wages paid out-workers.

(103) •
 200

The demands articulated in factories struggles,

organized by factory committes and independent unions began

to define, although in an indirect and piecemeal fashion,

the parameters of a self-defined workers' class condition.

But, by and large, these struggles remained contained within
the limits of various job sites. The spread, or
generalization, of the struggle depended on the actions of
.
autonomous and independent unions, fighting in the labour
market for effective workers's rights. This was the only
battleground where it was possible for the working class to
attempt to define for itself a dignified place in society.

Recognition of the workers' social rights meant

that their role as partners in the social and economic
policies that the country was beginning to formulate, also
had to be acknowledged. The new groups in power (not to
mention the traditional ones who had not been displaced) did
not have the slightest intention of opening up that space.

The many discreet strikes and rank and file actions

occurring within workplaces throughout the country, as well

as other forms of popular protest, certainly threatened the

dominant classes, but never enough to force the state to

change its plans to make the government the sole arbiter of
.
a less-than egalitarian societ:".

For the provisional revolutionary government of

1930-1934, the most basic social rights of workers -- the

right to employment, to an a-hour workday, to weekly rest

 201

periods and holidays, to safe job sites and healthy labour

conditions, to the abolition of cynical exploitation of
women and children -- all these rights were "donated" to the
workers as a result of the government's recognition of
social justice. -Never mind that these rights had been the
historical demand of Brazilian workers since the turn of the
century. Never mind, as well! that workers had relentlessly
•
called the public and political attention to their demands
in countless "small struggles". Not even the "legislative
furor" (as the industrialists called the Labour Ministry
. action) with which the new Ministry of Labour sought to
absorb and diffuse the demands of the working class could
undermine the workers resolve to win these rights for
themselves (as the many strikes after 1930 demonstrate).
Furthermore, the strikes seem to have stimulated the need
for a better union organization which several workers
categories made an effort to build. It was thus as a result

of the threat of possible autonomous unions -- a threat

which was nurtured by the independent factory workers self-
organization and by its challenging the prevailing model of
exploitation -- that the state gradually forged itself as
the centralized administrator of social conflicts.

In order to be effectively implemented, the

demands stemming from the workers' daily factory life

pressuposed the construction of a political negotiating

space between employers and workers. This,in turn, assumed a

working-class organization which would have both the

 202

legitimacy and the capaci.ty to be representative and

effective, and thus powerful. Regardless of the capacity of
the working class to crepte this kind of organization, from
the very start, the government's tried to destroy even the
possibility of i~s ever coming to life.

The years between 1932 and 1935 wi tnessed the

history of the destruction~ of the autonomous power of
labour, caused by the government's trade union law. The
history of the law's implementation is itself also
fragmented: the government's action based itself on some
workers' interests, but not on others; it asserted itself by
exploiting the internal divisions within the working class;
it granted both advantages and disavantages to labour
through its proposed measures to control the market, such as
workers 'registration (identification cards, passports to
.,
their social rights) job stability, a welfare system and
above all in its proposal for a system of judging dissidence

(Conciliation and Judgement Councils, later, the Labour

Court). With each new regulation, the state increased its

own autonomy, while simultaneously taking over the

issues raised in the working-class struggles.

Thus, the effective implementation of the working

class social rights --particularly those affecting their

daily work life --was to depend on the course of the

political struggles yet to come in the history of the

Brazilian working-class movement.

 203

NOTES

1.Jo~o pes~oa was the popular governor of the state of

par~~~a, w~th a goo~ rep~tation for his integrity and
~dm~n~~trat~ves capac~ty. H~s assassination at a coffe shop
l.n Rec~fe create.d enormous popular commotion allover the
country and antecipation the October military coup.

2.Chaves Neto, Elias. Minha Vida e as Lutas do meu Tempo:

Memorias. Sao Paulo: Ed. Alfa Omega, 1980. p. 29.
3. Cavalcanti, Paulo, 0 caso Eu Conto Como Foi: Memorias,
Sao Paulo, Edit. Al fa-omega , 1978, p. 83.

4. Sampaio, Consuelo Novais. "Movimentos Sociais na Bahia de

1930: Condicoes de Vida do Operariado". (mimeo). V Encontro
Nacional da ANPOCS. 1981, p.5.

5. Sampaio, idem, p.6; Basbaum, ~oncio, Uma Vida e~ Seis

Tempos: Memorias. Sao Paulo: Editora Alfa Omega,
1976.p.84.The riot was directed against the Electric Bond
and Share Company, who controlled the tram, electricity,
telephone and Lacerda elevator services. The immediate cause
of the riot was its services' price increases. 84 trams and
all the company's facilities were destroyed.
6. Pimenta, Joaquim, Retalhos do Passado: Memorias. Rio
deJaneiro: 1948,J pp. 397-403. Cavalcanti, 1978, op.cit.
pp. 83-87.
7. Cias, Eduardo. Um Imigrante e a Revolucao: Memorias. Sao
Paulo~ Ed. Brasiliense, 1983, p.21. Rodrigues, Edgar. Novos
Rumos. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. Mundo Livre n/d, pp. 278-279.
8.Foster Dulles, John. ,Anarguistas e Comunistas no Brasil.
Rio de Janeiro: Ed. Nova Fronteira, 1977, pp 358-359.
9.CAFE FILHO, Joao, Co Sindicato ao Catete: Memorias
Politicas e Confissoes Humanas. Rio de Janeiro: Ed. Jose
Olympio,1966, p.68.
10. According to the existing literature, the main acto~s in
the 1930 Revolution are: the lieutenants, the reg~onal
oligarchies and - in playing a very minor role - th7 ~~ddle
classes. The working-class itself seems to have ~artl.cl.pat7d
minimally, if at all. Two authors questl.on. thl.S
interpretation: De Decca, Edgar, 1981,. 0p.Cl.ti and
Vizentini, Carlos. 1979, op.cit. See Introduct10n.
11. Simonsen, R, Evol uc;ao Industrial do B~as~l , Sao Paulo,
2nd e.,
d 1 9 72 i 0. Onody, A Infla~ao
Y
Bras1le1ra, Rio, sid;
 204

Edgar Rodriques, Trabalho e Conflito Rio, sid; Eulalia

M~ria Lahmey~r Lobo, "EvoluC;ao dos preo~ e padrao de vida do
R~o de Jane~ro 1820-1930" Revista Brasileira de Economia
vol.25, n.4, ~973; M~rio Cardim, "Ensaio de analise do~
fatores econom~cos e f~nanceiros do Estado de Sao Paulo e do
Brasil" ,Sao Paulo, Secretaria da Agricultura Industria e
comercio, 1936. '

12. According to?Bonduki, the lack of transportation created

tight living spaces in Sao Paulo which, in turn, led to a
high demand for land and building materials. Given their
. .
inhabitants' limited resources, common walls were built ,
rooms sub-d~v~ded, and water points and sanitary fittings
were shared. Cf. BONDUKI,: Nabil. "Habitacao Popular:
contribuicao para 0 Estudo da Evolucao Urbana de Sao Paulo",
in Valladares, L. (ed.). Repensando a Habitayao Popular no
Brasil. Sao Paulo: Ed. Zahar, 1983. "Cortiyos" are a type of
slum tenements, usually found in old, decaying mansions.
Since abolition, they were the main housing option for urban
workers. Their classical description can be found in the
famous, turn-of-the-century novel by Azevedo, Aluisio. 0
Cortiyo. Sao Paulo: Ed. Atica.
13.Dias, Eduardo. 1983, op.cit. p. 17.
14.BONDURI, Nabil. 1983, op.cit. pp. 141-143.
15. For Rio, cf. Edmundo, Luis. 0 Rio de Janeiro do Meu
Tempo. Rio de Janeiro: Editora Melhoramentos, 1952; and
Parisse, Lucien. Favelas do Rio de Janeiro, Evolucao e
Sentido. Rio de Janeiro: Cadernos do CENPHA, no.5, pp.33-34.

16. Basbaum, Leoncio. 1976, op.cit. p. 43.

17.This description comes primarily from the period's
1 i terary works. cf • Lobo, Mara (PAGU), Pargue Industrial.
Sao Paulo:Ed. Bra-siliense, 1980 (1932). Schmidt, Affonso.
cf.especially, As Aventuras de Indal~cio. Sao Paulo: Clube
doLivro, 1948, among others. F~r Bah1a, c!. the no~els of
Amado, Jorge, particularly, Jub1aba. F?r R~O de Jane~ro, cf
Lima Barreto, 0 Triste Fim do Pol1car1o Quaresma. Sao
Paulo:Ed. Brasiliense, 1982 (1922).
18.Interviews with elderly dwellers in the ~eighbourhoo~s of
Mooca and Bras, in Sao Paulo --Dona An1ta, Dona H1lda,
Sr.Antonio, Sr. Alfredo, Sr. Eduardo-- who today are between
70 and 80 years old.
19.The Brazilian popular diet was raised for, debate by the
State, in the latter part of the 1930's, 1nsofar as the
State intended to intervene on behalf of the popular
sectors in an attempt to improve their life expectancy, and
reduce the social disease and mortality rates. See ,Josue de
Castro, "a valor da alimenta<;ao:estudos econom~cos das
 205

cond~9~es d 7 vida das classes operarias no Recife". Boletim

do M7n:ster~o dO,Trabalho (BMTIC)n.s, January 1935;idem, "As
co~d~90es_ de v~da da classe operaria no Nordeste" in
Al~mentaQao e RaQa, 1935; Jorge Moraes "0- Problema
Alimentar no Estado de ?aO Paulo", Revista d~ IDORT , 1939;
Alexandre Moscoso, Al~menta9ao do Trabalhador Rio de
Janeiro, Tipografia Italiana, 1939. '
20.Cavalcanti, P~ulo. op.cit. 1978. p.50.
21. In 1930, 'only 39% of the children between the ages of 7
and 11 were enrolled in the first grade. The drop-out rate
must have been very high, given the working-class children's
need to work and the neglect in which schooling found
itself.Popular diseases were " rarely treated by doctors but
rather popular sectors relied on home-made and religious
medicinal recipes. Public health services were limited to
treating epidemics.
22.Cf. interviews, note 18, above •
.
23.0n the urban dominant class and lifestyle, cf. Penteado,
Yolanda, Uma Vida em 'Cor de Rosa: Memorias. Sao Paulo:
n/d.,Lobo, Mara (PAGU). op.cit. iMorse, Richard, A Evolucao
da Cidade de Sao Paulo. Sao Paulo: Ed. Difel, 1969. DEAN,
Warren, A Industrializacao de Sao Paulo. Sao Paulo: Difel,
n/d.
24. See Martins, Jose de Souza, Empresario e Empresa na
Bioqrafia do Conde Matarazzo. Sao Paulo, 1973; Dean,
Warren, Ope cit. ~

25. The working class press often refers to the industrial

entrepreneurs' slave mentality. On the factory as a
privatised sphere, c·f. simao, Aziz, Sindicato e Estado. Sao
Paulo: Ed. Dominus, 1963.
26. Race was significant category in al~ Brazilian
intellectual production, dating ~ack to ~he ~nfluence ~f
Brazil's first anthropologist, N~na Rodr~~e~ , a~d h~s
theories on the disruptive effects of ,m~sc~genat~on ,on
Brazilian people. Nina Rodriques~ ~s C~let~~~dades Anorma~s.
Also Oliveira Vianna, Raca e Ass~m~la9ao, R~o, 1928
27. Cf. 0 Observador Economico e Financeiro. March, 19~7,
Vol. XVI, p. 121. Cf. also, Limeira Tejo, ,Retrato do Bras~l.
Po~o Aleg~e: Ed. Globo, 1949.

28. Measures taken by the textile entrepreneurs, in 7luded

mainly pressuring for the reinstatement of prot7ct~ve ~mport
tariffs. Some companies also tried to pr?duce f~ne clot~s to
compete with imported textiles. Cf. stel:n, st,anley, or~<1en~
~ Evolucao da Industria Text!l no Bras~l. R~o de Jane~ro.
 206

Ed. Campus, 1979, ch. 8. On middlemen in the textile

industry, cf. Stein, ibid. 1979.
29. Cf. Stein, ibid. 1979, p. 126.
30. ibidem , ,
31. Dean, Warren. op.cit. p.134.
32.Saes, Decio. "0 civilismo das Camadas Medias Urbanas na
Primeira Republica." in Cadernos Unicamp, no. 2.
33. idem, p. 2
34. Carone, Edgar. A Prime"ira Republica. Sao Paulo: Ed.
Difel,1971. Also Canedo, Leticia Bicalho, 0 sindicato
Bancario em Sao Paulo. Sao Paulo, Simbo10, 1978.
35. Carone, Edgar, Ope cit., p.79-l09.The "artificial nature
of industry" was a current issue in the 1920s, when the high
prices of national industrial products divided public
opinion on the need to industrialize the country.
36. Carone, Ope cit., 3rd part, item c.
37. Cf.the descriptions of the middle classes found in the
following novels on and from the period : Lima Barreto,
Clara dos Anjos. Sao Paulo: Ed. Logos, 1976. Lima Barreto,
Os Bruzundangas. Rio de Janeiro: 1932. Alcantara Machado,
Antonio. Bras « Bixiqa e Barra Funda. Rio de Janeiro: Ed.
Jose Olympio, 19}3. Scmidt, Affonso, Os Saltimbancos. Sao
Paulo: Clube do Livro, c. 1948.
38.Getulio Vargas, himself, is an example of the first kind
understanding as can be seen from his Provisional Government
speeches. The lieutenants are the clearest example of the
second kind, clearly inspired by authoritarian intellectuals
such as Alberto Torres. The working class is the best
representative of the third kind of understanding.
,

39. Cf. Almeida, Maria Herminia T., Estado e Classes

Trabalhadoras no Brasil, 1930-1945. Doctoral Dissertation,
OSP, 1979

40. According to communist writer Leoncio Basbaum, "although

1930 revolution began as a military coup, it became a
popular revolution with mass supp'ort ( ••. ) The communists had
not paid attention to the masses' aspirations for change.
Only we and the old rotten republican parties opposed the
revolution. But now we had a chance to know what was Lenin's
'bourgeois-democratic revolution' and we could push it to
the left •.. " Basbaum, op.cit., p. 97. Nevertheless, this
opinion failed to win inside PCB internal debate. Five years
 207

later, wi th the front alliance poli tics of the ALN, PCB

would assume the themes of social justice and democracy.
41. The data on the creation of the Labour Ministry comes
from Araujo, Rosa Maria Barbosa. 0 Batismo do Trabalho: A
Experiencia de Lindolfo Collor. Rio de Janeiro: Ed.
Civilizacao Brasileira, 1981.
42 •• ARAUJO. ibid... 1981. p.63
43. Lawyer Joaquim Pimenta was a dubious figure in the union
movement in Recife during the early 1920's. He led general
strikes, helped create unions, instigated a mass
mobilization (called the Hunger Campaign) against a treasury
law which raised taxes, causing the bankruptcy of tradesmen
and smallholders and a food shortage. In his youth, Pimenta
was a strict Catholic, converted after reading the
positivists, especially Spencer. Evaristo de Moraes was a
lawyer, journalist and writer, defender of workers and
rebels during the first two decades of this century, and
founder of one of the socialist parties at the turn of the
century. In 1905, he wrote the first (and one of the most
sensitive) books on workers' rights. Educated as a Catholic,
he became a social-democrat and advocate of state
intervwention along the lines of the European experiments.
Like Pimenta, he held a university seat in Law. Agripino
Nazareth was one of the leaders of the 1919 strikes in
Bahia. Cf. Pimenta, op.cit., 1949; Moraes Filho, E.
Apontamentos de Direito Operario. SaoPaulo: LTR Editora,
1971, Introduction. See also Foster Dulles, 1977, op.cit.
-'
44. Araujo, op.cit., p.65
45. Speeches given by Lindolfo Collor, first Labour
Minister. Inaugural speech, December 1930, reprinted in
CARONE, E. A Sequnda Republica, Difel, 1974, pp 220-225;
Speech to the Rotary Club, December 1930; speech to the
Commercial Association, January 1931, reproduced in Araujo,
op.cit, pp.177-193
46. The political battles at MTIC involved different
interest groups around the issues of industrial, tariff and
labour policies. Furthermore, the lieutenants consistently
opposed Collor. Cf. Santa Rosa. 0 sentido do Tenentismo,
pp.66-68 e Helio Silva, 1966, op.cit.
47. Cf. Carone, E. A Republica Nova, Difel, 1976, p.lOl and
Basbaum, Leoncio. Historia Sincera da Republica. Rio: Ed.
Fulgor, 1968, vol 3, p. 24. The Sao Paulo estimative was
made by the entrepreneurs 'association, CIESP, in a November
1930 circular which also appeared in the press.
48. The National Coffee council, a government agency set up
as a result of the crisis, imposed radical measures to
 208

restoreprices: millions of sacks' of coffee were burnt,

planting forbidden and workers' salaries reduced.

49. Cf. Villela, Annibal and Suzigan, Wilson, Politica do

Governo e Crescimento da Economia Brasileira, 1889-1945
Ipea/Inpes, 1973, pp.172-l75; stein, stanley, Ope cit 1979,
chapter 9.
50. cited in stein, op.cit., p.126 and 144.
51. Information comes from the newspapers A Plateia, A Plebe
(working-class papers) and Correio da Manha e 0 Estado de
,Sao Paulo; from Rodrigues, Edgar. Novos Rumos, Pesquisa
social 1922-1946, Ed. Mundo Livre, n/d; Carone, Edgar.,
1976, op.cit: Almeida, Maria Herminia, Ope cit., 1978;
Campos, Ney Pedreira n Antagonismo de Interesses" Faculdade
de Direito da USP, Seminarios de Legis1acao Social, 1942.
52. The Sao Paulo state appointee was lieutenant Joao
Alperto who had nominated another lieutenantJ MIguel Costa,
to~ reorqanize the state Police Force. The latter tried to
gain popular support in order to strengthen his hand against
the Partido Democratico and also against the Federal
Government.The two lieutenants allowed the Communist Party
to orqanize itself in Sao Paulo, increased workers' wages
and tried to institute their own labour code.
53. For many authors, the strikes during this period (1930-
1935) revealed a lack of organization, due to the fact they
were called by factory commissions only loosely linked to
the unions. The movement would be also weak because it did
not have a central, guiding ideology, since it was based
exclusively on economic demands. Nevertheless, the majority
of these movements in the early 1930's were partially
successful. Although they were often repressed and broken
up, the list of demands increased year after year. At the
same time, the restriction of demands to specifics~ meant
that factory owners and the government were unable to use
their usual weapon of accusations of "communist
infiltration". They were thus forced to deal with the social
issue in other terms.
54. The Ministry tried to carry out a voluntary census of
the unemployed in order to send them to the country to work'
on farms. It talked of setting up rural "settlement
nuclei", d.!.stributing passages, handig out food at Christmas
and setting up shelters for the families of the unemployed.
Besides this, it arbitrated directly in some factory
disputes and the Minister and his staff received both
employers and employees to hear their problems and demands.
Evidently none of this solved unemployement or the crisis.
Cf. Araujo, Ope cit., pp. 110-116; Carone, Ope cit., p. 142.

55. Decree-law 19.842, 12-12-1930.

 209

56. Minister Lindolfo Collor, interviewed in 0 Estado de Sao

Paulo, 29/1/1931, quoted in Araujo, op.cit. p.107.
57 • o. Pupo Nogueira, Secretary of CIFTSP, the textile
entrepreneurs' association, and member of CIESP. The text is
part of CIESP's 1930 bulletin and was later published in
Nogueira's ,A Industria em Face das Leis do Trabalho. Ed.
Salesianas, 1935.
58.Carone, E. op.cit. 1976, p.150. See also Bernardo,
Antonio Carlos, Tutela e Autonomia Sindical. Sao Paulo,
1982. ----------~~~~~~~~

59.Pupo Nogueira. ibid.

60.Idem. Text presented to the CIB, and published in his
book.
61. CIFTSP, 1927 and 1928 annual report. A memorandum
presented to the CNT in 1927. Republished in Pupo Nogueira,
ibid.
62. Castro Gomes. op.cit. 1979. Up until 1935, the Sao
Paulo and Rio entrepreneurs' associations repeated the same
main argument they had used in 1927 , about the
"disorqanization of work in the factory." Other arguments
also dating back to 1927 were also repeated: that holidays
would increase the "moral and social disorganization of
workers," allowing them to "vent their latent vices" in the
streets, where they would "spent long hours of inaction",
given that "their homes are encampments"; factory workers
f • • •
could not have hol~day r1ghts because the1r work was manual
and therefore not subject "of the mental wear and tear
suffered by office workers", who deserved holidays. In the
third place, harsh discipline did not exist in Brazilian
factories due to the "sentimental" nature of Brazilians; and
finally, the owning class exerted a civilizing influence and
were promoters of well being, given the "unstable" and
nnomadic" character of workers. Cf. Pupo Nogueira, whose
writings are reproduced in the Reports and Bulletins of
CIFTSP, CIFTA (in Rio) FIESP and CIB.
63. On the Holidays Law, cf. Blass, Leila Maria, Imprimindo
a Propria Historia: 0 Movimento dos Trabalhadores Graficos·
no final dos Anos 20. Masters degree thesis, University of
Sao Paulo, 1982. Castro Gomes, op.cit. 19:9. Saens Leme,
Marisa, A Ideoloqia dos Industriais Brasileiros. Ed.
Vozes,1978.
64.See note 63.
65. Castro Gomes calls attention to the fact that a law
can only be considered to be in effect and thus
inspected after it has been enacted and published: cf.
 210

Castro Gomes, op.cit. The time between the Labour

Ministry's bill and its actual enactment was relatively
long for all the laws: 8 years for the Holidays Law; 7
years for the Female Labour Law; 7 years for the
Minors' Law; 9 years for the Welfare Law; 15 years for the
Labour Accidents Law; 8 years to establish the Labour
Court; 10 years for the Union Law. Looking back since the
early years of the Republic, there have been laws that took
30 years to be enacted --and even more to be obeyed, such as
the Law regulating the work schedule.
66.These arguments appeared for the first time in 1917, in
ani nterview with Jorge street (the model for the "good
boss" during the First Repub~ic) by 0 Estado de Sao Paulo
newspaper.Reprinted in Pinheiro and Hall, A Classe Operaria
no Brasil, vol. II, p. 176-186.
67. This term was used in an 0 Estado de Sao Paulo
newspaper editorial.
68. Cf. Pena, Karia Valeria. Ku1heres e Trabalhadoras:
PresencaoFeminina no Traba1ho Fabril. Sao Paulo: Ed. Paz e
Terra, 1982; Moura, Esmeralda B., Mulheres e Menores no
Trabalho Fabril, 1890-1920. nip. n/d.
69.A Plateia, June 1,'1931.
70.A P1ateia, Kay 2, 1932.
71. Cited in Pena, op.cit,p. 138-139
72. Pupo Nogueira,"' OPe cit
73. Cf. Penteado, Jaco, Belenzinho 1910: Memorias.Sao Paulo,
Martins, 1962.
74.see note 66.
75.Street, Jorge. "Codigo do Trabalho." Jomal do Comercio,
September, 1927, in Pinheiro and Hall, op.cit. pp. 176 -
186. Pupo Nogueira, op.cit. 1935. pp. 106 - 110.
76.Alvim, Maria Rosilene Barbosa, "Trabalho Infantil e
Reproducao Social", Rio, 1981; Alvim. M.R.B., "Notas sobre a
familia num grupo de operarios texteis", Rio, 1979; cf •
Chapter I, above.

77 .ALVIM, ibi~d.

78.Cf. Edgar Rodrigues, op.cit. 1981

79. Ibid ..

80.Dias, Eduardo, op.cit.,p. 25-26

 211

81. Interviews. Cf. note 18

82." Lembrancas de D. Brites": in BOSI, Ec1ea,Memoria e

sociedade, Lembranga de Ve1hos. Sao Paulo: Ed. 1982.

83 Seyferth, Giralda, "Aspectos da Proletariza<;ao no Vale do

Itajai" in Leite Lopes (ed.) Cultura e Identidade Operaria
Sao Paulo, 1986.·

84. idem, p. 109.

85. Pena, Maria Valeria. op.cit, Chapter IV.

86.Decree-Law n. 2l.4l7-A - 5/17/1932.

87. Pup 0 Nogueira, o. "Trabalhos das Mulheres nos

Estabelecimentos Fabris." in Nogueira, op.cit, p. 79 ••
88.Pena, Maria Valeira. op.cit., p. 155
89.Pupo Nogueira. op.cit.
90.Quoted in Carone, E, op.cit. 1976

91. Dias, Eduardo, op • cit; cf: the novels listed in

footnote no.17, specially Pagu.

92. Decree-Law 21.364 - 5/4/1932.

93. Cf. "Inquerit6 Sobre Horario de Trabalho na Industria
Nacional de Fiacao de Tecelagem." CIFTA archives. Rio
deJaneiro: 23 January, 1931.

94.Letter from the Tecidos Paulistas Co. to CIFTA: Answer

to their bulletin dated 9 December - 26 December, 1930.
CIFT Aarchives ; Memorandum from Sergipe entrepreneurs to
the Labour Ministry: 29 October, 1931, CIFTA archives;
Peixoto and Gon<;alves to CIFTA, 12 December, 1931 (Propria,
Serqipe); Villanova & Co. letter to CIFTA, 15 December,
1931 (Serqipe) •

9S.Tecidos Paulistas Co. letter to CIFTA: idem.

96. Jomal do Commercio. January, 1932; Letter from
theCommercia~ and Induc;trl.al Association of Joinville, 12
October, 1931; CIFTA archives.
97.See note 93

98. Correio da Manha, May 20, 1930; Jornal do commercio,

July 11 and 12 1932; Jornal do Commercio, June 18, 1932.
 212

99.Salgado Filho, J.P. "A Legislacao do Trabalho" in

Boletim do Ministerio do Trabalho, Industria e Comercio,
no. 4 December 1934, p.l07. and also no.6 February 1935, p.
115.

100.See appendix: strikes

101. A P1ateia, May 2, 1932 to June 6, 1932.
102. Rodrigues, Edgar, Ope cit.
103. idem ibidem.
 213

CHAPTER III : MERELY POLITICAL INCIDENTS - WORKERS' RIGHTS:

UNION STRUGLES (J'~o. J'\31)

"All the Revolutionary Government asks

is that it not be disturbed by merely
political incidents, which would
encroach on its valuable time for
solving administrative problems ••• "

Getulio Vargas, May 1931.

1. Labour rights and trade union laws

At first, no one thought there would be many incidents.

In March 1931, the Labour Ministry had enacted the first
Trade Union Law (decree no. 19770 - 3/19/31) which,
according to the bill's attached statement of purpose, was
J

conceived specifically to turn unions into a "buffer" (sic)

between the antagonisms of labour and capital. Through what
was now the legal right to organize into distinct
associations, entrepreneurs and workers alike were being
invited, in Minister Collor's words, to "replace the old,
negative concept of class struggle with the new,
co~structive and organic concept of class collaboration"(l).
The decree's proponents posited that it would ben~=it
workers, guaranteeing their right to organize without
suffering penalties from their employers (2). Furthermore,
by transforming the unions into "advisory and technical
 214

agencies in the federal government's study and solution of

problems related to their class interests", that is, "into
agencies cooperating with the public authority", its authors
believed they were shifting what until then had been
marginal or almost outside the law, into the very centre of
Brazilian social organization itself. As Minister Collor
explained in the decree's statement of purpose, "union
.
rights or collective rights began to exist at the very
moment when ••• an agreement regulating the rights and
duties of the entrepreneur'class (sic) and the worker'class
(sic)was actually established (3)." In the words of Joaquim
Pimenta, author of 15 of its 20 articles, "the expression of
(the workers'] interests must be checked by a legal system
stemming from these classes' approach toward the power
structure ( ••• )through the state's commitment to recognize
unions ••• as necessary for the balance of the judicial
.I

order in the national economy" (4).

Nevertheless, the union's "incorporation" into the state
went beyond turning the state into "the supporter of unions"
which were seen as weak entities (5). Only four of the law's
20 articles actually guaranteed specific rights; the
remaining 16 defined the legal and disciplinary conditions
for exercising those rights. The union had to gather a
minimum of 30 pe""ple who shared and "identical, similar or
related profession l ' , who were over 18 years old, and of
Which 2/3 of whom had to be native born or naturalized
Brazilians in order to have the right to organize
 215

professi~nally and defend their interests: to carry out

"welfare activities"; to sign labour contracts and to demand

the rights defined by the labour legislation.
Foreigners,even long'time residents, were forbidden to hold
leadership or representative offices. Unions had to abstain
..
from discussing "social, political or religious. sectarian
ideologies" which by the government's definition were
.
inappropriate to the economic" and social class interests
which the "advisory and technical" unions, now assistants in
the state's "solutions", were to raise as demands. Unions
first had to be recognized by the government in order to be
heard. The conditions for recognition were: only one union
for each profession in each municipality (if two already
existed, only the larger one was to be recognized); that its
statute had previously been approved by the Ministry; and
that it aqreed to submit an annual report to the Ministry,
."

including, among other items, information on its financial

situation. Furthermore, that the Ministry could delegate an
official agent to attend the general assemblies and check
the union's accounts,"informing on any irregularities or
violations" of the decree. Moreover, penalties for unions
which did not comply with the decree's articles, ranged from
fines to their closure, and included discharging its
leadership or its definitive dissolution (6)
According to the law, the Labour Ministry forbade unions
from becoming members of international entities without its
expressed authorization. However, it allowed groups of
 216

three unions to create regional federations, while five

could organize into a national confederation. Both
federations and confederations, however, were subject to the
same obligatory controls over their statutes, constitutions
and operations.

As many analysts have shown (7), this law entirely denied

the unions' character as representing workers and defined
them instead, as Getulio Vargas later explained, as an
"organic force, cooperating with the state". The
government's only concern was to channel -- if not prevent -
class conflict. Indeed, Getulio Vargas was very precise when
he defined. this purpose: "until recently, the lack of
trade'union organization and methods has led to the false
impression that unions are agencies for struggle, when
-
actually they are defenders and collaborators of capital and
labour in relation to the public authority" (8). Hence, the
."

union were, above all, a legal entity created by the state.

This was the basis for the rest of its subordination:the
state itself would define how the union might represent the
class. This is how workers' representation became, by law, a
state investiture: it became the domain of the power
structure itself (9).
It really should have been a case of creating political
incidents, although initially the organized labour movement
tried to ignore the law's very existence. Throughout 1931,
the movement basically concentrated on stimulating strikes,
protesting their working conditions which had deteriorated
 217

because of the depression. However, organized labour already

knew that, besides management, they also would eventually
have to deal with the Ministry and its laws. Part of the
movement itself had even made an appeal for the Ministry to
intervene directly: workers of both the Leopoldina Railway's
and the Carioca Textile Company had addressed their demands
to the Ministry (rather than to manag~ment) in December,
.
1930. Joaquim Pimenta described the style of paternalism
underlying this direct mediation: ..... the minister had
barely taken office, but already there were hundreds of
people streaming in, from morning to night, creating a
totally confused and hectic atmosphere, c~mplaining about
thousands of different things which Agripino Nazareth and I
would have to address as best as we could ••• " (10).
Approaching authority to request its intervention in the
name of justice was not unusual, for it expressed the
J

country's long tradition of relationship between the

popUlation and the government. Even after the government
formalized a specific agency to deal with labour demands,
the Labour Court, direct appeals were quite common for the
Ministry's mediation in solving specific differences with
bosses. The very novelty of the Ministry, in 1931, led it to
seek legitimacy which in turn made it even easier to request
its int~rvention; the best example of this is the Sao Paulo
textile strike in July of that year (11).
The politicized part of the labour movement, however,
quickly realized that it could not ignore the Labour
 218

Ministry nor its interference in union organization. Indeed,

its organizational autonomy, arduously built up over the 30
--
years prior to the Union Law, was now being deeply affected
by each of the law's articles. The law essentially sought to
dismantle the prevalent and growing form of unionism: small,
•
politicized, with an intense immigrant participation;
organized by profession and work'place; opposing one
.
another along ideological lines; and, above all, focusing on
factory daily life and their rank and file's conditions of
proletarianisation (cf. Chapter I). The whole hearted
refusal of the state's goal to put the'~ unions ,under its
control actually began in May, 1931, when~inister Collor
undertook a n\llll1:)er of trips to explain his policies. Despite
various working class associations endorsements of the
Ministry's policy in Sao Paulo, Collor's meeting with some
of the organized labour unions was tense and conflict
J

ridden. His meetings with workers, who had been mobilized

and organized by their own movements prior to 1931
(particularly textile workers), in the large hall of the
Labouring Classes Association became notorious. Everardo
Dias remembered the mood of the confrontation which incited
the workers who crowded into the room and who had put the
"old proletarian militants" at the" fore front, in the first
rows. The Minister waG accompanied by a "numerous court. of
'protectors' besides an appreciable number of police from
the OOPS (Department of Political and social Order) and
other very suspicious characters." The Minister did not
 219

manage to finish his speech: he was heckled, refuted and

finally hissed off the stage. The meeting ended in beatings

, ,
and imprisonments, while the Minister fled out the back
entrance" (12). ColI or also heard the Union Law criticised
and rejected in his trips to the North and Northeast
(althought dissent was demonstrated differently). It would
appear in the middle of customary political rituals in his
.
honour, in speeches by the non'working class political
leaders who organized workers' associations (13). Some of
the Minister's heterogeneous staff members also created
problems for him in these contacts, for they did not hide
their sympa~~y for socialist theories and often slipped. '
ideas into the Minister's speeches that were more advanced
than he would have liked (14).
organized labour manifestations arose throughout the
nation, in spite Jof two important aspects: first, that the
law did not force workers to unionize, thus union
associations outside of the official framework could
continue -- something that stronger unions, determined to
preserve their organizations' autonomy, held on to, at least
until 1933. Secondly, many of the unions that decided to
register with the Labour Ministry and to reform their
statutes did so under protest and condemned the items and
norms they did-not accept in the law. As Araujo has written,
for example, the Union of the Commercial Employees of Rio
rejected the restrictions on political debates (article 1),
the Ministry's right to choose the union'S leadership when
 220

the elected one was deposed (article 16), the elected

leadership's one year trial period, and the appointment of a
-'
"stranger" to a union leadership position (a Labour Ministry
employee who by law would take over the union should its
leadership be deposed). They also protested the Ministry's
right to decide on the -fate of their assets (article 20).
The trade and commerce association (AEC) also protested
along similar lines. 'Restaurant waiters and employees
protested the discrimination against foreign workers who
accounted for most of the employees in the trade; above all,
they protested against the Ministry's excessive intervention
(15). Moreover, what perhaps best explains their adherence
to the Ministry is their own recognition of their lack of
the necessary strength to fight for workers'rights without
any institutional backing: as was demonstrate in the case of
the Sao Paulo bank tellers in 1931. (16) •
Adherence to the law was found primarily in the case of
workers trying to create their ~ssociations in the country's
less industrialized regions, where there was much greater
exploitation of the working class carried out entirely
within authoritarian and rural oligarchic principles. The
Fabricas Paulista in Pernambuco was notorious in this
respect, where owners used their private militia to prevent
workers from collectivizi~lg in any form -- besides gathering
them into a working class company town which, to~ether with
the factory, created an enclave and served to exert maximum
control over their daily life. For these cases, the Labour
 221

Ministry's laws seem to have been essential guaranteeing.the

right, which the workers already sought, to act collectively
to defend their interests. Indeed this was one of the prime
objectives of the law: the creation of unions in areas where
they had previously not existed(17). Another eloquent
•
example is the history of the Miners's Union created in Nova
Lima, state of Minas Gerais, formed by gold miners from the
.
st. John del Rey Mining Company which refused to implement
its workers' legal social rights and, on the contrary, did
everything to prevent them from collectivizing (18). The
Union Law was thus widely accepted in cases where weak
industrialization, combined with oligarchic employers,
prevented workers from setting the limits on their unbridled
exploitation. Werneck Vianna has shown that during the law's
first four years, 50% of the recognized unions (i.e. those
which had accepted the governments' conditions to organize
J

or reorganize themselves) were found in

barely'industrialized regions while only 25% of these could
be found in Rio and Sao Paulo (19). These findings coincide
~

with observations by the Ministry's own technicians, who

travelled throughout Brazil seeking to rally support for
the Labour Ministry's actions and were relatively successful
in unionizing labourers along those lines (20).
Even so, adherence to the Union Law and the creation of
new unions following its enactment did not occur without
contradiction -- that is, it did not reflect adherence to a
State which was viewed as responding to employers' refusals
 222

to allow unionization. The associative movement in regions

far from the urban centres had already expressed itself
through strikes and deeply felt antagonisms toward some
factories' despotic organizations, such as in the
above-mentioned Paulista Company,(among several others) in
Pernambuco, as well as various in Minas Gerais and Rio
Grande do SuI. Even the Ministry's staff knew it, through
.
their own previous political experiences.
The trade unions and the politicised sector of the labour
movement made their rejection of official unionism quite
clear through their local
. struggles and strikes
. -- this is
particularly visible in the cases of labour organizations
in Rio and Sao Paulo. In 1932, several militant trade unions
with a practice of self-government, fought tenaciously for
their right to organise and represent their rank and file
membership. without the imposition of the law. Their
."

newspapers attacked both the law and the Ministry, referring

to the latter as the "employers' government department"
(hotel clerks of Sao Paulo), "a fascist pillar they intend
to impose on the country's proletariat" (printers of Sao
Paulo); and to the former as "[a law] through which the
workers' moral and economic slavery will be even further
reinforced" (workers of Sao Paulo's Light Company); "the
vilest and lowest scheme, aimed at getting workers to give
,
up their real trade unions" (shoemakers of Sao Paulo) .(21)
In addition, that very year, there emerged what Antunes has
called "dual unionism" --i.e. two representative
 223

organizations began to coexist: one submitted to official

norms while the other, refusing to submit, struggled for its

,
autonomy(22). According to Antunes' research, several trades
split in Sao Paulo, and indignant texts by those supporting
autonomous trade unions denounced the little representative
power those groups who had adhered to the law actually had.
For instance, the hotel and related services employees now
had one new, single union, created according to the
Union'Law decree and about which the former trade union
remarked : "it was created by individuals linked to the
employers to divide the sectors' employees for, since its
enactment, we've seen our demands and rights set back rather
than defended." The same was also happening to the printers,
railway workers, steel workers, the Light Company's workers
and commercial employees.Resistance to the government's
union policy also came from all the ideological tendencies
J

within the union movement (anarchoAsyndicalists, communists,

trotskyists and socialists) except for the so'called
"Ministerialistas" -- i.e. the trade unions that supported
the law or were created after the its enactment (23) •
.
Both the few trade unions requesting recoqnition from
the Ministry and their lack of organizational and bargaining
skills are, as Werneck vi anna show, a ~easure of the
effectiveness of this resistahce. As·aforementioned, 50% of
these unions were found in the barelyAindustrialized
interior while 36% represented employees in the dry'cleaning
and construction sectors. However, Vianna also notes that it
 224

was essential that the Government destroy all the

independent trade unions if it were successfully to take
over the workers' "representation"(24). Either side could
win or lose in this battle. Until 1935, there were no prior
indications that the state's authoritarian bureaucracy would
?

succeed against those worker'association movements which

were clinging to their own autonomy. state triumph was thus
.
not the only alternative possible for the experience lived
in this political process. As Albertino Rodrigues remarks,
"the new political order gradually curbed the free
development of the unions, though it was not sure which
might be the most efficient way of doing so" (25).
The union movement, for its part, was recommending
political resistance through its own daily activities
against the employers. It thus was inscribing itself along
with other movements,
., in the very space of a society seeking
to be governed in a different way. That this does not
express a weak or backward class which does not or cannot
engender a different political project, is patent: the
labour movement expressed its practices and representations
about the rights it sought and how they should be
implemented through its strikes themselves -- particularly
between 1930 and 1932, the most important years in this
proce~s. This was to have deep repercussions on society
because it implied control by unions and associations of the
labour market and as such, the power of the labour movement
 225

could be independent of 'the state and exercised within the

space of society itself.

Confronted by the de facto resistance of the more militant

unions who continued organizing strikes and protests beyond
the state's sphere, the Labour Ministry was forced to create
more efficient alternatives that went beyond enacting laws
demanded by the movement and whose actual enforcement was
.
doubtful. While the laws defined some minimum requirements
for the labour market to operate in a "civilized" manner
[length of the work'day, workpace conditions, women's and
children's labour, holidays, and the minimum ,wage which was
proposed but was not implemented until many years later],
the high frequency of strikes during this period showed that
these laws were fully implemented in factory solely as a
result of workers' pressure. From the point of view of
workers who had a., history of self'organized unions, who made
the labour market an issue and whose resistance to the
Government stemmed precisely from the continuity of their
demand'oriented practices, union Law were.. perceived as a
method for controlling them amd usurping their
autonomy. Thus, the government had to be more creative,
adding to its coerciveness certain benefits for those who
unionized accordingto its norms.
In order to guarantee that labour unions would adhere to
the 'Ministry's laws, it link access to labour rights to
those workers who joined unions organized according to its
legal rules. It began with the workers' right to have a
 226

professional'record book, a passbook where the employer

would keep track of the worker's situation, such as his or
her hiring and dismissal dates, wages received, type of job
performed, holidays and benefits to which he or she was
entitled, along with marital status, parents' names and
other personal information. This "passbook" was to become a
prerequisite for the worker to unionize and, later,to
appeal to the courts should disagreement with management
arise. (This record was considered proof of the fairness of
his or her claims). Cases of dismissal, wage variations and
accidents were also recorded here. Finally, in 1934, a new
law guaranteed holiday benefits eXClusively to those workers
who had professionalArecord books which meant, in short,
that this benefit was limited only to those members of
officially recognised unions.
The professional passbook had already a long history,
J

tied to the first Holiday Law of 1926, before it finally

became an identity card which, in a narrow'minded,
paternalistic society, thus provided some guarantee for the
workers. This law created a holiday passbook to ensure its
enforcement and without which the worker could not request
for or prove he or she was entitled to holidays. The
entrepreneurs and factory owners had practically boycotted
these passbooks and attempted to avoid the enforcement of
the law. The workers saw these holiday passbooks as a means
of controlling and repressing those who were the most
militant (26). In fact, their fears were justified. During
 227

those years, the employer association's general secretary

had organized an information file on workers active in the
strike movement which was forwarded to the police (27). In
the early 1930's, that same secretary even outlined a
proposal recommending that, besides recording professional
~

data in the passbook, management should also register any

"serious errors" (indiscipline, mainly) the worker had
committed. In which case, he continued, "the professional-
record passbook must be given to the Police Department
(28)." Although the preliminary plan did suggest something
along these lines, the government wanted to make the
passbook a controlled document protecting labour rights.
This explains why it only allowed the actual cause of
dismissal to be recorded in it --which in any case, was all
that was needed to identify workers who were most active in
the labour movement ••
J

The organized labour movement struggled tenaciously to

break the link between social rights (such as holidays), and
official unionizing and professional passbooks. The
independent trade unions had tried to issue their own
professional'record books with the same effects on the right
to holidays. Thus workers, employers and state disputed the
labour market, inch by inch,since the 1920's: but by
refusing to abolish the link between the access ~o social
rights and official unionization, the government managed to
defeat the workers. Kasumi Munakata has described the case
of the printers union of Sao Paulo which legally (and in
 1932), alsodetailed the labour conditions for each,
according to services rendered (32).
By legislating the specific conditions for buying and
f
selling labour power, the government was primarily seeking
to prevent independent union action in the labour market.
However, in the early 1930s, the government faced the
vigour of the strike movement which was continuously
reminding it that, besides guaranteeing certain basic
workers' rights, the very compliance to the laws presupposed
that workers' organizations had to have some control over
the conditions for this market's operation. This is the most
significant aspect of the state's having linked the
workers' access to social laws to their adherence to official
unions: through it, the relative vague bills of law that
specified where the social laws would actually be
implemented, gradually
., shifted toward the authoritarian
state's detailed definitions. In this respect,the law
establishing Collective Labour Agreements and the Mixed
Commissions of Reconciliation and Judgement (May and
November,1932) is clearly a case'in'point. The importance of
collective bargaining agreements stemmed from the fact that
the minimum guarantees that the social labour legislation
provided would be implemented as collective negotiations
between workers and entrepreneurial unions: thus, workdays,
holidays, wages, would all effectively be regulated by the
agreements. As such, workers organized by sector of
production would acquire the power to negotiate their labour

. - --------
 ~2.~-229

1932), alsodetailed the labour conditions for each,

according to services rendered (32).

By legislating the specific conditions for buying and
,
selling labour power, the government was primarily seeking
to prevent independent union action in the labour market.
However, in the early 1930s, the government faced the
vigour of the strike movement which was continuously
reminding it that, besides guaranteeing certain basic
workers' rights, the very compliance to the laws presupposed
that workers' organizations had to have some control over
the conditions for this market's operation. This is the most
significant aspect of the state's having linked the
workers'access to social laws to their adherence to official
unions: through it, the relative vague bills of law that
specified where the social laws would actually be
implemented., gradually shifted toward the authoritarian
state's detailed definitions. In this respect,the law
establishing Collective Labour Agreements and the Mixed
Commissions of Reconciliation and Judgement (May and
November,1932) is clearly a case'in'point. The importance of
collective bargaining agreements stemmed from the fact that
the minimum guarantees that the social labour legislation
provided would be implemented as collective negotiations
between workers and entrepreneurial unions: ~hus, workdays,
holidays, wages, would all effectively be regulated by the
agreements. As such, workers organized by sector of
production would acquire the power to negotiate their labour
 230

conditions. Subsequent reforms of the text "corrected" this

power, us ing not the word "contract" but instead
"adjustment" and, above all, submitted it to the Mixed
commissions of Conciliation and Judgement. Subsequently, the
mixed commissions were separated from the collective
contracts and became Reconciliation and Judgement Councils
which, besides collective contracts, also welcomed
individual demands, and thus 'seriously damaged the workers'
collective union action. They also prevented strikes (any
strike was immediately placed under the council's
jurisdiction) and eliminated the chances of union pressure
(31) •

Once again, it was factory workers in the country's

interior and in small companies who accepted and, perhaps,
benefitted from the collective bargaining agreements. By
1934, the Labour Ministry had registered 86 such agreements
J

signed in Maranhao, 71 in Minas Gerais, 169 in Pernambuco.

In Rio, an amazing 4,556 collective bargaining agreements
were registered for companies having from two to five
employees. In contrast, only four collective bargaining
agreements were signed in companies having more than 100
workers (34). Still, the law did have one thing which must
have interested workers: article 11 allowed that collective
agreements endorsed by 2/3 of any professional sector would
be extended to the entire sector. Although entrepreneurs
protested against this article in the law, seeing it as
resembling a "dictatorship of the working'class unions", the
 231

Labour Ministry insisted on keeping article 11 intact,

certainly because the possibility of extending collective
~-

contracts to an entire professional sector would provide the

necessary weight to laws which were not being obeyed.
FUrthermore they were laws which instituted a potential
harmony between capital and labour, even prior to the
"contractors'" agreement. In other words, they defined the
.
guidelines for controlling the labour market according to
the dynamics of state bureaucracy. The proud tone announcing
the first collective agreement to be extended to an entire
sector (land transportation) in the Labour Ministry's
september 1934 Bulletin, in Rio (35), also showed how this
could engender an entire model of market organization under
the state's aegis. In other words, contract negotiations
between workers and management would now be submitted to a
political and juridical
., authority. Hence, their sole concern
would be to comply with whatever decisions had been reached
between them.
It is difficult to evaluate the Reconciliation
Councils'performance due to lack of data regarding the
operational procedure, whether in collective or individual
law suits. Nevertheless, the Labour Ministry did publish a
few reconciliation agreements in Rio between July and
September, 19~~, which indicate that the issue basically
centered on the entrepreneurs' "violations of the social
labour legislation ". For example, through the
bakers'collective bargaining process, the entrepreneurs'
 232

union was forced "strict compliance to the 8' hour law" as

well as to holidays; both of which were existing rights that
bakery owners certainly did not obey. Moreover, although
,
weekly rest'days were not paid, employers nevertheless did
not allow them: they were part of the agreements achieved by
the bakers, the steel'workers(against the Cia. Federal de
Fundiyao) the waiters (against the tenants of the
.
dining'cars of the E.F. Central do Brasil). The workday
often extended beyond the 8 hours that the law stipulated,
and the various agreements ratified this extension on the
basis of a"special bonus" of 25%, 30% and 50% _" .. the latter
for steelAworkers working over 12 hours a day. Employers
agreed to other demands, such as "strict compliance with the
child labour laws", "abolishinq fines and secret files,
"tolerating absences with just cause", abolishing the
"indemnities" workers were forced to pay for any damages
J

incurred. Employers, for their part, won the above'mentioned

agreement to extend the workday: All American Cables Company
managed to invalidate all the complaints "employees have
made, to date, concerning alleged violations of the labour
legislation, as well as [to] prevent the latter from
following up on any other claim that might be pending or
that is based on events prior to the present agreement." The
Cia Federal de Fundicao got their workers to wo~k on Sundays
and holidays. Finally, even the Minister himself achieved
something: the Cia Cantareira and Viacao Fluminense
employees agreed to have their union "recognize that any

-----
 233

demands that the company did not address could only be

fought for through the mediation of the Labour Ministry"
(36). Nevertheless, in some cases,reconciliation did fail.
,
The same bulletin notes that the dispute between the bosses
and the workers at the Fabrica de Tecidos Bangu, one of the
largest textile companies at that time, had not been solved
because of the management refusal to reach a settlement(37).
Most of the lawsuits involved. wage tables and delayed wage
payments.
Thus, in view of all the evidence, the period between
August of 1930 and 1934 seems to have been permeated by an
intens~ struggle focusing on the autonomy of the labour
organizations and their chances to participate in shaping
the labour market, which was expanding and acquiring a
growing importance alongside industrial expansion itself.
The significance
. .,of this potential to act in and control the
labour market lies less in its economic implications, than
in the fact. that this was the chosen field of struggle for
those social groups clinging to their autonomy and longing
for action and specific aims, against an external power
seeking to establish itself as the sole legitimate domain of
the collective order. At stake in the struggle to control
the labour market was the potential political value of
autonomous labour organizatio~emerging in Brazilian
society, which then confronted the novelty of its
industrialized cities and the social, cultural and political
relations these engendered.

-
 234

Explicitly, as chapter II shows-, radical inequalities

between workers (and other kinds of waged labour) and owners
were indeed overall recognized, although their conflicts
were not predominantly interpreted in a positive light. On
the contrary, they were almost primarily seen as signs of
the latent fragmentation of a profoundly heterogeneous
society, permanently about to implode (3). This
.
justified,(for those who viewed it this way), a strong state
which could put society on an acceptable course of organized
development. Implicitly, however, the recognition of social
inequalities involved more complex conditions for creatinq a
new pattern for public social order. The political aims of a
"modern"social order involved having to deal with the
workers as new actors with a triple role to perform on that
stage of social order: for they would be, at one and the
same time, producers
., of wealth and value, citizens equal to
all others in rights and duties, and collective subjects of
political actions. While the labour market was the space
where labour power was undoubtedly negotiated as a
commodity, it is important to recognize that,
simultaneously, the regulating of daily life, the workings
of already'recognized rights, the possibility of raising new
demands and the public legitimacy of collective action were
all being negotiatb4 as well. This is whatt:-justified (for
those acting within this understanding of negotiation), the
demand for a social and political autonomy which could
guarantee freedom of action and establish a dynamic through
 235

which social rights could prevail precisely because society

itself would welcome public life.
During the 1930's, the different social groups (and
particularly the workers) were fighting precisely for (and
lost) this right for a collective and differentiated life.
The workers'movements had raised all the issues for shaping
a modern urban and industrial society" an aim the new 1930
government had explicitly stated. It was because of the
manner in which workers were going about solving those
inequalities, as suggested by their rebelliousness, that the
government was forced to legislate quickly on them. After
all, the issues of employment and unemployment, women's and
children's work, labour conditions, and management
discipline over the intensity of work, became state laws
(and society's criteria of organization), in only four
years. At the same
., time, the right to unionize was gradually
becoming the means of identifying power and law to society,
such that the ability for social self'organization -- as
suggested by the organized labour movement -- had to be
disciplined, regulated and controlled. In other words,
social and collective action would be restricted to a public
legally'authorized, and, as such, restricted sphere.
The vigorous strikes from August 1930 until 1934,
(excluding 1933), indicated that the workers did not
passively accept the government'regulated and organized
rights with which the state addressed working'class demands.
Workers knew that the same action and pressure practices

-- ---. -
 236

they had resorted to prior to 1930, were needed for this

legal organization to actually work. At the same time, the
above'discussed both resistance and adhesion to official
unionism shows workers' different atittudes to the
government's project. In this sense,the issue of accepting
~

state protection, as well as the struggle against it, could

be found in differentiated practices, corresponding both to
the government's own groping in the terrain it itself
created, and to the workers' own internal differentiation as
a class.
Thus,
. contrary to common assertions, acceptance of (or
the struggle against) the state's protection of rights does
not seem to have stemmed from the "passivity and
backwardness" of unprotected workers whose historical
demands the state was addressing legally and in a
paternalistic way. Similarly, it is equally difficult to
J

attribute it to the strategies of the politicised labour

organizations, that is, to their ideological errors and
successes (39). While both may actually have existed, for
purposes of the argument being developed here, it seems more
relevant to trace the way the laws were actually being
inscribed in a crucial sphere: the daily lives of workers
who confronted tr~ditional forms of discipline. This
suggests a two'fold analysis of events which, by the end of
the decade, ultimately, pointed to the triumph of the
regulating and controlling state over the politically'tense
and aroused society. First, the way the legal guarantees of
 237

labour rights were actually incorporated in workers' daily

lives must be approached, which involves exploring the
extent of political confidence they could actually have in
,
the state. Second, it is important to look at the way the
legal redefinition of factory organization actually became
public -- that is, the way it shaped a field of debate in
which the prospects of "justice and equality" (or juridical
equivalence) for the society 'and, particularly, for the
world of labour, were de facto politically and culturally
recognized. If this could have happened, both suggest a
change of values concerning the social and political
hierarchy which had prevailed culturally in Brazilian
society. As such, the mere enactment of laws would not in
itself affirm the (regulated) citizenship stemming from the
world of work. The first question refers to the
effectiveness of the laws " and as such, to their control;
.I

the second question refers to a privileged sphere in which

the new conditions for defining citizenship could be
debated: the 1934 Constitutional Assembly •

.
2. The effectiveness of the social laws and labour rights

When the ex'chief of police, Salgado Filho, replaced

Labour Minister, Lindol=o Collor (who fell from power due to
regional disputes), in April 1932, he received a set of 30
social law decrees to which were rarely adhered along with
seven bills not yet enacted into law. As Castro Gomes has

.. _---- --
 238

stated, ~algado Filho administration would be marked "by the

two'fold effort to stimulate and enforce unionization in
compliance with the law" on the one hand, and on the other,
"to actually implement the laws and bills that had already
been introduced" (40). Almost two years later, soon after
leaving the Ministry, Salgado Filho realized the enormous
difficulties in implementing the laws. According to him,
these stemmed from the genera~ lack of trust and
misunderstanding spread first "by those alien to the
workinq"class world" and, second, by workers who, due to
their "lack of understanding" united with the ,"unrepenting
demagogues and extremists". Secondly, Salgado Filho pointed
to the "weak and deficient organization", limited by its
scarce resources and by its own "novelty", that is, lack of
experience. The ex"Minister pointed to the "materially-
deficient preparedness" of the Mixed Commissions of
J

Reconciliation and the Councils of Reconciliation and

Judgement, whose judges and members were not salaried, and
who only numbered 15 (and even so, only in the Federal
District, Rio de Janeiro). Pessimistic, Salgado Filho
recorded the persistence "of the workers' recourse to
violent means (i.e.,strikes) in spite of the labour
legislation", as well as to the "employers' impeachment" of
the reconciliation commissions and councils and their
"systematic attacks" (through negative "publicity") on the
legislation. He ended his evaluation stating that the laws'
benefits failed to convince workers and entrepreneurs of
 239

their legitimacy because there was not a tradition of

credibility in the law (41).
It is significant that the eX'Minister linked the
state's unsuccessful attempt to reconcile and control labour
conflicts to the employers' resistance and to the
ineffectiveness of the Ministry's agencies in guaranteeing
compliance to the laws. Nevertheless, Salgado Filho remained
silent regarding the actual incorporation of workers' union
into the process which would ensure compliance to the law.
Although entrepreneurs and workers were invited to unionize
under the same organizational patterns and to participate in
the effort to peacefully solve" their litigations, with
corresponding rights and duties, they obviously did not
occupy the same power positions before the state's law.
Regardless of how the issue is approached, the fact remains
that the Union Law was aimed at previously'mobilized workers
and their relative success in controlling demand-based
struggles. As for workers who were not mobilized and did not
have an associative tradition, the law prevented new unions
from taking place as a politicizing experience. It sought to
inscribe the movement and working'class organization in
officially'authorized, politically and economically-
tolerable molds, whose limits had been clearly predefined by
the centralized S~ate.

Employers required union organization apparently more

for pedagogical reasons, than for actual control. The law
indicated that employer authority (mostly exerted in a
 240

oligarchic and authoritarian way) inside the factory should

be exercised with greater political intelligence and under
different disciplinarian molds. This is why the labour
legislation de-privati sed factory space, implementing.
generic but public rights for the labour manager relations
inside the factory. Regardless of how absurd it might have
seemed to employers, who could not tell the difference
between proletarians and the', poor, and who saw workers
solely in terms of the nature of their own immediate needs,
the government was actually inviting employers to enter
J

modernity, opening the way for them to approach

. . the state
and participate in its effort to build a disciplined
society, where risk could be minimized.
At first, the entrepreneurs did not understand the
siqnificance of these new laws. As stated in previous
chapters, the possibility of having to change their modes of
exploitation scared them. Their greatest concern was finding
out how much they would pay for their entry into capitalist
modernity. Also, many of the factory owners did not
understand how to extract maximim productivity from their
workers without the full exercice of their personal will
inside the factory. Finally, the thought of negotiating with
their workers as equals -- that is within the bargaining
structures granted by law tl] -the labour unions -- repulsed
them. Indeed, . like the mobilized workers, the
entrepreneurial associations also decided to ignore the law
and very rarely unionized (42).
 241

However, they soon realize the futility of maintaining

this posture. Since they had already accumulated experience
from bypassing the first, early 1920's, labour/laws, they
thought they could use this to check the government's
legislative efforts and thus delay the laws' actual
implementation for long as possible. Furthermore, the
nation's entrepreneurs were being pressed by working'class
strikes which raised traditional demands, which now took the
the form of complying with already'enacted legislation. This
suggested confronting the pressures in a different way.
Finally, the 1931 Union Law had a provision which
frightened factory owners: it gave workinq'class unions the
power to inspect labour conditions, and to appeal to the
•
Ministry should they find cases of non-adherence l.n
relation to work schedules (particularly. those of women and
children) ; equal .,pay for equal work; and sanitary working
conditions in the factories, workshops, shops, plants.
Unions could also solicit from the Ministry measures against
breaches of the laws guaranteeing their own union right
(article 8). Article 13 reinforced the power of the unions.
It prohibited employers to fire, suspend or demote "
whether professionally or through salaries either
unionized workers or those who had, in the safety of their
union, "expressed ideas or attitudes which differ from their
employers (43).
Perhaps even sooner than the labour movement itself
(which rejected official unionization in totum, and hence
 242

its possible benefits), the employers saw th~t these

articles pointed to the figure of the shop steward, "who
could give advise on strikes or disobedience of companies'
internal
.
requlat~ons",
,
and who "would bring the annihilation
of authority, hierarchy and discipline which is essential
for any organization", as the report of the special
commission created in 1931 by the Centro Industrial do
Brasil, explained in its analysis of the decree(44). It
continued recommending that "the existence of labour union
representatives [should be] explicitly forbidden at the
workAplace" and suggested that "all the issues should be
raised solely at the union offices"(4S). The entrepreneurs'
struggle against the working class' power to interfere in
factory work issues also appeared in Sao Paulo, and not
limited to the entrepreneur associations' internal bulletins
and reports. The newspapers printed interviews of
.I

entrepreneurs who declare, for example, that "what is

difficult to understand is that they [the workers] want to
have their representatives at their work'places and with a
say in the employers' decisions. Thus, we will not be able
to fire workers without having previously consulted their
class representatives. Should this criterium prevail, there
will not be any more discipline or, even less, efficient
Ylork (46)." ;..

Between 1931 and 1934, the entrepreneurs systematically

rejected the union's contract and inspection power. They
rejected the provision in the afore'mentioned collective

-----
 243

contracts law, stating that wage tables could not be

negotiated at the union level and, even less, could those
--
adjustments be generalized to an entire regional
professional sector. FIESP (Federa9ao das Industrias do
Estado de Sao Paulo) asserted that "while it is true that,
on individual terms, exploitation by employers can go
.
unpunished, it is also true that the result under the unl.ons
.
will be the opposite" (47) • When the labour accidents law
was reformulated, in 1934, and labour unions' inspection of
compliance was included, the entrepreneurs persisted in
their cr~ticisms: "it threatens the factory establishments'
principle of authority and discipline(48)." They continued
in the same vain when the Holiday's Law was finally enacted,
in 1934. It clearly specified that "the regional federations
and, in their absence, the professional'sector unions could
check, through their duly authorized representatives of the
Labour Ministry, on any violation and act accordingly
(article 23)" (49).
Factory entrepreneurs may not have been overly
preoccupied with the labour movement, since labour had
already chosen a form, other than the law, as an expression
of its intention to fight for the factory space and the
labour market -- strikes. Some of the more influential
sectors of the organized labour movement maintained an
independent policy for working'class unions at all costs
and, thus, they rejected the set of laws enacted by the
State, whether those obviously against their organizational
 244

autonomy (the Union Law) or those merely responding to their

traditional demands. Other sectors decided to support and
,pressure the government's social legislation without,
however, desisting from using strikes as their priority.
They demanded the immediate regulation of enacted as well as
new laws. Nevertheless, although they did make their
presence known even in the official unions, and spoke of the
need for unions to inspect the application of these laws,
there were no signs of any evaluation of the possible gaps
opened by the law. The unions linked to the Communist Party,
"\ for example, were more interested in containing the
movement's internal divisions ( worsened by the diverging
positions adopted with respect to the government) and
asserting the principal of union unanimity. Hence the
struggles to assert the demands directly affecting
working'class daily life became secondary to what they
thought was the more important task of centralizing the
movement and inserting it within the larger themes of
ongoing political institutional conflicts (for example,the
struggle against "integralismo").
These diverging approaches (the total rejection of the
state laws and the plan to insert themselves in the state's
organizational structure in order to better fight it) may
have be.:..n effective in many ways, but the crucial point of
the desired autonomy ultimately lay in their chances to
organize the workers' bases; and this involved controlling
the factory, in other wordS, controlling the organization
 245

of production. Obviously the movement's chances to actually

"take control" would not materialise from any given
principles but,rather, from the autonomous unions' potential
to maintain a practice alive in the factories.
The entrepreneurs resistance was quite marked precisely in
this point: they vehement opposed giving up their total
control of either the factory or the labour market.
Although the organization of factory groups was a common
practice to which striking workers would resort, signs
which pointed to their redefinition beyond strike movements,
stemming from the now'existing social laws within the
factory space itself, were few. Hence, the unions were not
mobilized about the law's recommendation that workers become
almost inspectors of the legislation.
The labour movement certainly had enough reasons to
reject this recommendation, given that the link between
social rights and organizational subordination increasingly
created a strong state bureaucracy which destroy~d any
chance for independent action. The very phrasing of the
laws, in fact, was biased and ambiguous. Although some laws
are known to have been submitted to the unions before they
were actually enacted, available data on how they were
shaped refers solely to the entrepreneurs' participation in
t:lem. The working' class' mark is also almcst absent from the
bipartite commissions that the Labour Ministry often created
to debate these bills. Moreover, it is quite possible that
most of the names mentioned in the Ministry Bulletin's
 246

announcements about. a commission's work were actually mere

puppets of the Ministry's own internal bureaucracy. The
obstacles against the labour's voice and vote participation
-- not to mention the real representation of the workers'
delegate -- was so ·great that during the 1933 Union Law's
reform bill,the employees' representative asked to be
excused because he had "countless errands to run" and could
.
not attend the meetings(50) •.
The entrepreneurs, however, were present at every step
of the law making process. In some cases, they stressed
their interests to such an extent that the text of the law
itself prevented the rights it wast formally ensurinq from
actually takinq effect. This was exactly what happened in
the case of the collective labour aqreements and the
reconciliation councils which delivered recommendations --
such that if the two sides did n~t arrive at an aqreement,
the conflict would remain undecided (51). There was no
guarantee of compliance, even in the few and rare published
labour agreements which contained some important points for
the workers involved. The exception to this may have been
those sectors controllinq the labour process and job market,
such as two of the above'mentioned aqreements (involvinq
construction) (52).
The Labour Minister himself mobilized his legal
counsell~~s ·to interpret the laws for the unions, actally,
to deny everything the law seemed to be saying. Thus, for
example, when the bank-tellers Union began a lawsuit
 247

concerning the legality of job site inspection of the social

laws, Oliveira Vianna, the Ministry's most famous legal
counsello~r, hurried to say that "the power to enter the
workplaces at any time of the day and inspect them is
restricted to the state authorities. Private individuals,
victims of rule violations, and their class associations
have the power, solely, to denounce and make accusations in
.
court ••• and no more. union representatives can only report
those flagrant violations of the law which they themselves
have witnessed ••• any nonAflagrant action is thus outside the
union inspectors' sphere of supervision, II (53').
On the very day that the new Union Law was enacted,
(July 12, 1934), the government organized the National
Labour Department (DNT) which was in charge of issues
involving unionization and labour conflicts. A special
administrative branch was created within the DNT to inspect
and ensure compliance to the labour laws, besides
investigating the protection of workers and best ways of
improving it (54). Since the Ministry did not have the
desire or the resources to turn the new agency into a
nationally-active institution (except for union control), it
delegated its inspection activities to existing government
regional branches. As such, it was only in Rio de Janeiro
that the ins~ection service Nas actually linked to the
Ministry. Thus, varied civil servants were, in fact, the
official labour inspectors that had the "power to enter
 248

'establishments to check on violations" which the legal-

councellors' reporters had denied to union delegates.
HoW effective could this service actually have been? In
December 1934, Rio de Janeiro chief inspector of the shops
and factory inspection service submitted his first report.
After listing the limited personnel on whom he could rely to
perform his functions -- his assistant, 3 inspectors, 10
supervisors, 2 assistants, 9 persons-in-charge and 10
responsible for internal services -- the report itemised the
difficulties they encountered visiting and checking 45,000
industrial, commercial and banking enterprises. The first
difficulty was "the animosity of many of the employers, who
are thus a tremendous obstacle to inspections, opposing
themselves with undisguised hostility to the interventions
by the Labour Ministry's representatives". Second, he
mentioned, "errors in the legislation" resulting from the
number of laws benefitting individual sectors which did not
combine with the general legal prescriptions. This generated
employers' interpretations and, consequently, "frequent
frauds". Third, Ita manual specifically on the work" schedule
and on recording labour conditions" was needed to facilitate
inspection. Fourth, there was not any office space provided
for the Inspection sector's monthly. personnel meetings and
inspectors were not even provided with eificient means of
transport to go to the more distant factories " they were
not even given bus tickets. Finally, the report asked for
 249

instructions on how to evaluate sanitary conditions in

factories (55).

,
The situation in the states must not have been much
better, although not necessarily for the same reasons.
Werneck Vianna has described that in Sao Paulo, the Labour
Ministry relegated its inspection activities to the State
Labour Department, which was incorporated within the Bureau
of Agriculture.Thus, labour reports were submitted to
another bureaucracy which was controlled by the
entrepreneurs(56). In essence, all this meant that although
the state Labour Ministry took action against employers'
non'compliance with some of ~e laws, for example in
relation to paying the correct amount due for holidays (57),
it did not actually go into the factories to check on
compliance to the labour time and conditions regulations,
which for employers, was essential. Records from Rio Grande
do SuI also indicate that the regional labour inspector
followed a policy which was so openly in favour of employers
that, as a result, 40 charters of union recognition were
returned to the Ministry, and its political direction had to
be shifted (58).
Thus, the number of strikes between 1931 and 1934
. demanding compliance to the social laws were not the only
indicat~on that workers did not see any reason to t~J~t the
Ministry. The laws' effective implementation only seems to
have existed where workers were ready to confront their
employers to force management to accept their basic rights.
 250

The language of the strikes was undoubtedly the most

effective form of pressure even, of course, on the state.
The labour movement also used other forms of mass pressure,
such as the "proletarian marches" in defense of compliance
to the laws. Also lengthy discourses about the necessity to
have labour rights enforced were inserted into speeches of
May Day demonstrationsiin demonstrations for and against
political groupi and even at public "homages" to the
president (59). Moreover, the government knew quite well
the effectiveness of these forms so that, although it
constantly used the argument of "civilized" negotiations, it
increasingly used the most repressive methods each time the
working class collectively took the initiative to demand its
rights. Extremely brutal police actions, not only against
strikes but, also, against workers' committees and party
organizations, became famous.
J

The issue of the real and daily application and presence

of these laws placed the government, the entrepreneurs and
the workers in a constant, detailed, varied and unequal
confrontation about the shaping of the public space being
opened by the legal regulation of capital-labour relations.
But the confrontation practises would soon enter into the
domain of interpretation, providing the content for the
different political visions that were to b~idelY debated in
a privileged space -- the 1934 constitutional Assembly
which was to legitimize the workings of power and the
society where it was being exercised.
 251

3.Workers' rights in institutional politics: the 1934

constitutional Assembly and the constitutional period

Against a backdrop of political agitation stemming from the

Sao Paulo Revolt of 1932 (60) and from the ineffable
articulations and re-articulations among the various groups
of lieutenants (tenentistas),: integralistas, regionalists,
oliqarchists, and Catholics (all of whom expressed their
interests in varying ways, whether through founding
political parties, newspapers, or movements) the Committee
which was to prepare the draft for the country's new
constitution was established on October 26, 1932. The
committee was comprised of educated members of the elite,
various famous jurists, army representatives and people
associated to the lieutenants' movement (tenentismo), as
well as the more important members of the government. The
draft was ready by the end of November. It included a new
actor in the country's legislative organization: the
professional"class representatives.
These professional" class representatives consisted of
deputies who had not been elected either by parties or by
universal popular suffrage but by representatives of
economically"defined social functions -- which at that time
referred exclusively to urban and industrial production.
Highly controversial, this form of political representation
was introduced by groups seeking to limit the regional

------
 252

oligarchies' political power and their de facto monopoly of

political party representation. President Getulio Vargas,
himself, the tenentistas and the less powerful, regional
oligarchies backed this professional-class representation
against those controlling politics in the central-south
states. The controversy included some unusual proposals,
such as the creation of a corporative parliament or of a
.
two'house political system, one professional-class and one
partisan. Finally, a one'house system was chosen which,
besides the representatives elected by universal vote, had
40 representatives from the professional and union
associations'-- 20 employees and 20 entrepreneurial (61).
The chance to participate in drawing up the country's
constitution, which would include guidelines for union
organization and contract rights and duties affecting the
labour market, led entrepreneurs and trade unions to choose
different modes of organization and strategies with which to
confront the battle they were waging in the public space
opened by the state's social legislation ~ These different
choices began with the entrepreneurs and workers' adhering
to the government's union scheme; in order to have their
professional'class deputies participate in the
Constitutional Assembly, the unions first had to be
recognized by tile government. They elected voting'delegates
Who, in turn, elected the 20 representatives who would act
in the Constitutional Assembly. Thus, by adopting the
ambiguous form of a parliamentary force, the union structure
 253

was acquiring an entirely new position in the political

sphere.
Few employers, themselves, had actually joined the
entrepreneurial trade unions at that time, and their
dominant sectors protested against the law, arguing that
they already belonged to independent, well'run associations,
besides pointing out that the union Law had not benefitted
them in any special way. Nevertheless, since the government
insisted on its unionizing requirement as a prerequisite for
participating professionally in the Constitutional Assembly,
by 1933, the employers' associations decided to campaign for
quick unionisation among entrepreneurs. Everything seems to
indicated that their efforts were successful; the number of
employers unions recognized that year went from 7 to 79 and
by 1934 had reached 273 registered entrepreneur unions. Of
these, 74 elected voting'delegates, of which 27. were from
Rio de Janeiro and 20 from Sao Paulo. Each voting'delegate
in turn, elected 17 employer'deputies, of which 16 were from
the South and 11 from the industrial sector (62). A survey
conducted by Castro Gomes shows that the same names always
appear in all these artiCUlations: a handful of
entrepreneurs represented the elite of the entrepreneurial
leadership.
Foremo$t amongst them, is Roberto Simonsen, a 3ao Paulo
entrepreneur who, since the 1920's, belonged to the small
entrepreneurial group concerned with modern management of
the labour organization process. In 1919, Simonsen (an

---- -.. _.-.

 254

engineer) already had tried to organize his own construction

company along the lines of "scientific management". He
realized earlier than most-entrepreneurs that workers
tolerance of the combination of harsh forms of discipline
and low wages would discrease. Ever since 1919, Simonsen
strove to disseminate the thought that regularly· paid and
"fair wages" be made commensurate with the "inevitable
variations in the productivit¥ from one man to the next"
meaning that the increase in the average wage level (and
the consequent decrease in poverty) would be directly
.
related to the increase in work eff~ciency. Simonsen also
intuited that if the employers' prevailing pattern of lack
of familiarity with the labour process and the workers'
growing protest power through strikes continued, employers
ran the risk of having the labour market and even the
factory space escape their exclusive control. The State's
first incursions into the factory space in the early 1920's,
when the first social laws were tested (cf. Chapter 1)
confirmed his assumptions and he tried to suggest to the
State that it try a different form of intervention; namely,
that it subsidise modern machinery, abolish inter-state
protective tariffs, and enact laws to protect industrial
production; in turn, the industrial sector would increase
wealth and have "healthy repercussions on our social
problems •.• " (63). While he tried to convince the government
and public opinion that by increasing wealth, industrial
productivity would create the bases for better work, health

------. .. - .. ----
- --~- ~- .. '- ..
 255

and educational conditions for the population, Simonsen

tried to persuade his peers that higher earnings and lower
level of worker discontent stemmed from rationalizing labour
..
grant~ng h~gher
,
wages in return for increased
productivity. In 1931, Simonsen founded the Institute for
the Rational Organization of Labour (IDORT), working
together with some of the most advanced entrepreneurs and
.
technicians who had previous experience with modern methods
of disciplining labour -- i.e. who had "scientifically"
dealt with the problems of labours' resistance to work, such
as absenteeism, quitting the job, under-commitment to the
work, hostility toward the production rh}~ (64). IDORT
recommended reorganizing traditional companies along Fordist
lines and promoting industrial education, professional
training and worker adjustment to "scientifically" organized
production levels. Between 1920 and 1940, Simonsen wrote
J

many articles which repeatedly alerted against class

struggle and communism which, he thought, would find
"fertile soil" in the inertia and ignorance of Brazilian
factory workers.
Simonsen and his friends were thus fighting on three
fronts: against organized-labour mobilization in the job
market and on the factory grounds; against the State's
intervention in the ~d.ctory space and t~le very
organizational model of the social rights it promoted; and
against the backward mentality of most of the Brazilian
entrepreneurs -- although Simonsen did share their belief in

---_.
 256

the intransigent defense of the employers' exclusive

authority in the production space. Furthermore, since the
late 1920's, Simonsen professed his ideas as an alternative
to both worker mobilization and State intervention in labour
relations. "Laws and regulations do not create productivity
and wealth," he said in a 1931 speech, He reiterated the
same theme in the 1934 Constitutional Assembly. "Let us
rationalise work and let our program be all-encompassing:
let it go from the systematic examination of our financial
ills to the improvement of our labour forces' health and
education; from the rationalizing of agriculture, to the
rationalizing of o~omestic market" (65), he continued,
demonstrating a far'reaching responsibility which the
I
distrustful public (and state) opinion would never have
expected from any entrepreneur (66).
In contrast, the prevailing mentality among the other
J •

entrepreneurs' representative bloc (for example, Francisco

de Oliveira Passos, President of the FIRJ (Rio de Janeiro
Industrial Federation) and Horacio Lafer, an important Sao
Paulo entrepreneur) was the opposite; classically, Lafer
viewed the government's social policy as a moral crusade
that should "protect the weak, provide for the unfortunate,
assist the proletariat and, in short, seek to make amends
for the world's miseries" (67).

Nevertheless, as authors who have made de~ailed analyses

of the entrepreneurs' role in the Constitutional Assembly
have nevertheless shown, these different mentalities did not

----'"-"--- -----
 257

prevent the entrepreneurs from taking a united stand 9 n the

practical aspects of the social legislation which was to be
recognized in the country's highest law. The debate raised
by the entrepreneurs' bloc insisted that the
(already· enacted) social legislation should not disorganize
?

factory· work efficiency, should not be prematurely

distributive, and should be restricted to general principles
which should merely point to 'the values and intentions
underlying the social rights, rather than to de facto
realities. Once again, at stake was compliance to the
social rights which, in spite of all the entrepreneurs
opposition and its own control mechanisms, were introducing
the workers to a new public space.
From the entrepreneurs' point of view, their victories
in the Constituent Assembly were not limited to those which
were included in the country's constitution as restrictions
on certain social rights .. such as the legality of
extending the S·hour workday; the permission for 14·year old
children to work; minimum· wage definitions based on the
Subsistence level of individual worker; and, above all,
banning the right to strike. More than this, the debates
regarding social rights recommended that the application of
the laws (and their practical regulation) should be adapted
to local conditions. This meant that the laws would be
handed over to the bureaucratic apparatus of regional state
governments precisely where regional employers'influence
was strong. Vianna has posited that through this measure,
 258

the qovernment was effectively institutionalisinq its

tolerance of the violations of the social legislation and
thus, entrepreneurs could "consider the times of
political-ideological polemics with the interventionist
state as finally over" (68). Havinq quaranteed that the law
•
would not enter the factory, at least in the crucial area of
the extensive and intensive exploitation of the labour
force, the entrepreneurs coula support the ideological
extension of factory relations into the social and public
organization of the country. Not only could they coexist
with the corporative aspects of the qovernment's social
control project, but they could even benefit, from it to the
extent that the laws' actual functioninq had been taken out
of the unions' control.: ',' \t' ';" .

The workers' representative bloc fought fiercely to

expand the already-enacted
, ., labour laws as well as for
measures quaranteeing these laws~. effectiveness. This
combative spirit was indicative of the autonomy which the
labour and union movement was able to maintain despite
.
having to submit to the official unionization rules.
Participation in the constitutional Assembly must have been
a powerful motive driving unions to request the Labour
Ministry's recoqnition"as well as the fact that the job
market's relative "stability" in 1933 redirected the
struggle toward the ability to reinforce the effectiveness
of the existing legislation. According to the Rio de Janeiro
daily correio da ManhA, the number of unions eligible for

---
 259

electing voterAdelegates was as many as 346, although Castro

Gomes, who quoted this figure, also shows that this union
representation was greater in the commercial and
transportation sectors than in the industrial sector. Thus,
for instance, 29 textile unions could be considered very few
?

in view of the importance of the textile industry in the

country, its widespread facilities throughout the nation and
the great number of workers it employed (69). Furthermore,
of all these unions, only a slightly over one hundred were
from Rio and Sao Paulo. Accordinqly, only two of the 18
professional'class deputies of the workers' representative
bloc came from the industrial production sector (one from
Sao Paulo and one from Parana) while 15 came from commerce
and transportation, 12 of which came from states other than
Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. To make the picture even more
grim, both the Labour and Justice Ministries had qreat
J

influence, and would daily call the labour'unions'

voting'delegates to the Ministries to establish the
composition and direction of their representative bloc (70).
Nevertheless, part of this bloc, known as the "proletarian
minority" left their mark on the debates on social and union
legislation, criticising worker orqanization's subordination
to the government, demanding the unions' autonomy and
attacking the employers and their proposals (71).
As a result, the debate on restricting the already'enacted
labour laws and the need to enforce their effectiveness
marked the confrontations with the employers' representative
 260

bloc. Such issues as the workday, limitations on f~male and

child'labour exploitation, expanding social security,
introducing the minimum wage and, above all, the right to
strike were the most heated debates and were vehemently
defended by the proletarian'minority faction.
The high point of the discussions centered on the model of
union organization to be adopted in the constitution. The
.
worker representatives defended one, single union per
industry, vested with full organizational and administrative
autonomy. Therefore, they rejected "any and all union
subordination to the Labour Ministry"; they upheld an
independent class program against the bourgeoisie; they
wanted unions to be given the power to enforce social laws
and also to have the right to call strikes "in the broadest
sense of the word." While some of the workers" deputies
pointed to ministerial
., solutions as ways of correcting
non"'compliance to the Law, recommending that "technicians"
rather than "politicians" should serve in the Labour
Ministry's inspections to ensure that they worked
effectively and neutrally, the proletariat minority proposed
that "all social legislation benefitting the proletariat
should come under the union's direct control, legally
authorized to file complaints in cases of violation of the
prevailing social laws" (72).
The workers goals were not realized. As could be
expected, the anti'worker proposals won. The 1934
Constitution sanctioned the principle of plurality and union
 261

autonomy, splitting these two principles which the labour

movement had defined as one and the same, and essential for
defending its interests. The movement was afraid of being
divided, (with the possible exception of the anarchists)
since it felt that employers could take advantage of any
such division, given most of the workers' varying levels of
information and adherence to the unions. At the same time,
the labour movement showed that the workers were not
interested in union unity without autonomy since, otherwise,
the unions could be turned into government instruments. The
entrepreneurs, for their part,feared the single'union
solution, whether it was controlled by the labour movement
or by the state. This is why they opted for the (winning)
proposal submitted by the Catholics who, in turn, were
interested in continuing the work they had been doing with
some worker groups
J
through the Catholic Worker Circles. As a
result, autonomy and plurality became the banner for a large
group whose motivations were heterogeneous and which were
expressed in the form of a liberal language (73).
The polarised discussion on the unions' autonomy, unity
and plurality showed that the state's powerful presence
could no longer be ignored in the struggle between workers
and employers. In only four years, the government had
asserted the bases of its ccn~~alised bureaucratic logic as
the source of the power, organization and management of
social conflict. The constitutional Assembly debates showed
that the social parameters for debate could no longer be
 262

defined without referring to the state's decision'making and

coercive mechanisms. This was due less to the fact that
there was no group in this struggle who could actually
impose its own autonomy than to the fact that, primarily,
the state's symbolic nature, as a necessarily'regulating
presence in society, already permeated it as a key
representation of the groups in struggle. In this respect,
.
this very way of representing the state was becoming the
point of departure of any action taken by social groups and,
thus, was determining their categories and strategies.
A result of this was that in fact, the Constitution had
consolidated state interference in capital and labour
conflicts. Although the Labour Ministry's bureaucracy
felt, at least, disappointed about the new Constitution
(especially the "legitimate revolutionaries", namely, the
lieutenants, who .,declared the new constitution to be the
"common grave" of the cause of the Revolution they had
staged in 1930, for it led to the return of oligarchical
liberalism) -- in fact, it had consolidated state
interference in capital and labour conflicts. In the
organized'movements' minds and practice the struggle already
had to go through the state. Although neither may have
admitted it publicly, both sides formulated their
strategies around the state project. Finally, the Labour
Ministry "reinterpreted" the very question of union
plurality and autonomy. This reinterpretation had to be
adopted by many entrepreneurial and workers' groups .. for
 263

the new Union Law issued by the Ministry (amazingly, only 4

days before the Constitution was enacted) reaffirmed the

,compulsory recognition of the unions by the Ministry; the

nature of the union as"collaborating" with the state; its
exclusively professional base and its subordination, as
unions had to send to the Ministry its minutes, membership
list, financial reports and details of its internal
.
operations. As Munakata has pointed out, the Ministry made
an artful interpretation of the notion of "autonomy" by
considering that it did not mean "independence in relation
to the law" (74). ~though often criticised as
unconstitutional, th~prevalence of the second Union Law
showed the material presence of the state as embodying the
public space of movement.
Nevertheless, the waged-labour and working'class groups
took the freer climate
., created by the constitutional
Assembly seriously; they used organized collective protests
to occupy spaces opened by constitutional democracy and by
organized political groups. Factories workers declared
strikes demanding compliance to labour laws and higher
wages, as well as claims such as the lifting of fines and
dismissals of chiefs and managers; the latter examples
showing that there were factories(even in Sao Paulo and Rio
C~ J'aneiro} where the symbolic constitutional value of
labour rights was still not at all enforced. In 1934, at
least 74 strikes were staged throughout the country; the
number decreased only slightly in 1935. Many of these
 264

strikes took over entire neighbourhoods and regions and

others encompasses industrial and professional sectors. But
most were limited to work'places, following the traditional
forms of protest and mobilization.
Side by side with strikes, a new type of political
practice was'emerging. It was characterized by the
popularizing of political debates in society, and further
.
benefitted from
.
mass organization fueled by a national
front articulated by the Communist Party. Although the
formal programme of this front, known as the ANL (Alianca
Nacional Libertadora), was similar to various ,others
developed by Communists Parties elsewhere in Latin Ame~ica

(anti-imperialist, anti-fascist, in favour of a popular,

nationalisinq government, with economic reforms and social
justice), what is important is that several of the society's
sectors, fighting, under different banners, adhered to it. It
was organized into neighbourhood or professional "cells",
each of which reflected its own base'group'.
characteristics. Thus, its themes included labour conditions
and the minimum wage; attacks on the government'.
inefficiency in promoting social rights, as well'as on
official corruption; a city'by'city accusation of the poor
housing and nutritional conditions, and with particular
emphasis on the conditions of urb4n transportation and its
costs:attacks against entrepreneurs and their backward and
paternalistic mentality, as well as against their pettiness
in factory management: it reaffirmed the rights ensured by

--.-
 265

the legislation; promoted consumer rights' demonstrations

for better food supplies, for lower prices, and for more
efficient and less expensive public services; organized the
agenda for group discussions of students, women , blacks,
with local newspapers and conferences; sought support from
.
the lower army ranks and launched particularly virulent
attacks on the latifundio, illiteracy and the lack of an
effective public health system. Although it is difficult to
ascertain exactly how many actually adhered to this
movement, it is known that in Sao Paulo alone, 412 people
were arrested the followinq year for havinq b~lonqed to the
ANL. Furthermore, the flourishinq of local cells did
received news coveraqe. In spite of the wave of citizenship-
related themes that swept Brazilian society in the few
months of the ANL's existence, were not distant from the
communists' plans to seize power and establish centralized
J

management of the various social movements, (as attested by

the movement's communist articulation itself); this seems to
have been less important than the fact that the ANL had a
popular and differentiated adherence which gave its movement
both impetus and a collective character. (75)
Inteqralismo, the right'wing movement opposinq the ANL,
also had its impetus and collective life. It was clearly
under the influence of nazism and fascism and, according to
Levine, the AlB (A9 ao lntegralista Brasileira) was able to
organize 4,000 "cells"(the same organizational form as the
ANL) in its heyday, throughout slightly under 700 Brazilian
 266

municipalities (76) . civil servants, the self'employed and

military personnel seem to have been the strongests
supporters of the AlB. Their numbers were complemented by
immigrant groups of Germans and Italians from small cities
and rural areas in
.,.
the South. Its policies were more
doctrinaire and abstract than those of the ANL; they were
created out of a confused combination of anticommunism,
anti-semitism and anti-capitaiism, permeated by caricatured
representations of a "national moral", rituals, manuals and
catechismal publications that lashed out against paganism,
tropicali~m and misceqenation as well as films and popular
music. It spoke outaqainst foreiqn capital and blamed the
liberal elite for the poverty and illiteracy of the
Brazilian people. To resolve these problems, the AIB had a
clearly'defined project: its total inteqration in the state,
in order to create a"real" nation. The AIB had several
entities serving as facades, such as the scouts, the "Green
Rescue" ("Socorro Verde"), sports clubs, schools, volunteer
women's social services, aviation associations, and in fact
it even created a para-military militia that trained noisily
and aggressively in public (77).
The significance of these two movements was crucial for
deciding the future of the workers and their organizations"
~autonomy as a political presence in formulating and managing
their rights. First, there was the danger that the ANL
represented -- much greater, obviously, than the AlB -- to
the government's corporativist and centralized project. The

.----- -
 267

ANL supported strikes and reinforced union opposition to the

Labour Ministry; it exposed, on the streets, the latter's

, ,
enormous inefficiency in achieving anything related to
workers' rights -- other than their silence by force.
Indeed, confronted by the growing number of strikes and
declining union memberships (requests for union official
recognition fell 20% in the nationalmovement, 60% in Rio de
.
Janeiro and 48% in Sao Paulo)-, and despite the new
constitution's guarantees, the Labour Ministry had itself
sponsored increased police repression to suppress strikes
and contain union autonomy. Accusations in the State
Assemblies and in the Federal House of Representatives
clearly denounce the extreme violence of that repression,
which was to mark the beginnings of the notoriety of the
police chief, Felinto Muller. Under Muller's authority,
strikers were imprisoned and tortured; many strike leaders
J

simply disappeared; and independent union headquarters were

invaded. Years later, Minister Agamenon Magalhaes admitted
that in late 1934, police coercion was encouraged in strikes
as the only means of putting the workers movement "within
the existing legal order", as if this order prevented union
autonomy and plurality (78). Second, the ANL, besides
showing its relative effectiveness in organizing public and
diversified pro~ests, publicised the strikes as a means of
increasing public support for their cause -- provoking in
turn the government's desperate response in the form of even
harsher coercive action. In April 1935, the government
 268

decreed the National Security Law, approved under pressure

out of a hesitant and weak Congress. Through that law,
independent unionism began to be destroyed and any strike
was repressed in the name of a Communist threat. Thus, nine
months of a "liberal" constitutional regime had again
generated a centralized government, whereby the legislative
branch was subordinated to a strong and centralized
.
executive in its decision'making processes. In July 1935,
three months after the law had been decreed and, during
which time,strikes were contained but not fully crushed, the
ANL was finally closed down.
In November, the Communist Party tried to~tage an armed
uprising which was very disorganized and unknown to most of
the party bases(79). This did not prevent it from having to
pay dearly for the incident. The government used this as an
excuse to end workin9'class organizational autonomy once and
J

for all and was able to decree a state of siege. The

government now co~tained the working class with its prisons,
deportations, impeachments, definitive union shut'downs. As
Timothy Harding has stated, as early as 1935 the working
class had already begun to live under the effects of the
1937 coup (80)

* *-* * * * * *
In August 1939, well into the Estado Novo that had emerged
from the 1937 coup, the third and last Brazilian Union Law
was issued, and (although slightly ammended) is still in
effect today_ The law adapted the union structure to the
 269

spirit of the Estado Novo dictatorship although, in

practice, that "adaptation" had already been aChieved
through the unprecedent repression of the independent
working class movement during 1936 and 1937. Hence, in
reality, it was more a case of legalizing that repression in
...

order to be able to deal with any further autonomous

collective mobilization. The government, after all, could
.
not forget the period when its inability to make itself
obeyed was exposed, when strikes had been constant and
publicised, when the opposition's quick organizational
abilities had pointed to the swelling trend of protests and
self organization. The government was thus reduced to
violently closing the public space that it had opened by
the very legal declaration of rights, for the risks of these
laws were now known: the working class demanded the control
of its own ways of functioning.
J

The new union Law was written in the spirit of the

previous two, although it restricted union autonomy even
further in terms of both orga~ization and internal
management; even the most minimum of details of union
administration were now subject to government approval. It
reaffirmed the single union per profession policy, based on
a long list of professional categories which it recognized
exclusively , and to which workers would have to conform.
These professional categories were then corporativized,
independently of how the real workers might conceive
themselves as a collective. Ultimately, the state-defined
 270

corporation took the place of the class as a real body, that

is, expressive of the workers' lived relation with their
work. Politically, the state's paternalistic image reached
its zenith: the union was placed as if in a nursery where,
protected from "the
.,. contamination of bad social elements , of
strange and corrupting intrusions, and from disturbing
ideological infiltrations" it could learn to have "greater
discipline and structure" -- that is, workers would learn in
it to be "conscious of their new duties to the profession,
to the national community to which they belong and to the
state, under whose discipline they find thems~lves". This
would all culminate in the "disclosure and selection of
leaders for the unions and the creation of a truly
professional elite" (81). As for the issue of the social
laws in effect (which were reaffirmed in the new 1937
Constitution), the National Labour-Department created 13
J

bureaucratic agencies for controlling, inspecting and

modifying their implementation •.
What then had happened at the end of this decade which
had turned from that longing for change and reform, that was
born in the 1920'S? A decade which had dawned with the
promise of a new equation from which to establish more
.
egalitarian social rights, a decade enlightened by the
struggles envisioning popular organization for polit-.tcs? By
the end of these 10 years of new experiences of power
organization, bureaucratic domination had already been
cemented into the government apparatus itself; confused its
 ·271

own ~pace with the society's public space and operated

solgly under the imperative of its own selfApreservation. By
the end of this decade in which there had been a brief
o~ening in a varied horizon of political debates, public
Jpinion found itself disarmed by ideological censorship,
feeling threatened by what it was being shown to be the
Jangers of communism, a society's disorder, and the return
.
to liberal "chaos". Many of the social laws issued to grant
~orkers their minimum social rights, ended up being nothing
~ore than a brilliant facade of governmental legitimacy to
hide the tragedy of a harnessed union and of the
little'changed reality of daily factory relations.
How can we ultimately ascertain that the laws, in
~ality; only marginally affected workers' daily lives?
First, beoause there is the unmistakable 'evidence of strikes
and movements ma~ing on'going demands for their compliance.
Second, the speeches of successive Labour Ministers and
government ~mployees, which follow along these same lines,
considering entrepreneurs' resistance as the major obstacle
barring the shaping of the enacted legal rights (82) •.
Nevertheless, perhaps the greatest indication is the
continued development of industry itself throughout the
decade and the impasses it had to confront, over those years
in order to actually be able to expand.

4. The textile industry and the entrepreneurs' use of the

social laws
 272

The history of the textile industry during this period is a

prototype of the conditions preventing labour laws and
labour rights from being implemented within the factory
production syst~ itself. This industry was responsible for
the highest rates of industrial growth, between 1932 and
1939, and set the basic cond~tions (described in Chapter I)
for manufactured production: a)it was regionally
concentrated in Rio, Sao Paulo and Minas Gerais; b) it
maintained close links with the distributors; c)it operated
at high profit rates; d)it relied on effective pressure
mechanisms, such as tariff controls and government subsidies
during sales crises, to ensure State protection in times of
emergency; e)it based its production on an extended workday,
using many workers on each machine as a result of deficient
factory equipmen~ (83). These conditions varied from one
mill to the next, particularly in terms of the
workerAequipment relation -- the more productive equipment
being found in the larger factories.
This textile industry met the 1929 crisis with a
reasonable margin of idle capacity in its equipment and
facilities. At the same time, its market was made up
primarily of low'income consumers. Fearing the effects of
the crisis on sale vol-umes;, in 1931, the entrepreneurs
.

demanded that textile'machinery imports should be restricted

in order to counteract what they were experiencing as an
"over-production" crisis. When the bill was presented to the
 273

congress, it also included a request for the reduction of

the workday to 8 hours -- something the entrepreneurs had
not r€quested and thus caused a great deal of protest. In
March 1931, a decree restricting machinery imports for "all
industries considered to be in a state of over"production"
was enacted, with no reference made to the eight"hour
work'day. This episode demonstrated, perhaps for the first
.
time, the enormous importance· of the extensive exploitation
of the labour force within the total set of production
elements. Throughout a minimum of twenty years, (actually
until'.1950), other incidents in this industry's growth would
serve to show the extent to which this form of exploitation
was possible, which was due to large supply of labour
.
available in the labour market and, necessarily, due to the
overall low technical levels in the organization of
production.
Although they had united in an organization for the
defense of their interests (the CIFTA, Confedera9ao da
Industria de Fia9ao e Tecelagem de Algodao, which was
represented in the Industrial Federation of Brazil), not all
the textile entrepreneurs shared a similar interest in the
measure to restrict the purchase of imported equipment.
When, as a result of another request from the Industrial
Federation of Brazil, the decree was extended in 1933 for
another four years, the small establishments in the
country's interior voiced strong protests. As stein points
out, "the curtailment of machinery exports caused friction
 274

among entrepreneurs", because the distribution and the age

of the machines were not the same, obviously, for all the
factories. The equipment of the small factories was worn out
and they could not increase their profitability through the
improvement of production,' like the larger mills who did
have the conditions to produce fine cloths at a better
price. It is important to see how that dispute was resolved
.
by using their common product~on element: the labour force.

The small companies "increased their output, lowered their

prices slightly, and immediately found a vast market" for
their coarse cloth production (84) -- and this production
increase could only have come about through the extension
of the working hours, given that this was the only available
and "flexible" factor in production. The large enterprises
"turned to the easiest method to reduce manufacturing costs:
they stretched the
., work-day beyond the normal ten hours and
added a second, even a third, shift." still according to
stein, this time quoting newspapers, "some small mills
producing coarse goods were reported to have worked sixteen
to twenty'four hours daily between 1932 and 1937, although
by mid'1936, workers were refusing to extend their workAday

into the evenings, on the grounds of fatigue." (85).

Nevertheless, non'permanent workers would agree to be hired
by the month or day, and would remain in the factory

overtime "even returning in the evening," as long as there

was no cut in their wage. This last example gives an idea of
the magnitude of the existing industrial reserve army, the
 275

classic role its presence'played, and the low reproduction

levels of the labour force.
This way of increasing production met with the classical
mode of labour force "exploitation through destruction"
typical of the periods of recent industrialization. It also
combined well with the costs'to'profit entrepreneurial
mentality mentioned above. It is important to remember once
again, that the eightAhour work day had already been decreed
by law in May 1932, that is, five years before the various
textile production shifts, referred to above, had been
adopted. The fact that the entrepreneurs rarely respected
that law is evident, insofar as the bulk of their profits
came from the increase in the workday'S excess hours, as
well as on their reliance on fixed and low wage. Stein
quotes the minutes of one textile factory's board of
d~rectors meeting in 1937, in the following terms: "in order
J

to reduce manufacturing costs, [the director] orders that

steps be taken to organize a new shift to work at night"
(86). To the extent this method of achieving greater
production can be generalized for the entire textile
industry -- and there are signs that it did operate
throughout the industry in the same way (87) -- the type of
industrialisation being shaped becomes clearer. Its
principr-1.. c.haracteListics were the absence of any capital
actually reinvested in equipment, the organization of most
of production in small and medium'sized companies, the total
lack of a modern conception of management which could
 276

rationalise production, .and the large number of workers

employed for extended work'days. These characteristics point
to a type of industrial expansion which relied entirely on
the extraction of what Marx called absolute surplus value,
combined with changing technical levels.
Moreover, while the entrepreneurs complained about a
state of crisis caused by "uncontrolled over'production",
.
the textile industry reached unprecedented growth levels, at
a rate of 10% per year between 1932 and 1939 and, obviously,
huge profits were made (88). The restriction on the purchase
of machines, far from being a means of controlling this
assumed over-production served, in fact, t~ make clear that
-- having no expenses for facilities and organization, nor
any thoughts of using resources to achieve efficiency based
on improved technology and management -- high profits were
made, instead, by operating equipment at near capacity, thus
J

lowering the unit cost of production.

This mechanism was again repeated between 1937 and 1940.
At the beginning of 1937, the fight between large and small
entrepreneurs was reactivated as a result of a new demand by
the large entrepreneurs of Rio and Sao Paulo, to continue
the restrictions against buying new equipment. Once again,
the small companies pointed to the unfair competition
between those who still nad equipment able to continue
producing profitably, and those who suffered from the lack
of finances to modernize and organize their production. The
proposal generated so many protests and accusations about
 277

the large industry's attempted monopoly -- which,

incidentally, must have been true -- that in March, 1937,
all restrictions on textile machinery imports were dropped.
Between 1937 and 1940, manufacturers "imported almost twice
as much machinery as they had in previous years" (89).
The Rio and Sao Paulo entrepreneurs then turned their
attention to restricting the .workday to eight hours,
adopting a position against eXtra hours. It seems clear that
this sudden humanist attitude was, in fact, a powerful
weapon aimed at destroying their small competitors and,
•
particularly, the northAeastern entrepreneurs, who possibly
had a market reserve in their region. stein portrays moments
of this new battle which are very enlightening: " ••• it was
even reported that one industrialist [in 1938] connected
with some of the largest northern mills ••• affirmed that the
southern mills and associations aimed at a'nefarious' plan
for a nation'wide, 48'hour week in the cotton manufacture
because they wanted to 'ruin' the northern mills"(90). That
dispute exploded through the personal efforts of the
Lundgren family -- owners of the already'mentioned Fabrica
Paulista and of the famous Casas Pernambucanas
(traditionally Brazil's major distribution network for
popular cloths), and spokesmen for the north and
northeastern industry -- against tne southern entrepreneurs.
Among other accusations about the real nature of the
proposal, the Lundgrens denounced the control of the work
hours, affirming that far from being an enlightened
 278

proposal, it was in fact a way "to oblige northern

entrepreneurs to follow suit" (91). They also asserted that
to use cheap labour against the better equipment of southern
factories was part of a healthy competition which the
southern entrepreneurs
.. sought to avoid. The violent
rejection, of the eight'hour workday proposal was also due
to the consequences of the measure: it presupposed raising
wages in order to allow higher income levels and, thus,
increase the size of the internal consumer market. Moreover,
the proposal also involved improving the overall quality of
the cloths produced.Neither the eight'hour workday and its
consequent wage increase, nor the qualitative improvement of
the cloths, could be established within most of the textile
factories' existing forms of organization, still based on
the molds of absolute surplus value extraction.
Several aspests of labour'force exploitation in textile
industry of the 1930-1940 become clear through this dispute.
The press published the wage levels in the various Brazilian
regions, referring to wages in Rio as "wretched", in Sao
Paulo as "infamous" and in Pernambuco, "hopeless." (92)
Disclosures about the Lundgrens revealed that they "ran
their mills as feudal seigneurs" and that even in Sao Paulo,
"textile mill owners used women and children on night shifts
lasting up to 14 hours· l
• It was apparent too thea.:': with the
exception of Rio, almost no conditions had been provided for
supervising violations of labour legislation (93).
 279

This entrepreneurial use of social laws shows the

structure of industrial relations and growth as having a
clearly important role in determining the trajectory of the
social laws in the factory; also it explains why the
independent trad7 unions had to be destroyed. Indeed, what
authors have called "a predominantly economistic action of
Brazilian trade unionism" was, in fact, an action that
tended to turn the factory in~o an arena of political
activity, because the laws of the state penetrated it. For a
decade, the unions and their strikes continued to denounce
the savage basis for industrial progress and, through it,
they developed the agenda of what were becoming the social
laws: they demanded the control of them, themselves -- and,
this would ultimately mean commanding the job market within
the factory site itself. This is why, the government's
penetration intoJthe factory's internal time, in order to
then externalize it in the form of a legal ideology of
formal equality -- became the real political and symbolic
issue. This is the reason that the government kept itself on
a terrain it defined as administrative, modern, just .... and
when necessary, policed. "Political incidents" could
certainly not have fit in there.

NOTES
---...;;-

1.Minister Lindolfo Collor.Discurso no Rotary Club, December

2~, 1930.Reprinted in Araujo, R.M., 0 Batismo do Trabalho,
R10, 1981, p. 178.

2. Cf. Joaquim Pimenta Retalhos do Passado. Rio de Janeiro

Imprensa Nacional, 1949. p.417
 280

3 .Minister ~indolfo Collor. "Exposic;ao de Motivos do Decreto

19,770 / 3-l9-~931. In: Louzada, Alfredo Joao. Legislacao
social Trabalh~sta. Rio de Janeiro: 1933, p.402.
4. pimenta, Joaquim. "Direito Sindical Brasileiro." in
Revista do Trabalho, November, 1935, p.3
5. Cf. Moraes Filho, .Eva~isto, 0 Problema do Sindicato Unico
no Brasil. Sao Paulo: Ed1tora Alfa Omega, 1978, p.223 note
224. ?

6.Decree-law n. 19.770 - 3/19/1931

7.0n the castration of trade-union autonomy by the state
LaW see the classic works of Simao, Azis. Sindicato e
Est~do,sao Paulo: Dominus Editora, 1966. Rodriques, Leoncio
Martins. Conflito Industrial e Sindicalismo no Brasil,
SaoPaulo: Ed. Difel, 1966.Rodriques, Albertino, Sindicato e
Desenvolvimento no Brasil. Sao Paulo: Ed. Difel, 1968.
Weffort, Francisco, Sindicato e Estado, Thesis, USP,
1972.Moraes Filho, Evaristo. op.cit., 1978. See also
Martins, Heloisa, 0 Estado e a Burocratizacao do Sindicato
no Brasil. Sao Paulo:Ed. Hucitec, 1979. Bernardo, Antonio
Carlos. Tutela e Autonomia Sindical (1930'1935). Sao Paulo:
1982.
8.Varqas, Getulio. A Nova Politica Do Brasil. Vol. III. Rio
de Janeiro: Jose Olympio, 1938, p. 144.
g.On the notion of representation as a political
idea(especially the medieval conception), see CHAUI,
Marilena."A Trajetoria de ideias de representacao", in
Chaui, M. "Por Uma Nova Politica." Revista Desvios, no.1,
J
Nov. 1982.

10 .• Pimenta, Joaquim. op.cit., 1949, p. 414

11.In this strike, the textile entrepreneurs refused to
negotiate and instead called the police to repress the
movement. The textile workers' union (UOFT) then sent a
commission of workers to Rio to ask for the Labour
Ministry's mediation. The Minister agreed to call the
entrepreneur association (CIFT) and forced them to
negotiate. Cf. Chapter II.
12. DIAS, Everardo. Historia das Lutas Sociais no Brasil.
Rio de Janeiro: Edaglit, 1962, pp. 179'186
1~.In the regions which were less industrialized but had
hlgher rates of popular dissatisfaction, "modernizingll
ten7n~i~mo organized "Popular Legions II or "Work Legions"
mloblllZl~g workers for their causes. Cf. Trindade,Helgio.
ntegrallsmo. 0 Fascismo Brasileiro da Decada de 30.Sao
Paulo: Editora Difel, 1974; and Araujo, op.cit., 1981,
Pp.79'S3
 281

l4.Cf. Araujo, op.cit., 1981, pp 83'84.

15. Ibid., pp. 145' 146
"
16. Canedo , Leticia Bicalho. 0 Sindicalismo Bancario em
saoPaulo. Sao Paulo: Editora Simbolo, 1978, ch. 2.
l7.0n Fabricas Paulistas, cf. Leite Lopes, J.S.,A Tecelagem
dos Conflitos de Classe na Cidade das Chamines. Doctoral
dissertation, UFRJ, 1986. Also from the same author,"Fabrica
'e vila Operaria: considera90es sobre uma forma de servidao
burquesa" in Lopes et alii, Mudanca Social no Nordeste, Rio
de Janeiro, Paz e Terra, 1979.Also Alvim, Rosilene
B.,op.cit., 1982. On the inceptive to create the unions,
cf.Rodriques, A., op.cit., 1968 and Pimenta, Joaquim,
op.cit., 1949.
la.Grossi, Yone de Souza. Mina de Morro Velho:A Extracao
doHomem. Sao Paulo: Paz e Terra, 1981
•
19. vianna, Luiz Wernecke Liberalismo e Sindicato no Brasil.
SaoPaulo: Paz e Te~a, 1976. p.144
20. Niemayer, Waldyr.Cited in Harding, Timothy, Political
History of Organized Labour in Brazil. Ph. Dissertat~on,
Stanford University, 1972 ••
21. These quotes can be found in A Plateia and also in
Antunes, Ricardo. Classe Operaria. Sindicato e Partido no
Brasil. Sao Paulo: cortez Editora, 1982, p. 82 and ff.Also
Bernardo, A.C., op.cit., 1982 and Simao, A., OPe cit., 1966.
22. Cf. Antunes, R, op.cit. 1982; SIMAO, A.,op.cit., 1966;
Troyano, Annez, Estado e Sindicalismo, Sao Paulo,1978.
23. ibidem.
24. Vianna', op.cit, 1976, p.142.
24. Rodriques, J.A. op.cit., 1968, p. 83.
25. Blass, Leila M.S., Imprimindo a Propria Historia: 0
Movimento dos Trabalhadores Graficos na decada de 20.
Master's degree thesis, University of Sao Paulo, 1982, p.67
27. Cited in Dean, Warren.A Tn:.lustrializacao de Sao Paulo.
Sao Paulo:Ed. Difel, 1971,-p.177
28. Pupo Nogueira, o. "carteiras Profissionais", (Jan.
1932). In A Industria Em Face das Leis do Trabalho. Sao
Paulo: Escolas Profissionais Salesianas, 1935
29. Munakata, Kazumi. A Legislacao Trabalhista no Brasil.
Sao Paulo: Brasiliense, 1981.
 283

46. Matarazzo, Francisco. Diario de Sao Paulo. 4-26-

1931.Quoted in Saenz Leme, op.cit 1978, p. 146
47.FIESP, Circulares de 1931. /
48.FIESP, Circulares de 1934.
49.LaW no. 23.768/1'18-34
50.circulares da~CIB., 1933'1935. Quoted in Castro Gomes,
1979, p. 245.
51. Castro Gomes, op.cit. p. 235
52. Boletim do MTIC, no. 3 Nov. 1934, p. 298
53. Vianna , Oliveira. "Fiscalizac;aao das Leis Sociais."
BMTIC, no. 4, pp.129'131
54.Decree no. 24,692, 7-12-1934
55. Boletim do HTIC. March, 1935, pp. 101-119. During
1934,according to this report, 4,475 establishments were
visited, of which 3,850 had some irregularity in relation to
the leqislation.
56.Vianna, OPe cit.,1977, p. 177
57.Simao, op.cit., 1966, p. 83.
58 . Munakata, op. cit., 19"81, pp • 88 - 89
J.

59.In 1933, there was a "Proletariat March" to the catete

Presidential Palace. The issue of the real compliance to
the Labour Laws was also raised in the 1932 Paulista-
Revolution, in the demonstrations against the
inteqralistas(1933-1934), and in the massive "homages" to
Getulio Varqas.
60;- Ever since the government had come to power in October,
1930, it had been run by the Chief of State and the state's
executive aparatus with no provision for legislative
assemblies. This order was to end when a Constitutional
Assembly convened to draft the new constitution, reflecting
the new political times. since the government-did not seem
at all decided about readily convening the Assembly, the
dominant Sao Paulo groups, relatively deprived of their
earlier power availed themselves of this delay to promote a
sweeping pro-constitutional movement in the country, that
eventually led to the Sao Paulo civil war against the
government groups surrounding Getulio vargas. A military
defeat, the Sao Paulo revolt did, nonetheless speed up the
pro~e~s for convening the constitutional Assembly, and for
deflnlng the constitutional powers of the government. In
 284

February 1932, the electoral code, which was to determine

both the representation and the electoral college to elect
the new president, was drawn up. Elections were scheduled
for May 1933. In November 1932, the bill for the new
constitution was submitted. Elections were held in May and
July 1933, and the work'of the Constitutional Assembly began
in November. The New Constitution was enacted on July 16,
1934 and two days later Getulio Vargas was elected president
of tehe Republic indirectly and constitutionally.
61.Castro Gomes, A. M. "A Representacao de classes na
constituinte de 1934", Revista de Ciencia Politica., Vol. 21
no.3, July/September 1978.
.
62.Ibid.Vianna , W., op.cit.;· 1977.
63.Simonsen, Roberto. "Financas e Industria". 1931. Also:
"Trabalho Modemo", 1919. On Simonsen and his ideas of
rationalizing work, cf. Howes, R.Progressive Cons;ervatism
in Brazil : Oliveira Vianna. Roberto simonsen and the Social
Legislation of the Vargas Regime. Ph.D. Dissertation,
University of Cambridge, 1976. • Henry Ford was translated
into Portuguese in 1927 by Monteiro Lobato.
64.Among these technicians was Roberto Mange, a Swiss
engineer who had dedicated himself to the selecting and
professional training of railmen for Companhia Sorocabana,
although his work was not restricted to professional
training alone.Rather, he conducted surveys to seek
solutions in education,in sanitation and in the
psychological and physical resistance of workers. Another
technician was Francisco de Salles Oliveira, an engineer
actively involved in the labour organization problems which
arose in the Companhia de Forca e Luz (Power and Light
Company) and in the various other industries he later worked
for. Both published articles inthe IDORT magazine.
65.Simonsen, op.cit. , 1931, p. 38.
66.IndustrY, came under the general attack of various groups
of society: from discontented, grievance-claiming workers,
from lieutenants who looked upon industry as a
"parasiticplutocracy" of the State; from coffee growers who
felt muchthe same; and from consumers who blamed protective
tariffs for the high cost of living.
67.Constituent Asseembly AnnalS, vol. 2, p.322i Quoted in
Castro Gomes, op.cit.,1978, p.92
68.Vianna, W. ap.cit. 1977,
69.Castro Gomes, op.cit., 1978, p. 101
70.Ibid, p.99; Grossi, op.cit., 1982
 285

71.Excluding the Anarchists, various organizations

structured along doctrinary lines (Catholics, Communists,
Trotskyists)had acquired positions· within official unions.
Furthermore,from all indications, part of the independent
movement had aqreed to become official but maintained its
own practices.In Sao Paulo, for example, there are records
of groups like the Coligacao Sindical Proletaria, the
Pederacao Sindical Proletaria, and the Frenta Unica
Sindical, all qroups of heterogeneous unions that,
nonetheless, strove to gainin dependenca from the Labour
Ministry. There was also the union-oriented communist
movement which founded various Regional Onion Federations,
in addition to vying for seats(from Pernambuco and Rio
Grande do Sul) in the State constitutional assemblies. Cf.
Munakata, K., op.cit.1981 ; Munakata, K. Algumas Cenas
Brasileiras , Master Thesis, UNICAMP,1983; Antunes, op.cit.
1983, Almeida, op.cit. 1978.
72.Cf. activities of the workers representative bloc in the
ANe Annals, cited by Almeida,op.cit. 1978, Castro
Gomes,op.cit. 1978
73.0n liberalism and its ramifications by the various groups
that fought for political power in the ANC, see Vianna, W.,
op.cit.,1977.
74.Munakata, Kazumi.op.cit. 1981, p.96
75. Cf. Levine, R. The Vargas Regime; The critical Years
.1934-1938.New York, Columbia Oniversity Press, 1970. Levine
analysis of ALN differs from other ones in detailling its
mobilization basis and capacity for channel political
allegiance. Other analists center on communists tatics and
ideological splite. See Aquiar Bas~os, Prestes e a RevolucAo
Social, Rio de Janeiro, 1956, Edggar Carone, A Republica
ye1ha , Sao Paulo, 1974, Helio Silva, 1935: A Revolta
Vermelha, Rio, 1969, Foster Dulles, J. Anarquistas a
Comunistas no Brasil 1900-1935, Rio de Janeiro, 1981
76.Ibid, Chapter 3.
77.0n the AIB, cf. Trindade, H.op.cit.:Chaui
,Marilena,"Apontamentos para uma critica da Acao
Inteqralista Brasileira" in Ide10gia e MobilizacAo Popular,
Rio dee Janeiro, 1978: Levina, R. Ibid.
78. BMTIC, no.3~, February, 1937
79.0n the communist uprising of 1935, see Basbaum, Historia
Sincera da Republica, vol. 3 , Sao Paulo, 1968, Carone,
op.cit., 1974 , Dulles, op.cit., 1981.
80. Harding. op,eit" 1973

.... _.--- ... _-

 286

81. vianna, Oliveira, et alii. "Anteprojeto da Lei que

dispoe sabre os sindicatos profissionais justificativa" in
~IC , n. 53 , January, 1939

82.Most of the authors who focus on social labour laws and

their compliance, in the post'1930 period, assume
that"inspite of the lack of personnel and other problems,
the Labour Inspection sectors guaranteed compliance to the
leqal mandates much more effectively than in previous
times(presumably durinq the 1920's)" Castro Gomes, op.cit.,
1979,p.237; or else, they suqqest that, at the beqinninq of
the dictatorship period (1937'1938), the state was
responsible"this time, for imposinq the effectiveness,
followed by a reasonable inspection, of the labour laws"
vianna , L. W. op.cit., 1977,p. 222. I argue the opposite
here.
83.Stein, Stanley. The Brazilian cotton Manufacture,1850-
1950 ,Boston: Harvard University Press, 1957: street,
Ernesto. "A Industria Textil no Brasil", Estudos Economicos,
no. 1, September, 19~0
84.Stein,op.cit. 1957 p. 143
85. Ibid., p.144
86.Ibid., p. 251, n. 27
87.Documentos CIFTA: "Inquerito Sobre a Jornada de
Trabalho."
88.Malan, et.alii •• Politica Economica Externa
eIndustrializacao no Brasil: 1939-1952. IPEA, 1977, p.273
89.Ibid., p. 148. 0 Observador Economico e Financeiro.
XXXV ,dec., 1938
90.Stein, Ibid., p.155
91. Ibidem
92.J.S. Maciel Filho •• "0 Pano que e' Pimenta" in 0
Imparcial, January 4, 1939
93.Quoted in Stein. op.cit., p. 257, note 88
 287

CHAPTER IV : THE AGENTS OF PUBLIC LIFE (ItJ~1- J~4Lt)

"The movement of November (lOth

the date of the Estado Novo coup) ( ••• )
was an imperative of the national will.
Our public life had gradually become an
arena of sterile battles (due to the
depletion of the sources producing
agents who stimulate and renew public
life) ( ••• ) The Estado Novo embodies the
aspirations and ideas it is instilling
[ ••• ] It will mobilize our healthiest
and our best to achieve the ideal of a
strong, dignified and happy Nation".
(Getulio Varqas, Head of the National
Government, February, 1938.)

I.The destruction of the public realm

The organized popular .and party movements - which, in 1938,
Getulio Vargas was calling the "arena of sterile battles" -
had been destroyed between November, 1935 and November,
1937. Their destruction had not occurred because their
"sources had been depleted", as Vargas declared but, rather,
because these movements had flourished as broad popular
mobilizations. Crushing their spirit had entailed the use of
massive repression, organized at the state level and legally
supported by a state of Siege decre~. Moreover, the acts of
repression against the increasingly organized working-class
movement, and the strikes of 1931-35, had made police
assaults common practice. unions were crushed, their records
 288

seized· and often destroyed by the police; independent

newspapers were censored or closed down with considerable
violence; almost 300 "undesirable" foreigners (mostly union
,
leaders) were expelled from the country; militant workers ,
intellectuals, military officers and soldiers were jailed,
tortured and dismissed; members of parliament were
imprisoned, as were, obviously, ALN and PCB leaders; anti-
communist propagand increased; and the newly-established
National security Court used summary proceedings to condemn
and confine militants of the organized movements and, often,
to exile them to ininhospitable reqions aroun~ the country.
All of this buried the incipient politics of social
mobilization outlined durinq the first half of the 1930s.
Above all, it destroyed the foundations of a differentiated
public space for information, debate and new qrounds for
social issues.

The swiftness with which union and party leaders

were silenced and the violence with which critical public
opinion was repressed in the course of those two years
I

proved overwhelminq. Even a superficial analysis of this

triumph of repressive authoritarianism reveals, above all,
the extent to which the dominant classes feared the force
behind the desire for change of an increasingly 'mobilized
society. However, it also points to the diverse and
fragmented nature of the political priorities which the
organized groups had defined for the social struggle. There
 289

had,. of course, been resistance ~o repression from all

sides, - but it had dissipated before a broad confrontation
could actually be organized. The so-called "parliamentary
minority" in the National Congress, for example, denounced
the arbitrary police actions and also repudiated the
qovernment's repressive bills. But, the majority of deputies
went along with the repression - a shocking revelation about
those who, acting in the name', of liberalism, had just
finished writing a constitution restricting government's
powers. Some groups, such as PCB and the ALN, were organized
clandestinely in 1936 and 1937, but sterile i~eological

debates (together with the repression) dissolved any

remaining potential mobilization. Similarly, new
conspiracies emerged in military circles but there too
Getulio vargas'increasinq power accentuated their internal
divisions. The presidential election promised for 1938
mobilized all the political circles, even though plans of
the existing government for a coup were known. Crowning all
of this, the anti-communist campaign, noting the re-
emerqence of "subversive and foreign forces", spread unrest
and forged information to discredit any autonomous
mobilization. At the same time, shielded by the climate of
repression, euphoric entrepreneurs reversed earlier
workiL~Aclass gains, while the Labour Ministry intervened in

many unions, silencing even their legally-sanctioned

demands. All of this opened the way for the coup d'Etat of
NOVember, 1937, which thus merely legitimized the
 290

destruction of political dissension, particularly when

organized by the workers (1).

This tragedy redefined the battleground for the

struggles of the workers, entrepreneurs, and government.
Indeed, it is this redefinition that must be grasped since,
however much the unprecedented artifices of the dictatorial
.
government of 1937-1945 may suggest only the mistakes and
the silence of class struggle in this period, in effect they
did not dampen that battle. Nevertheless, its form may have
changes entirely because the chances of such struggles
becoming explicit were so few. In the first place, the
continuous resistance of the working class in the factories
insistently challenged the entrepreneurs' exploitation and
their abuses of the workers' basic rights. Secondly, certain
unions tried to take advantage of the government's own
agenda demanding the de facto implementation of the precepts
of the CLT - in spite of all the limitations which these
imposed on union organization. In the third place, ~e

promises contained in the government's developing social

policies did not prevent urban living standards from
deteriorating, and even the guarantee of a legal minimum
wage did not impede the growth of social inequalities.
Hence, the outburst of urban protest around 1944, by
impatient consumers who opposed economic restrictions on
their survival and recognized the link between these
restrictions and the privileges which the authoritarian
 291

government had granted to the entrepreneurs. None of this

occurred in a systematic and organized way; more than ever
before, social struggles during this period were unequal and
fragmented, their organization prevented through repression
and eclipsed by the brilliant spectacle of the state. still,
this did not stop these struggles from being part of the
historical dynamics of the period. Even if they were hidden
.
behind the only kinds of popular demonstrations (those
supporting Brazilian participation in the World War) that
marked these years.

The silent conditions of labour

One might well imagine that the only two strikes

J

recorded for 1936 - one by the Porto Alegre railway workers,

the other by the "securi tarios" in santos (2) - represent
the final gasps of a movement, and that now even "minor"
stoppages were being crushed. Nevertheless, between January
and the coup in November, 1937, the Labour Ministry itself
officially recorded 21 strikes around the country. Demands
by the strikers included establishment of a minimum wage

(endorsed in the 1934 constit'nticn), wage increases, the

reinstatement of family allowances discontinued by the
companies and, as usual, adherence to the a-hour workday. A
significant number of workers participated in some of these
 292

strikes: 5.000 textile workers at Votorantim, for example,

struck for wage increases in Sorocaba,SPi 1,600 textile
workers from the Fiayao Jafet were involved in a strike in
the city of Sao Paulo. Sporadic and spontaneous stoppages
seem to have continued until at least 1942 - (1939: textile
workers, Taubate, SPi 1940: steelworkers, Laguna, SCi
railway workers of RSi textile workers of PEi 1942: printers
.
of RJ) - and resumed in 1944,' with a discourse clearly
antagonistic toward employers.

Nevertheless, the strong repression against formal

and informal groups in the companies, meant that other forms
of resistance and rebellion came to the fore. This becomes
apparent through the legal texts (theoretical essays and
decisions on judicial inquiries) published between 1936 and
1941 and distributed by the Labour Ministry. The issue of
J

how to deal with "acts of indiscipline and insubordination",

begins to appear insistently in these texts, having been
(badly) defined in article 62 of the 1935 Civil Code.
Actions by industrial workers were described as "acts of
violence, of reiterated disobedience to regulations, of
insubordination to the internal rules and to instructions
and orders from hierarchical superiors" (3). These were
viewed as s~rious offensesi hence, the article allowed
employers to fire the accused workers immediately, without
prior notice or compensation. Although, by this time, there
were a number of provisions in the Labor Laws ensuring
 293

permanent employment or, at least, minimal job guarantee,

these fell by the wayside if the employer alleged "acts of
insubordination", a "lack of interest in performing tasks",
the "incontinence of conduct, which makes the worker
incompatible with the job", or physical aggressiveness,
drunkeness, gambling, negotiating on their own behalf and,
finally, laziness and a bad attitude (5).

It is difficult to imagine that any Brazilian

factory worker in the 1930s and 1940s, facing the harsh
working condictions and terrible wages which prevailed
within an arbitrarily labour process, would not have had
some sort of reaction which could have caused him or her to
be listed under one of the above offences. The law
regulating dismissals and loss of employment thus functioned
more as a threat, ., reinforcing employers' absolute authority
within the factories, and at keeping employees' conduct (and
productivity) under their control. By allowing employers to
specify what constituted a "just cause" or "serious
offence", the law withdrew from the workers the very
guarantees it claimed to recognize. In what appears to have
been the rule for Brazilian social and labor legislation,
the government's concession of workers' basic rights,
simul taneously created loopholes through whi(';~l entreprene.;J.L"s
could manipulate those rights. Moreover, the bypassing of
these de facto rights was crowned by the overall
ineffiCiency of the judicial departments. The latter
 294

required that workers involved in a complaint be dismissed

during the trial period, so that they could neither work nor
,
receive their wages, hence leading workers to agree to any
kind of settlement with their bosses (6).
,

Thus, until 1942, workers' "suspensions" for

disciplinary motives are recorded in the Conciliation and
Judgement Councils' hearings, 'indicating attempts by the
employers not to pay severance compensation nor to give
advanced notice of dismissal. Some employers went so far as
, to invent the notion of "permanent suspension", managing to
"irritate even those judges who sought to clarify that this,
in effect, meant dismissal (7). What is important here,
however, is the large number of references to trials of this
kind. Besides pointing to the entrepreneurs' manipulation,
it indicates the frequency with which these "acts of
J

insubordination" appear to have occurred, particularly when

one keep in mind that not all the cases reached the Courts.
Hence, workers' behaviour was described indetail and judged,
whether it pertained to sporadic or habitual drunkeness,
.
absences and their causes, the importance of criminal
antecedents, petty-thefts (of nails, thread, meters of
cloth), "abandonment" of employment due to illness, physical
aggression, any complaints about changes in their work
schedule, their tasks or even their factory sites. (8) All
of this was discussed between employers and the labour
courts, since those directly concerned did not have recourse
 295

to union pressure (dismissal cases having been placed beyond

the unions' reach). As a result, workers were left to
confront the political strength of the entrepreneurs in
what, effectively, became individual cases. For the most
part, the Council decided in favour of the employers, if
only because, until 1938, "administrative inquiries" into
serious offenses by workers were, by law, conducted solely
by the employers themselves. .

There is no doubt that the employers' ability to

bypass and limit workers' legal rights was reinforced during
the period of the Estado Novo. All the "small" and petty
acts through which the entrepreneurs guaranteed their power
in the factory above and beyond the labour legislation, can
be seen in several of the Councils of Conciliation and
Judgement trials Jand later, in those of the Labour Courts).
Employers did not post the work schedules, as required by
law; they refused to count the workdays correctly when
calculating holidays; they used erroneous professional
classifications for their employees, to prevent weekly rest-
days; they took advantage of their workers' lack of
information to write receipts for partial compensation; they
did not compensate overtime or night shifts correctly;
moreover, for second violations companies were merely issued
a warning by the Ministry. The "advance notice" of dismissal
was, itself, given at the employers' convenience (which
 296

varied at each company) rather than according to the time-

interval stipulated by the law. (9)

It is not surprising then that workers' rejection

of disciplinary regulations in the factories was common,
even when they may have wanted to ensure a job for
themselves, as at the end of the 1.930s, when industry still
considered itself to be in crisis (textile
•
"over" production") and jobs were scarce. Unemployment rose
particularly in the textile industry, wage-cuts were common,
and the workday was e~ended for those workers who wanted to
stay on - all of which are measures traditionally adopted by
the Brazilian entrepreneurs to deal with periods of crises
(see Chapter III). Formal rights were not worth much in this
context, and employers continued to expand both their
profits and their factories in an equally-traditional way:
-'
they refused to take any action, even when confronted by the
steady deterioration of working conditions. Union newspapers
demanded better hygiene, as well as more ventilation and
light. They denounced the cramped bathroom quarters which
also served as dressing rooms, thus damaging work clothes
and the workers' normal dress. Bus drivers' low wages and
long workdays, put them into an "enervated, revolted and
tortured" state of mind (10), - perhaps a fitting
description for all workers in 1941, subjected on all sides
to the unending series of "small" acts of repression in
their daily work.
 297

To the extent that they could, however, the

workers did not keep still. The struggle to maintain social
and labour rights is visible even in those sectors where
f
unemplo~ent was on the rise, where exploitation increased,
and the union and labour laws only served to bypass working-
class protest. Documents sent by the unions to the Labour
Ministry, for example, record the struggle to maintain the
a-hour work schedule, particularly in the textile industry,
where employers continued to try to change the legislation.
In 1939, the Thread and Textile Workers Union drew up a
vehement letter of protest, denouncing the measures to
extend toe workday as arbitrary, and reminding entrepreneurs
and the government, alike, that the 48-hour week "was not
created to counter-balance economic interests, but rather to
safeguard those moral principles that have been
sociologically (sic)
-, guaranteed for the proletarian classes
( ••• ) It is deplorable that, in seeking to balance
production and consumption, the adoption of an above-normal
work schedule is also being pursued. And the very industries
that most fight for this incredible measure are also those
Which most scorn the 8-hour law. For a long time now, a
number of factories have been relying on a spitefully
incorrect interpretation of decree 21.671, which regulates
the collective bargaining law, to justify operating for over
10 hours a day, while union protests have been met with

indifference". (11)
 298

In 1940, the union itself went to the Labour

Ministry, to denounce factories where only one group of
...
workers were being used to work two consecutive shifts. They
also denounced attempts by employers to extend the notion of
"apprentice" to include
.,.
youths up to the age of 21, and
arbitrary wage deductions. At thesame time, they stressed
that workers were apprehensive about acknowledging their
denunciations to the Labour Ministry's inspector, for fear
of dismissal. (12) Hence, it seems clear that, in spite of
the leqislation continuously bein~ enacted during the
period, entrepreneurs were assurea that they could continue
to be in charqe of the factory as their ~wn, exclusive
space. Havinq silenced the social movements and harnessed
the unions, this period was truly the entrepreneurs' golden
moment.

The greatest blow against workers' basic rights

came when factQries were made to operate at full production
(particularly in the textile industry), as a result of the
outbreak of World War II: external markets were opened to
the entire Brazilian textile production. Textile
entrepreneurs evinced a significant shift in their ideas:
not only did they riow admit that the equipment really was
obsolete and that th~re was a need to buy more modern
machines, but they also openly recognized that the
profit'source of textile manufacturing was the extra hours
and shifts added to the normal day. Hence, they almost
 299

entirely forgot their concerns about "over-production" as

well as about raising the standard of living of the
Brazilian population through higher wages and shorter
working hours (see Chapter III). An inquiry carried out by
the Ministry of Labour
. along with another made by the Diario
Carioca newspaper in 1946 and 1947 respectively, described
what happened during the first years, of the war: "Textile
.
manufacturers used improvised' mill hands, turning
apprentices into weavers and hiring farm hands for jobs
requiring skilled labour", according to the former. "Card
sections were operating at an average of 14.55 hours a day,
spinning rooms, 15.30 hours and weaving sheds, 12.20 hours" .
reported the latter, and, as Stein remarks, "It should be
noted that the figures represent national averages, for
averages from some states were frequently much higher". (13)

Thus, southern entrepreneurs gradually began to

shift the emphasis of what had been their typical discourse
in the 1930s and no longer insisted on the issue of time-
control. In 1941, together with other entrepreneurial groups
in industry, they turned to the government to demand
"changes in the legislation regulating labour time, as well
as insisting on the participation of employees of both
sexes, and of minors, as being indispensible for certain
industries". They also demanded that criteria drawn from the
needs of business be used to determine working-hours "up to
a limit of 12 hours of the day and night". (14) Not only did
 300

industrialists achieve this objective, in spite of workers'

protests, but they also secured two other basic conditions
for the existing mode of production: uninterrupted
production, through legal prohibition of the workers's right
to job mobility: ...and the elimination of the possibility of
organized protest, by defining the textile industry as a
"war industry".

Thus, ten years after the legislation guaranteeing

the a-hour workday, which had been systematically attacked -
when not ignored -, Brazilian workers received a stronq
blow to their rights. In 1942, in the name of the "state of
war", the qovernment decreed the reestablishment of the 10-
hour workday in exc~ge for a 20% increase in the normal
hourly wage. This decree actually opened a breach for the
traditional employers' demand concerned what they regarded
as necessary working hours: "Article I, item 2: in view of
the pressing needs, the workday can exceed the limit fixed
by law, whether to respond to reasons of force majeure or to

ensure that pressing services are executed or concluded and

which, otherwise, might cause definite losses ••• ". ( ••• )
"Item 4: "Continuous work schedules can be implemented in
public-service companies, or in those of interest to
national production and defense. ( ••• ) weekly rest for the
workers is guaranteed ••• ". (15) The aim of the vagueness of
the underlined clauses is evident: these could be subject to
flexible interpretations. In October of the same year,
another decree deferred the right to holidays in those
 301

industries deemed essential to the national security. (16)

Finally, in November, the attack was concluded, with a third
decree forb'idding job changes in "war industries" (as
defined by the Military Ministries), thus tu~ing their
workers into "army draftees". The latter "will be considered
deserters ... when they do not attend work for periods longer
than 8 days" and "absence fro1U service will be punished with
fines of three day's wages per day of absence", since they
are considered to be "on duty" to the establishments. (17)
The broad scope of these decrees becomes evident when it is
recalled that certain "civilian" industries such as textiles
manage to have themselves classified as "war industries",
such as the textile business.

These decrees represented the best of both worlds

for the entrepreneurs, crowning their efforts and struggles
against labour rights and their legal enactment. The decree
meant that the full power of factory command had been
restored to employers and that, legally, they were once
again in exclusive control of the labour process. Editorial
and articles in journals such as Industria Textil (CIFTES)
and The Economic and Financial Observer (linked to the
business world, as a whole), along with the FIESP and CIB
reports, did not hide ~h~r satisfaction with the new
decrees. Moreover, now entrepreneurs had an excellent
justification for increasing the exploitation of the labour
force: a patriotic and nationalist call to "produce more and
more", a phrase often used by Getulio Vargas when addressing
 302

the workers. Thus, the World War in the world brought

internal peace to the entrepreneurs, who had previously
competed intensely for the internal market. All the
proposals to change industrial operations were forgotten.
Having opened th~ world markets, the war had ensured that
industrialists could achieve internal reconciliation without
having to change the traditional ways of extracting surplus
labour from their workers.

In spite of all the existing repression, the

workers seem to have tried to resist the return of
unrestricted exploitation. Signs of this can be found in the
discourse of the government and the employers themselves.
Beginning in 1941 (exactly when Brazilian exports were
rising), specialized business magazines, government
publications and legal reports began to discuss how to
"instill the workers with an interest in their trade". (18)
The textile industry would have to operate at full capacity
in order to supply the market opened by the war. Given the
existing conditions of production, this meant securing as
much control as possible over the workers' productivity. Now
more than ever, discipline over workers would have to be
assured, given that no other resources - whether more
efficient machines or changes in labour relations - could ~e

mobilized to increase productivity. However, workers'

resistance to this discipline seems to have increased
proportionately to these demands. From the end of 1942 until
1945, the texts by entrepreneurs and government alike
 303

acquired a warning tone, and the word "sabotage" was often

used.
/

Hence, by 1942, Brazilian jurists had already

begun to define acts of "sabotage" and to solve certain
?

labour disputes accordingly. "Sabotage" included "decreasing

the amount of production (commonly referred to as
"loafing"); lowering the qual~ty of production; damaging
machinery and raw material; slandering the producer or
boycotting production; practicing obstruction by
meticulously-adhering to the regulations". (19) Union
\

leaders were called on in 1943 to reinforce workers'

"military conscription", while a decree was enacted giving
the unions the right to "combat the fifth-columnist presence
in factories and mills". (20) Thus, for example, a member of
the newly-forming National Confederation of Workers in
Industry, delivered a radio ~ress encouraging workers not
only to produce more, but also to " denounce implacably the
defeatists and the saboteurs, regardless of how they present
themselves." The speaker blamed defeatists and saboteurs for
machine breakdowns, calling them indolent and pointing to
their "bad attitude" - a reference to their refusal to clean
the machines without compensation, their slow operating
pace, thei~ resistance to following the required work
rhythm, and their complaints against the quality of raw
materials. Workers behaving this way were now "suspect,
dangerous individuals, fifth-columnists", while the new task
.
of the "labour soldiers" and of the "barrack-un1ons " ,1n
. th e
 304

factory battlegrounds, was to "produce and to be vigilant".

(21)

Although the workers were silent as a result of

the repression, in practice, their resistance seems clearly
to have grown. Speeches from employer and government alike,
insistently addressed the issue of internal discipline in
the factories. During the first semester of 1944, the trade
magazine, Industria Textil published notes and articles on
the "need for an immediate solution to the internal
problems" of the factories. "A labor shortage is
beginning," one of the articles stated, "and the broad
implementation of the wartime work schedule is not being
enforced"( ••• ) "Workers stay away from the factory for one
or two days, looking for better-paid work - which they can
easily fi~d, because the lack of manual labour has raised
wages in other activities". The fact that decree 4937 of
1942 h~d forbidden workers to change jobs and punished
absenteeism severely, makes this article even more
significant. At the same time, Sao Paulo and Rio newspapers
suggested that the law's own focus on entrepreneurial
interests hampered the workers, and was thus to blame for
this state·of affairs. Moreover, they suggested that workers
and employers should be left "at ease" to conclude
Collective bargaining agieements that reflected "their
mutual interests." (22)
 305

Employers were far from wanting any kind of

negotiation. Their perception of the working-class problem
focused exclusively on the issue of labour disqipline, that
is, on how to force the workers to achieve ideal
productivity. EmRloyers' narrow-mindedness is apparent in
the debates recorded in their various publications. In
these, instead of studying the real question, they seek
..
models to break the workers - finding them in the backward
or totalitarian countries of the period. In this respect,
the traditional professions of the liberal faith are quite
forqotten. They marvelled at the example set by Japan, where
young working-class women were placed in boarding houses
(defined as an act of charity) or sighed over the Russian
worker Vinoqradowna (the female version of stakhanovism).
Their own bolstered self-image soared to the ridiculous
heights when theYJpublished the code invented by the
director of the DNT for good factory behaviour. It
represented employers' values, as well as the kind of
factory administration they sought. The code indicated how
little the Labour Ministry b~reaucrats themselves had not
assimilated what are essentially labour rights):

l'Every employee should know:

1. that he must work well to deserve a salary;

must arrive at the job on time; adhere to the meal schedule
and not be distracted by conversations during working hours;
 306

2. that the employer and fellow workers must be

respected;

3. that, when absent, he will have less vacation

time, even if he is only absent one day a year;

4. that laziness in performing his duties is a

serious offence;

5. that drunkeness is cause for dismissal;

6. that to attack a hierarchical superior or a

colleague on the job is a serious offense"; along with many
-
other such recomendations, such as the need to avoid wasting
raw materials; to treat the employer as a friend, not to act·
outside the union. (23)

The struggle against "desertion" and "sabotage"

seems to have reached its peak in 1944 - although, given the
image of harmony and social integration that the getulista
dictatorship continuously fabricated, none of it ever
appeared publicaaly as a political question. Nevertheless,
government warriings were often heard throughout 1944,
through such means as the famous government radio program "A
Hora do Brasil", broadcast nation-wide early every evening.
Q~ ~t, the Labour Minister, Marcondes Filho, constantly

alerted listeners against "those workers who still allowed

production levels to fall, even after President Vargas'
laws." Analyzing the causes of the factory workers'
behaviour, the Minister declared, "the fact that these
 307

people are poor or unadapted to their occupations is no

excuse for me, because they once produced more than they do
today, and for lower waqes ••• "(24). In another speech, the
Minister stated that the fall in productivity stemmed,
essentially, fro~ two causes: job absenteeism and a decline
in efficiency. He saw job absenteeism as being a "sad
display of individuality", hence
. implying that the workers
were satisfied with their low' wages and standards of living.
The Minister attributed the decline in efficiency to the
workers' lack of understanding of their' social rights. But
he also did not hesitate to refer to those "harmful
elements", whose "physical laziness", "ignorance", and "bad
faith" prevented their" obedience to the sacred duties of
patriotism". (25)

That same year, inquiries by the unions

(particularly in the textile industry) arrived at the Labour
Ministry, requesting that their labour disputes be submitted
to the Labour Court and not to the military authorities.
(The textile industries, it will be recalled, were defined
as "war industries" - see p. J.Ol). The Labour Ministry
relentlessly, limited itself to responding that "once an
industrial establishment is placed under military authority,
the enforcement of the labour leq~~lation ceases to apply to
it". (25) Cornered on all sides, growing factory-workers'
resistance (as described above) now expressed itself through
individualized refusals to be tamed. Although there is no
way of knowing precisely the extent of such individual
 308

resistance, some· idea of its importance is suggested by the

fact that, at one 1945 court-hearing alone in Rio, 800
workers were prosecuted for changing their job and for
absenteeism. (After the end of the war, a campaign
developed for th~ir "broad, general and unrestricted
amnesty") (27).

.
In June 1944, the g9vernment published its Law of
Industrial Mobilization, tailor-made for the textile
industry, in an attempt to respond to pressure by employers
who alleged that factories were already operating at full
capacity within the prevailing labour organization. The law
thus sought to demand even more restrictive measures on
workers' rights, and, indeed, many of the workers' rights
were roundly suppressed by the law. Women and children over
the age of 16 were allowed to work on night ~hifts;

uninterrupted shifts were permitted, that is on Sundays and

holidays; no worker could change jobs without his/her
employers' consent and no other employer could hire him/her
without proof Qf that consent; more than eight absences
constituted quitting a job, and were punishable by prison
sentences, ranging from 15 days to six months. By November,
1944, even industrial advertising had incorporated this

pattern of exploitation without major problems: "Extending

the workday calls for better lighting! Change to Sudlux'
fluorescent bulbs and your factory's production will
improve ..• " Or, "Carding, spinning and weaving 24 hours a
day! That's the situation at textile factories today! They
 309

don't even have time to stop to overhaul the machines, and

the lack of spare parts make certain repairs impracticable!
Texaco's lubricants are the answer ..... (28). That same year,
in December, a worker fainted after 23 hours of consecutive
work at the Lanificio Jafet: the factory fired him alleging
"laziness". (29)

Thus workers, particularly in textiles, were

reduced to impotence and isolation in their daily work.
This is why the forms of resistance devised by each factory
worker in his/her forced isolation and individualization
make sense. Moreover, taken as a whole, they were efficient
from all indications. Ultimately, what the entrepreneurs
had achieved by the early 1940s, was the reduction of
workers' conditions to the pure models of privatization and
enslavewment found at the turn of the century (see Chapter
One) - the difference being that they could now resort to a
sophisticated state apparatus which intervened in social
issues through legal means, hence reducing even further the
chances of a possible reaction by workers. At the
ideological level, industrialists also used the discourse of
patriotism and war to make any absenteeism from work
illegal. Thus, the super-exploitation of labour was once
agai~, and overtly. the standard which governed industrial
capital accumUlation - accepted by the society and upheld by
law.
 310

Moreover,the government, for its part, had

destroyed the eme~~ing public sphere of the 1930s, whether
I-

by silencing the debate through censorship, or by crushing

the collective social movements through repression. The
Estado Novo gove~ent sought to replace the public sphere
by cultivating what had already been inaugurate in
totalitarian Europe: the spectacle of the masses before the
personification of power.

2. Individual Solitude and Mass Spectacle

There are many records of the spectacles promoted

by the Vargas dictatorship, spectacles of social and
ideoloqical identity-buildinq between state and people -
between the Head of state and "his" people. These spectacles
replaced the public, civil and political space. The
government invested in these spectacles with care, since,
appropriating the public sphere and hiding it from society
was one of the pre-conditions for ensuring the success of
the authoritarian and dictatorial style.

A device was especially created to meet the needs

of each social qroup. The government intended to built an
extensive educational network, which the Education Ministry
coordinated, planned, coordinatej and t;or. . trolled. It led to
the country's first national education plan, whose major
concern was the establishment of an educational career-track
centering on the secondary school level. Part of the latter
focused on the systematic training of the elites who would
 311

go on to university: part of it centered on professional

education (technical-industrial, commercial and agricultural
courses). At the same time, the school provided moral
education, itself differentiated according to its targeted
social group: th~s, the Ministry defined curricula to teach
women how to become housewives: youths, to be responsible,
and the elites to be leaders. Educational objectives were
.
thus differentiated according to sex, social class and age.
A special youth program was also created which resembled the
Italian fascist militia: the youth were to become the main
attraction at celebrations commemorating national dates,
heroes and symbols. The Ministry also en~ured the approval
of the "family statute", which encouraged formal marriage
(in the Church, and acknowledged by the civilian
authorities) and family reproduction. Propaganda everywhere
promoted the moraaity of the extended family, in which men
were the undisputed head of household, and women played
subordinated roles. Family allowances were created as an
incentive to population growth.(30).

This same Ministry also took over the promotion of

national identity as part of the authoritarian spectacle.
The Ministry incorporated the 1920s modernista emphasis on
revaluing popular culture (31): Brazilian f'.>lklore, the
Indian heritage, popular cultural values expressing the
Brazilian "way of being" (particularly as represented by
Macunaima, Mario de Andrade's "characterless-hero"), the
country's tropical environment. An effect, the Ministry
 312

reinvented a tradition (32) which the state then disclosed

in an attempt to endow the country with cultural substance ,
-"
thus turning it all into an ideological program (33)~

Government bureaucracies were established for the

.
management of culture: the Educational Radio Service; the
National Institute of Educational Cinema, the National Book
Institute, the National Music: School and the National Choral
conservatory - all of which were aimed at creating patriotic
works. The spirit of "national values" was introduced into
school curricula, so that children learned civics, mOrality,
~

sang about the country's vigor and beauty, celebrated the

flag, national independence week and Tiradentes (a somewhat
dubious eighteenth-century republican conspirator and martyr
to Brazilian independence), and were required to complete
physical education courses. Grandiose architectural
buildings were undertaken for the better-educated sectors
the best example being the Palace of CUlture, which housed
the Education Ministry. This space opened by the State ended
up being occupied by the leading Brazilian intellectuals,
unable to resist a venture that endeavoured to turn art and
culture into one of the pillars of government strength.

In 1939, the government created a key institution

to make spectacles of myths, the foundation of its
authoritarian management of society, the famous DIP (Press
and Propaganda Department) - located, perhaps as a result of
bitter chance, in the National congress building. Attempts
 313

to establish this department had begun as early as 1931, but

it was only after the public space (opened by the debates
and the social movements) was destroyed, that this
department could establish itself as an agency for
fostering, controlling and regulating culture in a broad
sense. The entire production of culture was in the hands of
the DIP, that is, was filter~d through its censorship and
•
promotion mechanisms. Two major ideological currents
underlay DIP's policies: first, to reestablish the image of
power as being a social and affective relationship between
the Head of state and the people ("with no intermediaries",
as Getulio Vargas repeatedly stated in his speeches); and,
secondly, to ensure that concrete demands for social justice
coincided with the action of the governing bodies.

The "personal" relationship between the Head and

the people was carefully constructed through the media (34),
but its high point was the ritual spectacle of the
President's meetings with the masses. Some of these rallies
were spectacles honouring the President, such as his
birthday (April 19th), October 3rd recalling the revolution
of 1930, or the celebration of the November 10th coup of
1937. Other were more traditional dates such as the week-
long commemoration of national independelh;e, and May Day,
which became the most important holiday during the Estado
Novo. These were spectacles constructed by the Labour
Ministry and covered extensively by the DIP. For them, the
Labour Ministry called on union leaders to gather the
 314

largest possible number of workers, who were brought

together to the downtown area, marching from there to the
catete Palace (in Rio de Janeiro) or to the state-government
f
buildings, or even to the hastily built platforms at
football stadium~ in provincial capitals • In Rio, the
president would order the opening of the Catete Palace
gardens to all, and made personal
. appearances to the
.
welcoming sounds of the masses' ovations. In other places,
he would appear in an open motor car, making triumphant
entrances, again to popular acclaim. Union leaders delivered
the most important speeches, giving thanks for the labour
legislation "bestowed" on them (although they also demanded
its effective implementation). The President, for his part,
would speak about the path for strengthning the Fatherland
based, since the begining of his government, on organizing
society along economic and class lines. Finally he would
conclude by saying that producing well, organizing through
the official unions and removing politicians and subversive
elements, were acts which pointed to the creation of a new
society. This ritual obviously contained traditional
criticisms aimed at enemies of the past, who were still
"cunningly spying" on the present: the communists,
parliamentary politicians, totalitarians, liberals. The past
was presented in such a way as to imply that social needs
and interests had never been allowed to surface, prior to
the Estado Novo: labour movements had only created chaos and
Subversion, the Liberal Republic had never met social
 315

demands, assistance for the poor regions (such as the

Northeast) had been ~gnored, culture was non-existent. The
public space previously shaped by the working class'
movements became the product of the more than 200 decrees
which now "proteqted" the workers. All of this "protection",
in the president's speeches, created a strange notion of a
"social democracy", which needed
. an authoritarian state to
ensure its efficiency and continuity. The Head of state's
ability to shield the society was visible in all areas of
social life, ranging from housing to transportation, from
the economy to education, from public health to the army.
Again and again, the large rallies and parades would confirm
the image of the nice President, of "Gege", who would burst
out laughing at jokes about himself, who strolled through
the streets and patted children on the head, who was even
presented as a "malandro" (sharper), always ready to draw
whatever he had hidden in his coat pocket, to strike at his
enemies. Film documentaries produced by the DIP showed the
applause and demonstrations by the crowds gathered to hear
the announcement of yet another labour law, to witness the
donation of yet another improvement of the standard of
living, to enjoy the sight of yet another of the President's

classic smiles (35).

Thus, the President's smile and emotional speech

at the festivities sought to dim the memory of social
struggles, of the non-implemented labour laws, the sense of
citizenship, freedom of information, of the repression
 316

against popular organization and against the dignity of an

active social and political life. The extent to which the
labouring classes actually adhered to these continuous
dramatizations of their "presence" in power through the
persona of Vargas, is difficult to assess. But, there seems
to be no doubt that the staging of these spectacles
persuaded and mobilized" the wprkers. At least, the state
.
celebrations did so, as the filmed images left by the DIP,
or even the government radio's estimated audiences, attest.
Moreover, even if these images did have a different real
meaning (whether because anti-fascist demonstrations also
displayed popular enthusiasm and participation, and were
thus an indirect message to the President; or because these
films were edited by the DIP itself) there is still no doubt
that Getulio Vargas left a positive memory for workers who
. lived through th~Estado Novo and can' today provide their
testimony on the period (36). Whether or not the staging of
an ideological spectacle which uses a leader to put the
semblance of popular near the centre of power is a patent
fantasy , the workers may still have been affected by the
fact that their issues were brought into the center of the
discourse of power. The suffocating daily relations in the
workplace and the isolation of workers in the poljtical and
union spheres, may not have been sufficient to jeopardize
the ideological efficacy of a government which had
recognized the workers' basic rights and raised them to the
level of the law.
 317

Nevertheless, in promising a whole new future in

return for hard work, the gover~ent could not count solely
on the spectacular staging of its massive shows, to secure
the adherence of the working class. After all, the workers
were totally coe~ced in the factories and job sites, they
earned little, their unions were controlled, and no
repetitive propaganda concer~ing responsibility and
patriotism on the job could eliminate their arduous
experiences of their daily lives • They were completely
marginalized from political decision-making and did not even
•
participate in the corporative "technical councils" plan,
organized to reconcile the diverse interests (which in
principle were class interests, but actually manifested the
divergent internal interests of the dominant class) (37).

Thus, it was essential that the government

continue its legislative work, constructing the "restricted
citizenship" of workers. Indeed, social laws acquired a
greater political meaning in the early 1940s. The first of
these was the final version of the welfare system, whose
long history can be traced back as early as 1923. The second
was the institutionalizing of the Labour Court, replacing
the old Judgement and Conciliation Juntas. The third was the
creation of a union tax, aimed at providing the uni~ns with
a stable income. But, the most important was the guarantee
of a legal minimum wage, promised since 1931 and finally
enacted in 1940. It was the most important because, besides
union issues, it also touched directly on workers' daily
 318

lives. Although all of these laws were ambiguous and

contradicted working'class interests in some sense, they
f nevertheless were by no means meaningless or trivial. They
actually did manage to channel most of the working'class
words and deeds tnto the state jUdicial space, covering and
camouflaging workers' lived realities.

Both the ~elfare system and the Labour

Courts system had, in practice, already been created
piecemeal during the 1930s. The welfare system was merely
formalized and extended essentially the Paulista railway
workers' Retirement and Pension Fund experiment of the
1920s. This scheme was based on contribution of employers,
and workers alike, but also later came to include a state
contribution. Management was made up of employer and worker
representatives in equal proportions. Several of these funds
had been established by companies before the creation, in
1933, of the first Retirement and Pension Fund Institute
for an entire category : the maritime workers. This
unification of the welfare services into one institute
served as a model for other occupations - bank workers
(1934), commercial employees (1935), and, finally,
industrial workers (1938) •. The Institutes all followed the
same parity manag~~2nt organization and the tripartite
income contributions. Over the years, they gradually turned
into large financial questions for the employers, as well as
for the "pelego" union leaders and for the government, since
they generated powerful administrative councilS to manage
 319

the enormous resources they mobilized as well as political

clienteles which ensured even greater subordination of
unions to the state. Although their operation was, already
in the 1940s, permeated by small and large examples of
favouritism and corruption, the Institutes responded to· a
broad range of situations: they provided retirement income;
insurance
. .
in cases of disability, death and terminal
•
illness; medical assistance for workers and their families,
and also covered job accidents (see chapter V) (38). The law
guaranteeing job security also derived from the old
welfare funds, still linked to the companies (until 1933),
since financial contribution to the company welfare system
demanded a certain permanence on the job from the workers.

The regulations for the Labour Court

System were issued in 1939. As in the social welfare area,
J

it unified already existing principles in the first attempt

to institute conciliation boards. The main objective was to
prevent class conflict from exploding ouvertly or from
allowing workers and employers to enter into open clashes
over negotiations. until then, the right to strike had been
upheld by the Brazilian judicial tradition, although its
limits were very narrow: the Penal Code punished strikes
caused "by threats or violence" as a crime, puttinc;, all
strikes under the jurisdiction of the police (39). Once the
Labour Court was established, however, the dictatorship
declared "strikes and lock'outs" as "antisocial recourses,
incompatible with the higher interests of national
 320

production" (article 139 of the Constitution of 1937).

Hence, any attempted work stoppage was a serious crime, to
be judged by the Security Tribunal. In May, 1941, for
example, a worker in the port of Santos was condemned to a
year in prison for having instigated a strike in waterfront
warehouses (40). Thus, just as welfare had been turned into
an essentially technical and ~lientelistic financial issue,'
.
the Labour court transformed the daily class struggle into a
moral and ethical question. As Werneck Vianna shows, "the
role of consciously managing the labour market fell on the
Court, translating the commercial relations between capital
and labour into the normative language of law," - while the
prime interest above both of them lay in the so'called
"public interest" of the reasons of State (41)

4.Minimum wage and patterns of working-class Life

The most important of the later laws on workers'

rights and the resulting social and political organization
of the factory and urban labour market, was, undoubtedly,
the Minimum Wage Law. The essential features of the minimum
wage were researched, legislated and debated from the very
first time it was raised as essential (during Getulio
Vargas' Provisional Government 'of 1930·'1934) (42), until its
actUal enactment by decree in 1940, at the height of the
Estado Novo. Between 1932 and 1936, a number of articles on
how the minimum wage should be established appeared in .
 321

theLabour Ministry's bulletin. They contained extensive

discussions of the European experience and debates published
by the Bureau Central de statistigue, on the criteria for

fixing the minimum wage. At first, several alternatives were

considered, such.as an average hourly wage, production per
hour of work, productivity per hour determined by the
skill'level required, the eff~cts of collective and
.
individual contracts, the costs of social services such as
retirement funds and costs of illness and, finally, the
composition of the family budget (43).

It did not take long for Brazili~~ policy'makers,

largely engineers and statisticians, to realize that the
notion of a "real wage" in fact narrowed these suggested
criteria down to only two alternatives: either the minimum
wage was determined on the basis of· productivity or it was
fixed according to the workers' standard of living. The
former alternative, according to an article published in
1934, involved calculating "labour productivity, which
should be considered as the main factor in assessing wage
workers' contribution to production. Moreover, any future
improvements on workers' cultural level and which might
influence productivity should be rewarded proportionally. to
that improvement's eff~,.:t on productivity". As for the
latter alternative, the article pointed to the need to know
the "typical working'class family's standard of living,
including all acquired material and intellectual needs or
goods". Finally, the article called for fixing an
 322

"appropriate minimum wage" for "less able workers" ,

combining the two ~lternatives to determine, in a flexible
way, the lower value of their wage.

It is interesting to note that the concept of wage

.,.
used in this article implied that it might become the means
to "gradually raise the workers' level ••• (and, hence,) had
undisputed advantages for th~ boss, for the country and for
the society". This, in turn, meant that any change in
productivity (resulting from improved technical conditions
.
of production) would be re~lected in the wages of those
workers working in the sectors which underwent technical
improvement. Conversely, the other alternative, based on the
amount necessary to support a workingAclass family, would
make all wages uniform, hence only reflecting differences in
the subsistence level resulting from differentiated levels
of skills. Thus, as the authors of the article correctly
stated: "the living conditions of an industrial worker in
the large urban centres, of a foreman in the factores, and
of an engineer •••• involve differences in the amount of
,
energy expended, time used, of efforts made through long
years of study for technical improvement •••• " (44). The
shift from one alternative to the other is actually a shift
from the world of production, itself composed b1 the la~our
processes creating value, to the world of wage labour
reproduction, constituted by those elements defining the
value of labour power.
 323

The debate raged for some time over the

criteria for establishing the minimum wage. Nevertheless, as
early as 1935, the second alternative was clearly emerging
as dominant, and the idea of incorporating productivity in
wage calculation~ gradually began to disappear from both the
debate itself and the actual measures adopted by the Labour
Ministry. Thus, in April 1935., the Ministry began to draft
an internal document on the minimum wage, demanding the
necessary data "in view of not only the sensitivity of the
issue but, also, the relative poverty of information at our
disposal to settle it" (45). This document called for an
investigation to gather data on the typical Brazilian
working'class family and on how to fix an average wage. It
also suggested the need for research on the cost of living
in each of the country's various regions. The 1934
Constitution cam~to be regarded as a reference for defining
the preferred approach to fixing the minimum wage: "Article
121, item b: minimum wage, able to satisfy, according to the
conditions of each region, the normal needs of the worker."
Although not yet established in January
1936, the minimum wage was legally defined in that month - a
definition which was to prevail until the end of the 1960s:
"Law number 185, of January 14, 1936. Article 10. Every
worker has the right to a minimum wage in payment for
services rendered and able to satisfy in a specific region
of the country and at a given period, his normal needs for
food, housing, clothing, hygiene and transport"-. The same
 324

law defined the minimum wage as "the minimum remuneration

owed to the adult worker for a normal day of work", and
specified that minors would have their wage decreased by
half and that the wages of workers employed in hazardous
jobs would be increased
. by the same proportion •
The law specified how the minimum wage
would be calculated. A "wage commission" would be created in
each region of the country, composed of five to eleven
members, with an equal number of representatives elected
from amongst employers and employees (in different
professions) and a president nominated by the state.
Following a detailed census of economic conditions at the
local level, including that which directly affected paid
wages, this commission's members, who were to be paid on the
basis of their participation, must determine regional
similarities in t~e average conditions and needs emerging
from life in their respective regions. In the same law, the
state required that, in order to do this research, all
employers (whether they be individuals, companies,
associations, enterprises, firms or unions), should submit
to the commission, within 15 days complete report of the
lowest wages actually paid in their enterprises, with a
classification of the jobs the workers performed. The law
also stipulated how to calculate the equivalent of wages not
paid in money. with this data in hand, the commission should
then determine the percentage of wages spent on food,
housing, clothing, hygiene, and transport. Once these items
 325

had been calculated, each commission would establish the

amount of the regional minimum wage, and this definitive
decision was then immediately to be made public • The law
stipulated a nine'month non'extendible deadline for the
regional commiss~on to carry out their work, under the
supervision of the technicians of the Ministry's statistics
Service (46).
.
While further decrees established these
commissions, the entrepreneurs publicly denounced the
dangers of the measure and protested violently against the
establishment of a minimum wage. Beginning in'1936,
entrepreneurs in industry, commerce and banking alleged that
they lacked the material conditions to pay the minimum wage
and alarmed the government with the spectre of the crises
that its adoption would invariably engender: ..... so that the
seriousness of the matter is clearly emphasized", states a
memorandum of June, 1935, by Rio, Sao Paulo and Minas
.
bankers, "we hereby declare that we have been well'informed
that, alarmed by the threat, as a result of merely
introducing this bill, the great national banks, have
decided to close most - if not all - of their agencies, and
that the minimum wage's "inevitable consequence, is to
increase both the cost of living and 'chomage"' (47).
Nevertheless, the government, went ahead
with its plan, although modifying its initial attempt to
establish what was known at the time as the "social wage"
and favouring, instead, a "subsistence wage." Both terms
 · 326

appear in the text which accompanies decree law number 399

of May 10, 1938, and regulates the provisions for
establishing the minimum wage. In this text, the Labour
Minister, Waldemar Falcao, explained that "having to choose
between the more.progressive legislations' social wage and
the suOsistance wage stemming from the state's first
attempts to fix a minimum for, remuneration, our legislator
opted for the latter, in order not to subject the employers
to demands which our economy could not tolerate, for it is
still far from the capitalist concentration which, in other
countries, dictates a broader and more generous concept of
labour compensation". This meant that the minimum wage
referred to "the adult worker, thus eliminating the idea of
a professional wage and distinguishing it from the idea of a
family wage." The same day, the Minister listed the
advantages of th&minimum wage for both workers and
entrepreneurs, while also pointing out that "the buying
power of the working masses ( ••• ) will allow the purchase
substantial quantity of industrial goods. These could never
be obtained with a decrease in wages, always a disas~rous

practice confronting consumption crises" (48).

At a rally held in 1938, the President
announced a decree-law, providing the final definition of
the minimum wage. Although restating the terms of the
previously accepted definition, its article 7 forbade "the
payment of wages in vouchers scrip or credit slips emitted
by the employer, or in days allocated for the employees'
 327

rest", hence threatening one of the major sources of profit

for rural employers and public works contractors in the
backland regions. This was symbolised by the well'known
f
company stores, at which workers were forced to make their
purchase using c~edit slips - a form of payment now declared
by the government to be "pernicious and over'used", and,
thus "in contempt of the law" . (49). In this sense, the
decree sought to use the minimum wage law as a way of
modifying patterns of precapitalist exploitation, although
this never actually occurred in practice.
Besides stipulating the conditions for
minimum wage payment for domestic labour (excluding family
businesses), for work by children (guaranteed to receive
half the minimum wage), and for workers in industries posing
health hazards (who would receive more), the decree also
defined the formula that the regional commissions should use
for calculating the minimum wage and establishing wage
levels accordingly. This formula represented the
adult'workers' daily expenditures and was made up of the sum
of the food, housing, clothing, hygiene and transport items,
.
while the part alloted to food had a prefixed nutritional
value in a table annexed to the decree. The table, in turn,
defined the type of nutritional "minimum ration" necessary
to sustain an adult worker, and calculated according to the
different regions in the country.
In March, 1939, the statistics and
Welfare Service (SEPT) of the Labour Ministry made public
 328

the results of the inquiry. The Ministry claimed that they

had collected almost 1,500,000 statements by employees (30%
of the country's wage'workers, 10% of the economic active
population) of which 230,067 were computed. These slips only
catalogued those~workers who received less than 400 thousand
reis - a sample which, according to the Ministry, had been
chosen "for obvious reasons" (i.e. it represented the
minimum on which a worker could survive). The slips also
included the type of services that these workers performed.
It is interesting to note that the data on the type of
services does not at any time appear in the results; this
could confirm the suggestion that the productivity
remuneration ratio. did not affect the establishment of the
minimum wage at all, but rather only affected the living
standard items. The latter were calculated by comparing
regional prices to the legal food distribution table
(published in the text of the law), considered ideal for the
worker. They were also calculated through referring to the
computations made on the basis of what the Labour Ministry
called "appropriate" housing, clothing, hygiene and
transport, in the presentation of the final law in May,
1940.
 MINIMUM PERCENTAGES OF THE MINIMUM WAGE, NECESSARY FOR
329
SURVIVAL, as proposed in the law for some state capitals.
- foo.d housing clothing
-
doctor transport
Ria 5a 2.0 a. 12 ~O
Sao paula 5.5 . 2.0 8 1.0 7
Recife; 55.· ao l.Q a 7
P•.Alegp3.· 5.0 2.0 b LO 1.2:
] •. fiarizcnte 55-, 1.-6 6 J.o. 1.)
SaLv.dox:' 6Q 2-0 b 8 4
Source: Decree'law 2,162, May 1st, 1940

These minimum percentages necessary for survival for each of

the workers' expenses differs with some of the results of
the SEPT's research, as the following table suggests:

SUMMARY OF INQUIRY ABOUT THE MINIMUM WAGE:

structure of the wage-workers' expenditures, in some states:

1938.

State~r fo.ad housing clothing docto.r:' medicine defici

su.rp 1u sor
Rm(D.F) 27.2 8.4 2.7 3.7 11.·5
Sao ca.o 2.a.6 9·4 2.2 4.8 6.1
Paulo int
"

""am:
C"E ! f7 ·s
2: ..
~.4
~ .. 4
2·3
5.. 2
4.,7
4.,·6
~. 9:,
--i... Or
.l:'~ .• int I IO •. c I2 .. ; 2.·5 5.. 9 -1~

RGS C~ .18 .. 4 8 .. 8 2 .. 6 4·4< 4,··1

int L5 .. 0 '0 .. , 2 .. 2· 4' .. -0" ..
~" .
. ulnas c.p I
I "'9
.~ ··4 L6.6 6.2 1.••7 3 .. 2 22.0
1nt I
I 58.,4 1 ~~. ~ 10 .. 4- 3·0 :;. .,4 9 .. 5
..
t" rl

Bahia can 69 •.J. l.8 •.1 7"3 ~ .. 7

~
4.. 3 "" b
-~
. +
7 ~ •.1 ~ .. 6 -~ .. 7
- .I;

- l.!l \I ..; l l ... l 9.. 4 4.9-- oJ

This difference between the amounts resulting from the 330
inquiry and the amounts suggested can also be seen in the
final law enacting the minimum wage. Although the Ministry
had said that its research had collected "the statement of
the lowest wages effectively paid" and that it had been
limited "for obvious reasons" to those workjars earning up to
'"'
400,000 reis per month, judging from the inquiry's results,

the average and the most frequently' paid wage between 1938
and 1939 (the year the research was carried out) were both
much lower than 400.000 reis:
RELATION BETWEEN THE WAGES COMPUTED BY THE 1938 INQUIRY AND

THE WAGES PROPOSED AND FIXED BY THE LAW OF 1940 (IN 1,000 REIS)

states capital interior

inquiry proposec inquiry . proposed
~----------~==~~~~~--~r-~--~---r----------..
Rio {D.F.l 200-2~O -- 240·
200
sao Paulo 150-200 220 100 - 150 170
150
Rio~G.do SuI 150-200 200 150 - 200 160
150 .
Rio de Janei. 150-200 ·100 - 150 100
50-100 180 150 -" 200 160
120
Pernambuco 100-150 ISo 50 - 100 100
~tinas Gerais 150-200 170 50 - 100 120
100 - 150 150
sta. Catarin~ 50-100 170 140
Espiri tQ San"1 150-200 160 100 - 150 150
120
Bahia 100-150 155· 100- 150 110
90
RioG. doNortE 20- 100 130 50 - 100 90
5.0-100 125 50 - 100
Pa~:!ba 50-100 IJ.o 50 - 100 90
Para 100-150 150 100 - 150 110
Alagoas 50-100 125 50 - 100 90
Ceara ~0-100
.-/
150 50 - 100 110
Amazonas 1$0-200 160 100 - 150 120

Goias 150-200 100 - 1.50 100

100-150 120 ..5.0 - 100 90
)Iato Grosso lSO-150 1 .JO 150 - 200 180
.... ) ....
Piaui 50-100 120 100 - 1.50
 331

Thus, the table indicates that the

minimum wage in state capitals was established at what were
already prevailing levels; they were almost half of the
amount thought to be convenient by the minister. The new
J

minimum represented a slight improvement in 9 state

capitals, though only in one of these was there actually a
significant increase. Of the lowest wages effectively paid
in 1938, the most frequent level for the capitals was
between 150 and 200 thousand reis,while for the interior, it
was between 100 and 150 thousand reis.This must have been an
extremely low wage; one way of assessing the matter is to
note that research at a Sao Paulo foundry almost two years
later (1940), confirmed that, although the workers there had
a difficult life, they nevertheless earned considerably more
than the amounts shown in the table above, for the
 332

most'frequently paid amount in this factory was in the 400-

500 thousand reis range(50).

Nevertheless, this kind of data must not

have made much impression on those who decided wage policy
other than the w~rkers'representatives who suggested higher
salaries. In January,1940,the head of the Labour Ministry's
statistical services sent the Ministry the final proposal
for the regional minimal wage' levels,whose value barely
surpassed the inquiry's most frequently found wage level. If
it is indeed true that these wages were very low,the right
to a minimum wage, implemented by decree on May 10,1940,
merely served to institutionalize cheap labour (51).
Also reflected in this minimum wage bill
is the image of workers whose value as professionals has
been profoundly undermined. It is worthwhile noting that the
law thoroughly ne9lected any reference to education or
cultural advancement. Hence, the implementation of the
minimum wage would not contribute to raising the educational
level of the Brazilian worker, as the original intention of
the 1934 texts had implied. Rather, culture and knowledge
were to remain outside of the money'wage relations and, as
such, were to become entirely dependent on the workers'
experience in the labour process. All that ~as being
prevented was the workers' starving to death. This is why
half to three quarters of the monthly budget had been
allocated to foodstuffs. Even health expenditures were low.
As the official statement by the Labour Minister explained,
 333

in May, 1938: the minimum wage was"a prudent determination

of intelligently articulated measures, aiming at ensuring

,
workers a living wage, without causing any disturbance or
withering away in the rhythm of our wealth". (51)
When the amount of the wage proposed for
Sao Paulo is compared to the minimum "ideal ration" as
defined by law (information for other cities was not
.
available),one sees that according to the decree, the items
for this ideal nutritional level would alone cost 70 hours
of labour, in a 200 hour monthly schedule. These 70 hours
correspond to a little over half of the minimum wage for a
person's survival, without counting members of his/her
family which, according to research carried out in Sao Paulo
in 1940, averaged 3.8 people(52). The type of working- class
family found in this research had a total income of 200$000
to 400$000, and was
., made up of 3 or 4 members, a couple and
children, exclusively dependent on the head of the
household's salary. Actually, the amount spent on food in
families having a monthly income of 200 to 300 thousand reis
reached 147$000, that is, 58%. Rent, water and electricity
cost almost 19% of that income. Together, these two items
added up to 194$400, which left very little for
transportation, health and hygiene, clothing and fuel.
Hence, these two items together accounted for 176,72 labour
hoursin a 200 hour monthly schedule.
The official minimum wage not only
ratified the existing wage levels in the various regions,
 334

but it also reinforced the previous standards of living:

three research studies carried out for Sao Paulo in 1934,
1936 and 1940 respectively, point to a continuity in the low
quality of life of the city's workers during the 1930s. The
first study was undertaken by Professor Horace B. Davis,
then visiting professor at the recently founded School of
Sociology and Politics in Sao Paulo (53). The total, working
population in the sample was 295, although the number of
people in the 221 houses was actually 1,198. Of those
working, 164 were men, 44 women, 48 boys and 39 girls. The
workday varied from 8 to 12 hours, the most common figure
being 9 to 10 hours per day (230 individuals). The study
also revealed a significant number of unemployed since the
effects of the crisis of 1929 were still being felt in 1934.
The modal wage of the men was 8 thousand reis per day, while
for women it was J5 to 6 thousand reis per day. Minors earned
half of the adult male wage.In monthly terms, considering
that these individuals had to work at least six days a week,
the modal wage of the male worker would be 240 thousand reis
-- more than the minimum wage proposed for Sao Paulo six
years later. The study did not specify the type of work of
those in the sample.
The research reported that people
managed to survive b~tter as a group, that is when there was
a family income; the greater the number of people working,
the higher the income, and the better the distribution of
expenses. The average family was composed of 5 to 6 people,
 335

their incomes ranging from 293 thousand reis to 436 thousand

reis per month, while they averaged 310 to 449 thousand reis
per month on expenses. From the 187 families, 100 were in
this bracket, 40 below it and 48 above. The highest monthly
family income found was 889 thousand reis (2 families) and
the lowest was 307 thousand reis (17 families).
Food expenses by these families
.
generally averaged 51% of their total expenditures, while
the average rent expenditure was 28% of their total
expenditure. The family with the lowest income spent more on
food and rent, although for the latter item, the trend was
not as clear as it is in the case of foedstuffs. The
families whose income was under 300 thousand reis lived in
great poverty -- the study found 74 such families. According
to the researchers, there were three reasons for this
situation: first,they were considered to be "a careless
J

group ••• who are continuously in debt for spending more than
they earned" -- hence, the first cause was insufficient
income. A sudden
.. decline in the living standards, caused by
the head of family's loss of employment or a lower'payinq
.
job was the second cause. The third reason was their very
large families, with many small children and only one wage
earner. In some cases, the researchers were so struck by a
family's poverty thac "they providad assistance out of
their own pockets"; if they were foreign immigrant families,
the researchers attempted to contact the respective consuls,
so that they would do something to improve their situation.
 336

This is why the researchers paid

particular attention to the various survival strategies that
their sample population adopted. Those families having a
certain amount of space around their houses, raised chickens
for household consumption -- this was the case of 48
?

families. Another 16 of the families living "rather far from

the city" also cultivated vegetables which, together with
chickens, they used for their" consumption. Those who could
do neither adopted various other strategies : "some cut
their expenses down toward the end of the month: others took
out loans or relied on friends.and relatives for help. Some
accumulated debts with shopkeepers, and would pay one of
them one month, another, the next month, without ever
managing to pay them all. One family seems not to have paid
its rent for months, or perhaps, years and, instead of the
rent, its budget book contained only one entry: "house move
J

-- 5$000" • Purchases on credit were very common and the

researcher notes that contrary to the united States, "credit
purchases were not for luxury items but, rather, were for
basic needs": the average credit payment was 15 thousand
reis per month and, in general, covered mainly clothing
expenses.
More than one third of the food
expenditures went to buying bread, flour and c~reals '
(noodles, beans and rice); this pattern was mostly found
among low'income groups. Davis explains, at great length,
why he considered this diet to be lacking in calcium and
 337

energy and, as such, entirely inadequate for the energy

expended at work. It was with evident sympathy that he noted
--
that "certain families suffer (hunger) through at least
,
one'month periods, which specialists would rate as
dangerously low or even totally unacceptable ( ••• ) This
"
shows that low'incomes forced working'class families to
choose foods they themselves considered bad but which become
.
the only ones able to provide'them with the necessary
energy". Thus it was not merely a case of nutritional
ignorance or of cultural food" patterns but, rather, it was
"related to the families' lQ,w incomes". This was reinforced
by the insufficient wage of the workingAclass families,
forced to pay more at the "corner shop" which gave them
credit, rather than at the market where an orange cost half
the price • The low consumption of milk made a particular
impression on the researchers: consumption was most often
J

found to be under two litres per month, and children seemed

to be raised without it. Low" income families consumed little
in the way of sugar and sweets: "even goiabada", notes
Davis, "which is considered the national dessert of Brazil,
is only consumed by 21 of the 75 families (those for which
he had complete food statistics) and, even then, only
sparingly ( ••• ) The Brazilian workers don't know the taste
of cake "they never ate it". Meat and vegetables was
sporadically recorded as items of working'class comsumption.
The Paulistano workers lived in "small
and modest low ceiling buildings, often far from street
 338

view, in the middle of long blocks which protect the

working'class of Sao Paulo. According to the survey 91

,
families lived in individual houses of three or four rooms;
Davis considered this to be the average Paulistano
working'class living quarters. The rest lived in "collective
?

quarters" , that is, basements, cOrticos (old and usually

decaying buildings, transformed into rented rooms) or
company owned houses. Kitchen' and sanitary installations
were usually shared in these latter arrangements. It is
interesting to note that even when there was a large number
of occupants for the amount of space available, Davis
considered that the corticos still offered conditions "more
hygienic than those of New York or than the Mietskaserne of
Germany", for the "warm temperature and the low houses allow
the Paulistano to burrough through the courtyard alleys, at
least enjoying the space". Even so, over crowding in the
J
A

basements and corticos was frightening, as were the

unsanitary rooms and bad lighting. The researchers found
families of 6 to 8 people living in only one room and two 11
member families occupied two'room quarters. Of the 221
famlies, only 13 had an individual or collective bathroom;
120 families had private kitchens; 64 shared kitchens; "the
rest had only one can with kerosene outside their door
instead of a kitchen, ana created the best conditions they
could to burn it ••. Practically all the families use
charcoal to cook, even though ••. it is slow to light,
 339

uncomfortable and is only recommended because of its low

price". (54)

Of the 140 women who gave information on

clothing, 57 did not have a street dress, 14 did not use
stockings and 17 did not have a pair of shoes. Of the men
27% owned only one pair of trousers and only half had a

jacket; 12 stated that they had no shoes. For the children,

the lack of clothes in generai is such that it is difficult
to believe that data on their clothing had actually been
collected, although, in this respect, there is no reason for
doubt.
A second study of workers' living
conditions in Sao Paulo was carried out in 1936, by the
Division of Social Documentation and Municipal statistics of
Sao Paulo (55). It was directed by professor Samuel H.
Lowrie, again a professor at the Escola Livre de Sociologia
J •

e Politica. The research also used budget notebooks, but

unlike the undiffereptiated sample used by Davis, this time
the population was well'defined: sanitation worker~ were
researched exclusively and 428 notebooks filled. The Lowrie
study portrayed a similar situation to the one presented by
Davis. All the able-bodied men, over 18 worked; 72% of the
boys and 67% of the girl"s between the ages of 14 and 17 also
worked. But only 36% of the women between 18 and 64 years
old, worked. The families' average monthly income was 400
thousand reis. The new discovery here was that they had
sources of income other than their jobs with the sanitation
 340

department; perhaps this could be explained by the fact that

the S'hour workday was already in force and that a
government agency (the municipality of Sao Paulo) respected
it; there could thus be time "left over" to take on other
types of jobs. The same reasons noted by the Davis study
explain this population's need for an additional source of
income: insufficient means of survival.
The famiiies averaged 53% of their
income on food, consisting largely of five items: bread,
rice, beef, sugar and lard. The balance was made up of
beans, coffee, potatoes and noodles. From a nutritional
point of view, Sao Paulo sanitation workers seem to have fed
themselves more "correctly" than the workers in the Davis
study: eggs, milk, vegetables, and meat were included in
their diet more often, although not in sufficient amounts.
However, their housing
., was inferior: 60% of the families
lived together in one room and, in some cases, up to 9
people were found to be sleeping in the same room. They
usually cooked in the open air, or in the same room where
they slept. Sanitary installations were, for the most
part,shared and the number of families using the same toilet
was, at times, as high as 20. In 27% of the cases, the water
for daily use came from wells or fountains and 64% of the
taps and wells were for collective use. Pro~essor Lowrie
concluded his study asserting that a wage increase was
necessary and should correspond to the increase in the cost
of living: he recommended 20% above the prevailing level.
 341

The municipality, it was argued, should provide an example

to private industry, by maintaining adequate working
conditions and a fair remuneration. (In fact, in November
1937, following the study's recommendations, sanitation
workers' wages were increased by 20%) •
..
The third study, carried out in 1940,
included 250 families of workers at a foundry in the city of
.
Sao Paulo. (56) As such, it focused primarily on steel
workers. The research was undertaken at the request of the
employing firm itself, which wanted to organize a file
both individual and by family -- of its worke~s, to use as
the basis for improving their living standards. It had plans
to construct a cafeteria, to create consumer cooperatives
and to design a system of financial aid, should the need for
it arise. The factory hired the Escola Livre de Socio1ogia e
Politica and the Division of Municipal Statisticsto do the
.I

study, under the direction of Professor Oscar Egidio de

. Araujo. Most of the factory's workers were between 20 and 34
years old and only 7 were under 20 or over 55, which, as
the report stated, was "perhaps due to the nature of the
work,which is rather laborious" •
Compared to the 1936 dustmen's research,
the age distribution was very different: the nature of the
work and the low remuneratioll made this job open to older
people. The wages were better: 13.9% earned less than 300
thousand reis, 11.5% earned more than 600 thousand reis and
the majority of workers earned between 300 and 600 thousand
 342

reis. Considering the work of all members in the family, the

distribution of income level inevitably improved: only 4
families earned less than 300 thousand reis, 88 were in the
300 to 600 bracket and 75 families earned 600 or more.

Food patterns were not better: beans and

•
rice were indispensible plates, bread and flour excessively
consumed. The average consumption of milk and meat was
confirmed to be far below the' recommended amount required by
minimum wage law; 27 of the 165 families inquired did not
buy or consume milk and only two consumed the legal defined
quota. As far as concerns housing, no case was found of
corti90 accomodations, and the average distribution of
people per room was a little better. Nevertheless, there was
a hiqh number of people who, as found in other studies,
slept in the same room, and mixed the kitchen, eating area
and bedroom in one room. The clothing continued to be bought
I

on credit, and the families of these workers were better,

although a significant number of people had not bought any
clothes for over a year.
A comparision of the results of the 3
studies gives a general picture of the living conditions in
which the minimum wage emerged in 1940, for Sao Paulo.
Compared with the study made by the Ministry of Labou~ to
establish the minimum wage, they leave clear some of the
features which defined low levels of subsistence and strict
choices regarding a dignified reproduction of life.
 343

SAO PAULO: INCOME, EXPENDITURES AND WAGES, 1934-1940

-- ---------,,
I - - - - - - - -- - - - -
Davis Lowrie MTIC Araujo
1934 1936 I 1938 1940
--- head family \ 240$000 252$000 65% I 201~000 400$000 711,
} - II' t

loW
2:
o sons&.daugh.
wife
i
l
,. 1 11~
4~ I
i 3"
14%
u ----- I - - I

, 8~
_z other... :
t, 4%

faod 50~
i
II S3~ . :,
S4.9~ S2~
: _____
-- • -
I,
-

: 22~ : !
181, I 22.6~ 12~

II_____l.~~~ __ " : I
lO~
-- ----
I
j
j
9.4~ 710
4~ 1 4'< -- I
,.
..., tobacco
! -- ~- -- - I, -- --- -

21a
--- ,

Q --------
2
-- j - - - - - - --- I
W
a;;
transport
- ---
I I 2~
- - - - -,---- -- I
, 3S
--2-.-2~---:-~--4~--------
: - - ------ ------ - - - I'

)( doctor ! .
2~
w- -- - ---- ,-- - - -- rrI--- --,---
leisure o.B~ O.3~ 0.270 -
- ,,
-I-~--

school O.2~ _l O.2~ --0-.-6"-- --------

- -I--
- --- :
-- - - - -
other li~ ----a-.S~----~: - - - - - - 14--~ sS---------
j

-=------- ------- -- --------=------- - - - - - - - -

As far as I know, there are no similar studies for other
cities, although ~ome regional investigations exist of
living costs and average prices for Rio de Janeiro, Porto
Alegre and Recife. (57) One can note considerable regional
variation: among the large cities, Recife and Porto Alegre
..
showed the highest figures for food expenditure (68.7% and
61.7% respectively). Rio de Janeiro registered 46.5% of per
capita expenditures on food, but the figure for housing was
the highest in the country, 27.2% of the minimum salary.
~t is precisely around 1940 that favelas began to attract

attention in Rio de Janeiro, with newspapers devoting space

to their growth on the hills of the city. The favelas were

described as places of "hunger, misery and human

 344

degradation", a world in which everything "is hostile to the

world down there. Everything is lacking there: food, water,
hygiene, comfort. A street isn't a street, it's a primitive
track. A house isn't a house, it's a hole". (58)
Nevertheless, as.early as 1941, it was said that 60% of the
inhabitants of favelas were workers and held regular jobs,
half of them factory workers. (59) In July, 1942, it was
reported that in Rio de Janeiro there were "60,000 filthy
shacks hanging on the hillsides, displaying an enourmous
social sore ••• ". (60) These informations left public opinion
divided between the attribution of the usual stigmas to the
poor and the social denounciation of impo~ishment.
In Recife (capital of state of Pernambuco), the question of
urban living standards was also posed through the housing
problem: the extraordinary growth of the mocambos in the
city. By 1938, ~ state government of Pernambuco had
created a special service to "combat" their spread, an
experiment which was exported to Rio de Janeiro when that
city decide to "defavelize" workers through the construction
of "Proletarian Parks". When Rio de Janeiro oldest favela
was removed to the first "proletarian park" (planned an
constructed by the Federal Government between 1942 and
1944), the aesthetics of the public spectacle attained
unimaginable climaxes: shacks were set on fire by night so
as the entire city of Rio de Janeiro could see poverty being
burnt by the government. (61) The experiments in Recife and
Rio both failed, because there was no way to impede the
 345

growing impoverishment of large numbers of workers nor of

the expansion of the urban labour supply through internal
migration. A similar fate befell the attempts to plan and
distribute food for workers through the establishment of
balanced diets t~ be served at meals in factories, which
were encouraged to construct cafeterias. However, even the
government surveys evaluating the viability of these
cafeterias showed that, despite subsidies, the meals would
be more expensive than the workers could afford. The
practice of workers at textile factories in Rio, for
example, was to bring a tin from home with manioc flour and
beans (and more rarely a piece of dried beef) which they ate
seated on the sidewalk or in the patios of the factories.,
when the latter were available. The research commission of
the government agency studing working-class nutrition
reported graphica~ly that the textile workers were ashamed
to show their eating tins and refused to be photographed.
(62)

At the end of the Estado NOVO, the impoverishment of the

urban working population was visible to all, worsened by
wartime scarcities and hoarding. (See Chapter V). Everything
that backward" and savage industrialization could bring on
was to be found in Brazilian cities: "full employment"
which corresponded to "full poverty", originating from a
very high level of exploitation of the labour force; hungry
and disoriented migrants wandering through the city streets,
expelled from an agrarian world untouched by modernity;
 346

widespread hunger and lack of decent housing; high mortality

rates (Recife: 27 per 1,000 inhabitants in 1945, Sao Paulo
13, Porto Alegre 17.2, Rio de Janeiro 16.2) caused largely
by infectious desease (tuberculosis above all: 272 deaths
per 1,000 inhabi~ants, but also typhoid fever, .dysentery,
and diphteria). The life expectancy in cities ranged from
49.2 years in Sao Pa~lo to 36.2 in Recife. As medical
observers enphasized, everythlng could be resolved with
"pure drinking water, sewers, better habits of personal
hygiene and better nutrition". (63)
Meanwhile, the dictatorial government continued its
spectaclc,- but was becoming visibly concerned by the
obviousness of poverty. In 1943, the minimum wage was
increased, but the rise in the cost of living continued. The
government sought, without effect, to contain it, regularly
announcing normative and moralizing measures, and each year
created bureaucracies on top of bureaucracies to deal with
the declining standard of living of the population.
Following the decree-law on Crimes Against the Economy of
the People (1938, responsible for the imprisonment of large
numbers of small shopkeepers), and the regulatory Commission
for Supply and Production (1939), the government established
a powerful Coordinating Agency for Economic Mobilization
(1942). The latter was a super-ministry which instituted
rationing (meat, sugar and bread, with fixed prices)and also
created supply stocks. The agency even required the textile
industry to establish a quota for "popular text 1i l es "
 347

accessible to the population, and installed similar schemes

for shoes and medicine. Moreover , each state had its own
commissions for each basic commodity: milk, meat, etc. -~he
work of these agencies resulted in vast impasses involving
industrialists, ~ral producers, middlemen and retailers, as
well as immense ~eues for the distribution of products, the
lowering of quality and, as a final achievement, a quite
.
extensive black market. (64) ·
To this state apparatus for the control of the economy, the
government added various other bureaucracies aimed at the
knowledge and "improvement" of ~orkers: Nutrition and
Welfare Service, Workers's Recreation Service, Hygiene and
Industrial Medical Service, Workers'Recreation Service,
statistical and Social Security Service, Immigration and
Colonization Service, National Services against
Tuberculosis, Syphilis, Malaria, Leprosy, etc. These
J

agencies were responsible for the systematic exposure of the

enourmous needs of workers and, therefore, for the emergence
of a social consciousness about the population of the
country. What these agencies did not show, however, was the
connivance of other sectors of the state bureaucracy -
specially the Labour Ministry, which had sufficient
deCision-making power - with the prevailing patterns of
exrlo~tation. The Labour Ministry kep~ its eyes closed

toward the frauds commited by businessmen against the social

legislation, when it did not contribute decisively itself to
the failure to implement minimum guarantees for the workers.
 348

In other words, the knowledge which the state collected

about various aspects of the life of the working classes was
not related to the management of labour relations in.the
,
factories and elsewhere. After all, it was in the workplaces
that poverty ori~inated, as did the discourse about it which
all official representatives presented to justify this
strange form of controlled citizenship, called corporative
but in fact individualizing, which eliminated the public
realm in order to be exalted as a spectacular achievement of
the state.
NOTES
1. On the 1935-1937 period, cf. E. Carone, A RepUblica Nova
Sao Paulo, DlFEL, 1974; R. Levine, The Vargas Regime: The '
Critical Years, 1934-1938, New York, Columbia University
Press, 1970; Basbaum, Leoncio, Hist6ria Sincera da
RepUblica, v. 3, Sao Paulo, Al fa-omega , 1968.
2. Ney Pedreira Campos, "Antagonismo dos Interesses" in
Seminarios de Legislacao Social (1941-1942),. Sao Paulo,
Faculdade de Direjto da U.S.P., p. 470.
3. Law no. 62, June 5th, 1935; Decree-Law 20,465 of 1933; on
the issue, cf. the opinions in the Revista do Trabalho by
Adamastor Lima, "Despedida Injusta", July 1936; Oliveria
Vianna, Parecer, March 1937; Ibid., March 1939; Anibal
Freire, Parecer, September, 1939.
4. These regulated the condictions for firing an employee:
advance notification should be given three days before for
day-wage workers, eight days for-weekly workers and thi~y
days for those paid every two weeks or on a monthly ba~~s.
They also regulated the indemnities which should be pa~d to
workers dismissed "without just cause". In this case,
workers were to be paid one month's wage for ea~h year of
employment. Firing workers who had been.on the ~ob for more
than 10 years was very difficult; they were ent~tled tO,two
months' pay for each year of service. The law also prov~ded
that if a worker's wage were significantly affected by a
cutback or a suspension of work far more than 30 da¥s, the
worker had the right to regard his contract as resc~nded and
to claim the appropriatte indemnity. For the most part, the
labour courts deal with these kinds of cases.
 349

5. Cf. Note 3.
6. cited in Antonio Carlos Bernardo, Tutela e Autonomia
Sindical. Brasil: 1930-1945, Sao Paulo, Ed. T. A. Queiroz,
1982, p. 116.
7. Cf. 0 Observador Economico e Financeiro, Ano I, June
1936, p. 107; Industria Textil, Ano X, no. 109, January:
1941, pp. 43-44; .. Industria Textil, no. 110, February, 1941,
p. 70-71. These business journals report the judicial
decisions of the labour courts.
8. Ibid.
9. A. Bergamini de Abreu, "0 Principio da Vitaliciedade",
Boletim do MTIC, no. 3, November, 1934, pp. 205-208;
Industria Textil, no. 109, Year X, January 1941, p. 45;
Industria Textil, no. 110, Year X, February, 1941, p. 67 and
pp. 70-72; Industria Textil no. 119, November, 1942, pp. 11
and 55; Industria Textil, no. 156, December, 1943, p. 41.
10. cited by Edgar Carone, 0 Estado Novo , Sao Paulo, 1976,
p. 123; 0 Trabalhador Textil, november-december, 1939
11. Quoted in Carone, op.cit., p.23

12. 0 Trabalhador Textil, n. 21, August 1940.

13. Stanley stei~ origens e Evo1ucao da Industria Texti1 uo

Brasil : 1850-1950, Rio, 1979, p.168

14. Industria Textil, n. 128, p. 45; Stein, op.cit., p.~6

15. Decree-law 4639, August 31, 1942

16. Decree-law 4869, October 23, 1942

17. Decree-law 4937, November 9, 1942

18. This sentence us used in all the entrepeneurial and

governmental articles to refer to the' problems of
disciplining workers in the period.

19 . Campos, op. C1't • , 1944 , p.433,· Cesarino Jr. , Direito

Social Brasileiro, 1942
 350

20. Decree-law 4.637, 1943

/21. Anto~io Francisco Carvalhal "Uma palavra ao operariado

naciona11,. Address delivered on PRD-2 Cruzeiro do SuI Radio
Rio de j aneiro, 1943. Reproduced in BMTIC, March 1943:
carva1ha1 was the president of the National cong~ess of
Industry Workers' organizing commission. .

22. Industria Textil, n. 151, July 1944; A Noite, April 1944

23. Segadas Vianna (General Director of the National Labour

Department) "Every employs must know" • 0 Jornal, April,
1944(Reprinted in business magazines).

24. Minister Alexandre Marcondes Filho, "CUmprir as

obriqa<;~es para apressar 0 termino da 1uta". Serie of radio
addresses, April and may, 1944. Pub1iseh in. newspapers by
the DIP as well as by employers' magazines. Also Marcondes
Fi1ho, A., Trabalhadores do Brasil; paletras do Ministro na
Hora do Brasil. em 1942, Rio de Janeiro, 1943.

25. ibid.

26. Opinion n. 144.861 of the Labour Ministry, March, 1944.

BMTIC and Industria Texti1, April 1944, n. 148, p. 69
;

27. Correio da Manha, January 8, 1946.

28. Industria Textil, November, 1944, n. 155, p. 32 and p.

35.

29. Court case 0 the Conselho Regional do Trabalho (Sao

Paulo). Published in Industria Textil, March 1945.

30. On the Estado Novo's Ministry of Education, see: Si~on

Schwartzman (ed) Estado Novo: um auto _ retrato CArgu1vo
Gustavo Capanema), Brasilia, 1982; Simoll Schwartzman et.
alii, Tempos de Capanema, Rio, 1984.

31. Modernism was a movement creating a new place ~or. the

fine arts, aimed at modern production (pa1nt1ng,
poetry,cinema,literature, sculpture). It was inaugurated by
the Modern Art Week (Semana de Arte Moderna) in
 351

February, 1922, and was a cultural event that had enormous

impact in intellectuals circles.

32. Cf. Eric Hobsbawn and Terence Ranger (eds.) The

Invention of Tradition, Cambridge, 1983.

33. Joao Luis Lafeta. 1930: a critica e 0 modernismo. Sao

Paulo, 1974. •

34. Radio was the major media used by the Estado Novo for
propaganda. More than half of the Brazilian population over
18 years old in 1940 was illiterate (56,4%), making radio a
powerful means of access to information. Between 1939 and
1942, the number of radios in the country doubled (659.762
in 1942). Comedy, music, sports and news programmes
coexisted with government propaganda, among which the "Hour
of Brazil" broadcast between 7 and 8:00 p.m. and essentially
covering the Labour Minister's speeches, stands out. This
program was rebroadcast in any public establishment having
a radio, as well as by loud-speakers installed in the public
squares. Besides the radio, DIP produced documentaries on
hte Government's achievements (250 films between 1938 and
1941). In the press, for its part, subject as it was to
censorship regulations, at least 60% of the articles
published were provided by the National Agency. On this
subject, see : Nelson Jahr Garcia, Estado Novo: Ideologia e
Propaganda Politica, Sao Paulo, 1982.

35. Cf .Garcia. Ibid; Mario Lago, Na Rolanca do Tempo,

Rio,1976; President Getulio Vargas' speeches in A Nova
Politica do Brasil, vol. IV, Rio,1938, vol.XI, Rio, 1947.

36Interviews with older workers, carried out in 1984.

37. The Estado Novo even designed a project of gove~eI?-t

for the country: a collaborative system between antagon~st~c
professional groups (especially workers and entrepren~urs),
represened by corporative entities organized accord~ng to
economic criteria. In this project, workers' and emploY7 rs '
unions form the consultante commissions to assess techn~c~l
decisions by the government. In practice, the system d~d not
work in this way; the entrepreneurs took advant~ge ~f the
comissions to represent themselves as an organ~zed lobby
within the state apparatu, and the workers rarely had a
presence left any significant mark. Thro~ghout the Estado
Novo years, it seems, workers' representat~ves ~ere ex~luded
from these commissions so that the latter funct~oned w~thout
disguise.
 352

38. On the welfare system in Brazil, see Amelia Cohn

Previdencia Social e Processo Politico no Brasil Sao paulo'
1981; James Malloy, .. A Politica da previdenci~ social n~
Brasil: Participac;:ao e Paternalismo" in DADOS Rio de
Janeiro, 1976; Celso B • Leite and L. Paranhos' Velloso
Frevidencia Social , Rio, 1962. Also consult the analysis by
Wanderley Guilherme dos Santos, Cidadania e Justica, Rio,
1979.
..
39. Penal Code of 1890, article 204 and 205. This changes in
this code (article 204, 205 and 206 of Decree 4.269 of
January 1921; Decree 5221 of August 1927 and Decree 22.213
of December 1932) did not. alter the narrow .margin of
"legality" within which strikes were permitted.

40. Ney Pedreira Campos, op.cit, 1944.

41. Luis Werneck Vianna, Liberalismo e Sindicato no Brasil,

Rio,. 1976, p. 226.

42. Strictly, speaking, the minimum wage was the only law
which did not emerge prior to 1930.

43 • BMTI C, n. 1, september 1934 and n. 9 , May 1935. The

organization of the entrepreneurs and their pressure on the
tchtlical debate are also recorded in that bulletin, in
various news art{cles from numbers 1 to 9.

44. ibid., n. 1, 1934 •

..
45. BMTIC, n. 8, April 1935, and n. 9 , May 1935.

46. Servic;:o de Estatistica da Previdencia Social (SEPT),

Sa1ario Minimo: Legis1acao « Estatistica e Doutrina, Rio,
1940.

47. Quoted by ?dgar Carone, A segunda Republica. pp. 238-

239.

48 "Exposic;:ao de motivos que justifica 0 Decreto-Iei ~99,

demaio de 1938, pelo Sr. Ministro do .Tra~a~ho, Ind~str1~ e
Comercio, Dr. Waldemar Falcao". Salar10 M1n1mo. Leg1s1acao.
Estatistica e Doutrina, Rio, 1940, pp. 3-57.

-,"--
 353

49 Decree Law n. 399, January t, 1938.

50. ,In, additio~ to survey~ ~y ,the Labour Ministry's

stat~st~cal Serv~ce research Just~fy~ng the "minimum ration"
was undertaken in Sao ,Paulo. To my knowledge, no similar
research work was carr~ed out for other cities until much
later. The Funda~ao Getulio Vargas designed a consumer price
index for the city
•
of Rio de Janeiro in 1946 •

51. see note 49.

52.0scar Egydio de Araujo, "t1ma pesquisa de padrao de vida".

supplement to Vol LXXX of the Revista do Arquivo Municipal,
Sao Paulo, 1941.

53. Escola Livre de Socioloqia Politica Horace B. Davis,

Pacirao de vida dps operarios da cidade de Sao Paulo" ,
Revista do Arquivo Municipal, vol. XIII, 1935~

54. Davis, op.cit.

55. Samuel Lowrie," Pesquisa de Padrao de Vida das Familias

dos Operarios da Limpeza Publica da Municipalidade de Sao
Paulo" , Revista do Arqui vo Municipal, , vol. LI, october
1938. . ., .

56. Oscar Egidio Araujo, Ope cit ••

57. For Rio de Janeiro, there are calculations upon an old

price index made in 1912, which would be to fully redefined
by Funda9ao Getulio Vargas in 1946. There is also Monthf1y
Statistic Series made by IBGE. The quoted data are from the
latter.

58. Correio da Manha, " a que vimos na favelas". 28/7/1940.

59. 0 Observador Economico e Financeiro, july 1942, p. 77.

60. Henrique Dias da Crux, " Os morros cariocas no. novo

regime" (1942) quoted by Lucien Parisse, Fave1as do Rl.O de
Janeiro: Evo1ucao e Sentido, Cadernos CENPHA, 5, 1969.
 354

61. Parisse, op.cit., pp. 59-79; Mauro Kleiman, "Acabar com

as favelas: partues proletarios provisorios". Chao (Architec
Review), June/July 1978, n.2.

62. Alexandre Moscoso, Al imentacao do TrJbalhador, Rio,

1939; Helion Polvora, " A alimentacrao dos operarios que
trabalham no suv-solo". BMTIC, n. 77, January 1941.

63. Henrique Maia Penido, " Aspecto do panorama sani tario

brasileiro" Revista do Servico Especial de Saude Publica, n.
2, VII, June 1955, p. 365; Eugene campbel and M. Morehead,
"A saude como fator do desenvolvimento no Brasil" Revista do
SeryiQo Especial de Saude Publica, V, December 1952; F.
Pompeo do Amaral, "as impressionantes indices de morbidade e
morta1idade como reflexos da desnutricrao de nossa
populacr ao " , Revista Brasiliense, n. 6, July 1956.

64. See Chapter V.

 355

CHAPTER V: THE CULTURAL AND MATERIAL HERITAGE:

REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRACY AND SOCIAL RIGHTS (1945-1950)

"The Brazilian worker of today has his code of

rights, his bill of economic emancipation. And he
knows perfectly well what that is worth, what this
represents as a cultural and material
heritage( ••• )Brazilians are now sufficiently mature
politically to chose ~hat is best for them.
President Getulio Vargas, May 1, 1945.

1. Political and social crisis; government and social

protest

The political events which led to the downfall of the

Getulio Vargas dictatorship are well known (1). The pact
supporting him started to crumble as early as 1943 as a
result of the domestic political climate engendered by his
decision, taken after much hesitation, to cede to public and
political pressures and send Brazilian troops to join the
allied forces in the war. The weak regional elites, deprived
of power, took advantage of this climate to raise liberal
banners and make inroads into a public opinion already
mobilized against Nazi-Fascism. Other manifestation
followed: the student movement protesting against the Axis
power, but also incorporating a repudiation of the domestic
dictatorial regime; intellectuals dissatisfied with
censorship ; prominent figures in the government, pressured
 356

by the situation and-resigning; veterans of the 1930

revolution founding organizations to mobilize the population

on behalf of the war (the Friends of America society and the
National Defense League -- repectively, Sociedade dos Amigos
da America and Liga de Defesa Nacional). All these movements
took advantage of the space created by a dictatorial
government which positioned itself against other dictatorial
governments. The war also split the army, dividing it into
pro-American and pro-Fascist factions; at the same time,
provided room for communists to regroup clandestinely.
The tensions worsened in 1944. The government's first
response was to resort to repression - closing associations,
tightening up on censorship, breaking up protest marches -
but as the demonstrations mounted, accentuating the Estado
Novo's legitimacy crisis, the government was forced to cede
to the most strident demands. In the early months of 1945,
Getulio Vargas siqned a bill calling elections (February);
gave his first press conference for years (March);
reestablished diplomatic relations with... the soviet Union
(April); supported the formation of a political party (the
PDS) and launched his War Minister, General Dutra, as the
candidate to succeed him in the Presidency( April); granted
amnesty to all political prisoners (April); re-opened
political associations, hired professors and publiw
employees accused of being "extremists"; legalized the
Communist Party; signed antitrust legislation (June). All
this demonstrates Varga's considerable skill in responding
 357

in a timely fashion to the opposition, in an attempt to

administer the transition to a democratic regime without
relinquishing power. As part of this effort, Vargas went so
far as to promote the establishment of a Labour Party (PTB)
mobilizing the entire Labour Ministry machine for support •
..

According to all political analyses of the period,

Vargas's skill in manipulating the emerging political scene
helped speed up the process leading to the coup that
overthrew him. A hardening of the various factions occured
in the second half of 1945, when the opposition
.
found .itself
faced wi~~ a mass movement demanding that Vargas remain in
power and convene a National constituent Assembly as an
alternative to presidential elections. This proposal enjoyed
massive popular support and was backed by the labour
movement and the communists; it became known as queremismo,
a term derived from the movement's slogan - tlQueremos
Getulio" ("We want Getulio tl ). The proposal coincided with a
number of important government initiatives to liberalize
labour laws,specially the elimination of Labour Ministry
control over collective bargaining, union elections and
union meetings. In addition, the government allowed an
unOfficial communist organization - the "Movimento unitario
dos Trabalhadores" (MOT) - to be active in labour unions.
The MDT's organizational capability was demonstrated in a
highly successful nationwide unionization campaign and a
step-by-step coordination of the activities of independent
 358

union leaders (2). All of this was,even more unbearable for

the opposition elites and the army, for it was a sign that
Getulio Vargas intended to remain in power and, what was
even worse, seek support with policies carried out on behalf
on the working classes. At the end of October, the generals
.
and the UDN (the liberal party of the elites) overthrew the
Vargas government. The path was now cleared for a
"redemocratization" process, which would begin with general
elections in December. Dutra was elected president with the
backing of the former dictator, and a parliament, which was
given the task of writing a new constitution, convened in
March, 1946, with representatives of the major parties,
including the Communist Party (PCB).
All this is well-known and, in terms of a strictly
political analysis, provides a convincing explanation of the
conflicting interests involved. But beyond the sphere of
.I

organized power, the year 1945 gave birth to an intense

mobilization of various social groups which, in different
ways, took up the banner of social rights - survival,
dignity and justice. Anyone who looks closely at the climate
of events during that year (especially as revealed in the
daily newspapers of the time), which continued into the
years that followed, cannot help but notice the collective
demands to "restore" :iving conditions, which were orcc
again portrayed as unacceptable; people felt their daily
lives were being disrupted either by greedy businessmen,
dishonest shopkeepers, incompetent bureaucrats or by the
 359

connivance of the government itself. In other words , s~ciety

not only mobilized around strictly political issues, but also

around a representation of living conditions which defined
the relationship between the middle and lower classes and
political events and brought into question the capacity of
the government (whether dictatorial or constitutional) to
fulfill its social obligations.
The return to a climate of public debate began as early
as the end of 1944 with issues such as the cost of living,
rationing and the shortages of basic necessities. Whatever
their causes, these problemas left the government helpless
in the face of public opinion. The numerous government
agencies had proved increasingly inefficient in coping with
growing discontent. The role of these agencies was
essentially punitive, although they did attempt to requlte
the production and distribution of foodstuffs. But the
threat of fines and imprisonment for those who made
"excessive market profits" and the depiction of black market
operations as "crimes against national security" did nothing
to resolve the situation. In addition to these problems,
there was growing inflation and difficulties with
transportation. The more that rice, milk and bread
disappeared from the shelves, the more people talked of
higher prices for meat, lard and beans; as stocks of
potatoes and onions continue to rot in port and warehouses,
the government issued more declarations and fines and set up
 360

more "consultations committes", without finding a way to .

slow the deterioration in living standards.
Judging from the newspapers, the public-made a direct
link between its own problems of survival and the gains of
the dominant classes, especially the "excessive profits"
that industrialists had enjoyed during the war. Already in
January, 1945, the Finance Minister had defended the
qovernment from the accusation that the drop in living
standards was the result of the profiteering of "certain
industrial and trading companies"(3). Towards the middle of
the year, newspapers were reporting that "i1'l\our country,
during the wartime years, an industrial entrepreneur is
i jUdg~inCompetent if he hasn't earned at least a 60% return
on his invested capital" (4). In August, newspapers revealed
that most wartime profits had ended up in the hands of
textile mill owners in the form of cash, stock dividends and
bonuses:

"The accounts of the Banqu Textile company have been

published. In 1939, at the beginning of the war, the
factory's capital totalled 9 million cruzeiros. Six
years later, thanks primarily to cloth prices, which
soared at the expense of the sufferings caused by the
war, that capital had increased to 40.5 mi~lion
cruzeiros. The factory was one of those.wh~ch praye~
daily that the war would never end. Dur~ng that 1?er~od
of tears and anguish, desperations and ~attles, ~t
distributed dividends and bonuses total~ng 40% to 50%
per annum on capital which was itself being steadily
and methodically doubled" (5)

And Rio's Correio da Manha declared that

. . t' ly
"The growth registered in many factor~es.d~d no ~mpin
a multiplication of production, nor an ~mprovement
 361

the quality of pro~uc:ts. Our, industry has developed

<?nly through the: J?rl.vl.lege<:1 Sl. tuation of substituting
l.mport~ an~ profl.tl.ng from l.t,by set~ing its own prices
( .•• ) l.n Sao Paulo, plant equl.pment l.S rotting from age
and exhaustion, while its owners are rotting from
wealth"(6). ,
The industrialists responded as best as they could, in
general laying the blame for shortages and rising prices on
wholesale merchants:

" ••• answering the popular unrest and pressure to put an

end to this ruinous situation( ••• )it must be made clear
whose fault it is. The uproar created by the consumer
masses is directed toward the factory more than any
other of the responsible sectors. We don't want to come
to the defence of an industry, if ••• the prices of its
products show obviously exaggerated profits, as can be
verified by examining the industry's accounts. But it
seems evident that today many of the claims against the
increase in prices must be directed, with greater
justification, at the wholesalers"(7)
But a ready-made clothing wholesaler, writing to the
Correio, stated that

" ••• the bl~e for this collapsing situation is falling

on our backs., but this is not fair. In 1945, I sold
1.8 million cruzeiros worth of goods and divided the
year's profit of 80,000 cruzeiros with my partner. The
industrialists, in fact, increased prices with no
further thought, as can be seen by the enourmous
fortunes they have ••• I don't even have my own house
yet" (8)
An avalanche of complaints reached the newspapers,
accompaying the protest against the shortages and high
prices of cloth, clothing and food; the protests often took
~he form of small raids Ou shops and wholesales merchants,
as well as the stoning and painting of slogans at several
factories. Those who could write sent letters to the papers
or else phoned the police to denounce and demand the
 362

punishment of "disonest dealers". For instance, complaints

were lodged against butchers who never had a quota of meat
at officially controlled prices; against the prices of
clothes and transportation; against the prices of so-called
"popular restaurants"; and primarily against the local
street and open-air markets, which should have offered
official prices.
In early 1946, the I eveI'. of conflict was so high that
even shopping sometimes involved violence: II At a milk stand
in Calendaria (Rio) a very small glass of milk costs the
exorbitant sum of Cr$1,00. Ze do Povo (the average man),
feeling himself cheated, protested against this robbery, and
the cashier responded by pointing a revolver at his chest.
Believe it or not, but it's true" (9). Some collective
violence was also registered: "Everything happened as we
predict. The population ran to the breadshops,
. formed a
queue and waited for the bread. The lack of the latter
caused a reaction:the people invaded .some shops and subdued
-

the bakers with real threats, demanding the product" CIa).

People felt a strong antagonism towards the merchants and
shopkeepers, as if they personified the whole system of
hardshiip and exploitation: " A passer by told us that
everything was being tolerated - everything, even the
impudence of tl,e merchants in ignoring the price-list under -
the very eyes of complacent inspectors; even the poor
quality of the goods on display on shop counters (because
the higher-quality products were sold under the counter at
 363

higher prices); and much more- In fact, everything could be

tolerated, he said, except for the insolent, rude and
mocking tone with which these merchants treat poor people
and those who react to their exploitation ••• ". (11). Many
streets demonstrations were held, including a hunger strike
..
in CUiaba in the state of Mato Grosso and a march in Recife,
Pernambuco. In February 1946, the police" asked the
population not to destroy the. shops, especially the
bakeries, because there is no reason for violence against
private property, given that the police are in control ••• "
(12). But at a time when "rebulding democracy" was the
great ideological catchword, and the hope for better days
met with the same repressive conditions of life, this kind
of warning did not touch the population. indeed it seems
that the people were so fed up that they were willing to
confront the police: " ••• the manager of the shop closed the
.I

doors, frightened by the crowd, and called the police. When

the police car arrived, a man started to shout, 'Gestapo!'
and succeeded in turning the crowd against the police force.
The man was arrested, but the crowd tried to protect him and
at the same time protect themselves. At this moment, chaos
broke out ••• " (13). Some protests even bordered on the
humorous: " Some chickens belonging to the chief of the
foodstuff Committee were stulen ••• the thieves left this
message: 'You are the food supply chief for the Rio
population which, tired and hungry, spends hour after hour,
from queue to queue, in search of their basic food needs,
 364

such as sugar and meat. Your garden is full of young and

tasty chickens. The thieves who signed this letter are also
--
hungry, and this is" a protest" (14).
Both humor and violence were common in the climate of
tension unleashed by the resumption of public protest
debate. Ever since censorship was lifted, information on
conflicts which previously could not be published began to
appear in the papers, along with portrayals of the violent
conditions of daily life in the cities. During the summer
which began with the fall of the dictatorship, torrential
rains demolished poor and working-class neighborhoods in
cities of the center-south regionof the country, while fires
destroyed the slums of Recife. The Rio newspaper complained
of the mud and rubbish which was spreading throughout the
city, while those of Sao Paulo complained about the beggars
and abandoned children. There was a chronic shortage of
housing for rent , and it became obvious that the number of
slums and shantytowns had grown in all major cities. This
discrediting of the government was noted in all the
newspaper, from the largest publications down to the
recently reopened union papers: people had to find their own
ways to cope with the adverse living conditions they faced.
When the mayor of Campinas gave the order to tear down,
ostensibly for public health rE::!asons, 010. mansions which had
became slumdwellings (the real reason was to clear space for
new office buildings), the families who lived there
physically resisted the police who came to evict them. When
 365

the new government threatened to raise rents, an "Alliance

for the Solidarity and Protection of Tenants" was b9 rn ,
which charged that the government was acting in the interest
of "social parasites" (the landlords). The landlords, lon
the other hand, infuriated with rent control laws, evicted
,.
tenants of their own, throwing their furniture into the
street (Sorocaba, Sao Paulo) and even destroying the house
itself - one landlord in Santos, Sao Paulo went so far as to
drive a truck into the front wall. Even the militar,. . and
civilian police could no longer get away with arrogant
behavior; a group of drunken soldiers in Sao Paulo tried to
destroy a bar and were thrown out by the bar's customers.
When a garrison of soldiers got into a fight with police
investigators and exchanged shots in the middle of the
street, they had their revolvers confiscatedby civilians; in
the center of the city, " unruly soldiers were almost
lynched by the people " , who ran after them and managed to
grab them in the street. There were disturbances in Rio
cinemas during the showing of films about political events.
Patients escaped from a mental hospital in Jacarepaqua
outside Rio (they were late captured by the police and
returned to the hospital), and lepers escaped from juvenile
detention centers. Families of persons who ~ad "shown up
dead" at police stations dared denounce what had r,~ppened
"in the newspapers and take their cases to court.
However, the most serious problem for workers , in
terms of their expression of social tensions, was
 366

transportation. According to newspaper of 1945 and 1946 ,

there were numerous cases of destruction of trains, buses,
trains and ferries - examples of the population's
dis~~ction with the condition of life, which emerged in a
very desperate way (in spite of, and probably because of,
y

the many negotiations between state and private transport

companies). Some headlines show the countless ransacking of
means of transportation: "Tra'ins destroyed by the masses in
the PraQa da Se" (Sao Paulo, 10/30/45); "Ransacking of the
Niter6i ferry because of a delay" (Rio, 12/14/46); "Minister
of Transportation calls for the masses to be tolerant of
urban transportation conditions" (1/5/46); etc. A typical
incident went like this: "Yesterday, at 9 o'clock, at the
Bras (Sao Paulo) train stop there was a violently explosive
display of tempers from hundreds of tram passengers.
Authorities from the local police station were called to the
~

scene, where they immediately took the necessary precautions

and managed to pacify the storm, controlling those who were
most active and removing the popular masses from the train
station. As far as we could determinate, the company (Light
& Power Co. of Canada) inspector ordered several trains
which were full of people on their way from the center of
the city to the (working-class) neighborhoods of Vila Maria,
P~~~a and Belem to return to the station. the indignant
passengers invaded the station and began to destroy several
trains, one of which was set on fire ••• one passenger was
beaten by the conductor and injured .•• " (15). The policy of
 367

the transport companies, apart from calling the police, was

to leave things as they were - a kind of punishment which
led people to desperation: "In March 1945, the suburban
trains of the Central railways were sacked; as a punitive
measure, the company continued to use the destroyed cars for
months and months, without windows , seats or sanitary
facilities" (16). It was also pointed out that the private
transport companies profited 'from the riots: "Nevertheless",
said an article in the Correio, " We do call the attention
fo Niter6i residents to one thing: don't allow yourselves to
be exploited. The ferries are being delayed o~ purpose, in
order to provoke a public reaction. Whatever the causes
might be, they have one predicted effect - destruction -
after which the Cantareira (the British transport company
owning the Rio ferry service) tries to qet compesation from
the government" (17).
J

The public, which was made up of workers with specific

work schedules, many of whom had to reach a certain transfer
points to get to work, were not at that moment interested in
the profits and compesation of the companies, although Light
& Power and Cantareira were very unpopular, much more than
the Central do Brasil railway. They were challenged by
"daily attacks which aim to disrupt our lives", as stated by
a working-class passenger of the Central (18). In March
1946, the Correio da Manha reported that "a committee of

workers was in our editorial offices to complain about the

actions of the director of the Central do Brasil railway and
 368

demanded action by the Transportation Ministry; they are

against the chaos reigning in the schedules of the electric
--
trains during the rush hour. According to the committee~
this week there have been delays of up to one hour after
5:30, causing the stations to be overcrowded to an
irritating extent. As if to test the passengers' patience,
empty train cars circulated on the tracks, many on their way
to another station without passengers, while those waiting
to travel home after a day of work sweated from the
overhelming heat of the day on the overcrowded station
platforms and were forced to put up with the administrative
incompetence of the head transport engineers. The committee
ends by saying: 'When patient runs out and as explosiiori
occurs, you are going to say that we are savages, anarchists
and a ton of similar thing. But first it is better to know
that working people can't always be sheepll(19). This
J

statement illustrated the situation very well: it was not

only the terrible condition of the trains, with everything
old or broken, nor only the constant overcrowding, which
forced passengers to hang out of the trams and tra~. door
(the so-called pingentes), nor only the great number of
people killed or injured in accidents and in old buses, but
above all, it was the time wasted in queues, the delays in
getting to work and the indifference of the transport
companies to the conditions under which the working class
had to travel.
 369

This exasperation with the deterioration in living

conditions affected not only the government that was
overthrown in 1945, but also the one which came to power in
1946. It also reached the centre of the political struggle
among different organized groups. All of them, in one way or
another, sought to dominate this climate of public
dissafection with institutional solutions and transform
.
popular discontent (as expressed in actions and words) into
arguments in their favour. In other words, the
inpoverishment of the working class and the fall in living
standards for the middle classes (as expressed in distinct
spontaneous and violent actz) offered opportunities for some
groups and caused fear for others. In both cases, the
political dynamic of the period was marked by social crisis
and, from the point of view of the workers, defined their
participation in political events.
J

The first signs that the crisis of the dictatorship was

moving beyond the realm of the political establishment came
with the debate (still highly controlled by censoreship)
over the unequal relationship between wages and the cost of
living. Writing at the beginning of 1945,the British consul
in Bahia noted that the year 1944 had been "a period of
steady deterioration" and that local government, as in the
other .:c.c'.'tes , " has earned for itself a general reputation
of incompetence and dishonesty" (20). In the same tone, the
British Embassy commented on the visit that Vargas made to
Sao Paulo in late December 1944: " I believe", said the
 370

report, "that for weeks before the visit took place, the
Catete Palace was worried because of news of unrest in Sao
Paulo, particularly amongst the working classes who, it is
said, were stating quite openly that something drastic would
have to be done to protect their interests. They complained
that they were being trodden underfoot and dying of hunger
because their increases in pay were incompatible with the
continued rapid increase in the cost of living, whilst big
business, fully protected by the Government., continued to
make four and five thousand percent profits. I heard that
(there are) alarming reports saying that situation ••• was
worse, if anything, than 1932: worse beecause in that year
the trouble was caused by few politicians (sic), whilst now
it is a popular hunger agitations" (21). In January 1945,
the same source stated that II a large employer of labour
told me that he had nevedr seen the people in such truculent
mood in the whole of his experience ••• "(22). In February,
the ambassador commented that economic situation "has
produced an almost complete lack of interest in the
manifetations of internal politics" and that "blame is apt
to fall more on Varga's associates than on Vargas himself.
But fundamentally there is a profound skepticism about the
possibilities of good government in Brasil" (23)
From January to May<of 1945, the new~ papers consistently
reported on the government efforts to lower the prices of
basic necessities, through standardized price lists, the
prohibition of imports of these goods and campaigns against
 371

shortages which aimed to punish those who illegally withheld

the goods. But during these months the problem only got
worse. Headlines such as "More tham 20.000 dozen eggs sold
yesterdf{ under police supervision" , "Government trucks sell
bananas at working-class prices", "Sugar arrives in campinas
and will be sold at the official price" , etc., appeared
repeatedly in the papers. Meanwhile, the withholding of
stocks for speculation, the pressures of producers and
merchants and the proliferation of numerous supply
commissions continued. The commissions made absurd
proposals, such as a system for distributing food based on a
classification of the population into "poor", "needy" and
"absolutely poor" (24) and the establishment of market .
stalls for "workers and peasants" in the town halls of
smaller cities, which caused even more confusion because of
the numbers of people who crowded into municipal buildings
-I

(25). Since none of these policies were successful, the

only way to satisfy public opinion was through "police
tactics", such that "merchants who practice condemnable ways
of getting rich quickly" were fined and detained - in
general, these were small shopkeepers, merchants,.comer
butchers and people who stockpiled goods in their homes
(26). And finally, the government would name the guilty
orca: the industrialists, especially i~l textiles , with their
"extraordinary profits" (27).
It was not long before the Communist Party became aware
of the possibilities offered by the crisis. Luiz Carlos
 372

Prestes, who had recently been granted amnesty, made an

historic speech in the Vasco da Gama stadium in May 1945
before thousands of people, in which he launched the idea of
a form of popular organization according to where people
lived and worked. These organizations "would struggle for
national unity, for peace and order, for economic demand of
the highest importance and for honest and free elections"
(28). He specified that these', organizations would be "broad-
based entities without party slant and open to men and women
of all political, philosophical and religious tendencies,
except fascist elements. In this way, the committees can be
made up of catholics, protestants, spiritualists, free-
masons, democrats, liberals, conservatives, employers and
employees - all the patriots and honorable people who wish
to participate"(29).
,
The proposal called for the committees to present their
.I

demands for better urban services (street cleaning, paving

of streets, water, electricity and sanitation), health care
(hospitals, emergency aid), and transportation (more buses,
-
and in better condition). Above all, the committees would
ensure compliance with the official price lists, distribute
rationing cards and denounce illegal withholding of goods.
In addition, they would fight for more schools , literacy
programs for adults and day-care ce.:.cers. In more general
terms, according to Prestes. it was hoped that "little·by
little, from the bottom up, grassroots democratic
organizations would develop at the city, state and regional
 373

levels, and the national level ..• "(30) One hardly need doubt
that the upcoming elections were a motivating force, since
-
it was suggested that the- committees carry out election-
related functions (voter registration, adult literacy
campaigns and explanations of the secret ballot) through
courses, debates, small political rallies and door-to-door
visits.
.
For at least eight months (through February 1945) the
neighbourhood committees were a succeess, judging for their
proliferation throughout all major cities in the country.
Not only the party newspapers, b~t also the m~jor

publications reported on their activites throughout the

country: working-class neighbourhoods in Sao Paulo "to hold
debate on improvements program" (Bras, Pari, Ipiranga); in
Rio, Recife and Belem do Para the committees delivered
petitions to the mayiQrs offering to help inspect for
J

compliance with price controls and asking for electricity,

paved streets, drainage systems, public water supplies and
punishment. for butchers. They also suggested tax exemptions
for small neighbourhood peddlers,held discussions on bus
service and announced partial victories. The newspapers
published some of these petitions, for example:"The popular
Democratic committee of campinas (state of Sao Paulo)
suggests that local farmers be allowed to sell fresh, rather
than pa#sterized milk. The commitee is not opposed to
pasteurization, because it represents a garantee for public
health. But in Campinas, due to the greed of milk producers,
 374

pafsterized milk smells and tastes bad, and its price is

really ridiculous. It is nevertheless worth emphasizing that
according to popular culture, it is customary never to drink
, f
milk without first boiling it, so this acts as a substitute
for pasteurization ••• (31).

Together with the popular professional committees (of

physicians,dentists,professors and lawyers), the
neighbourhood committees also~promoted various activities,
such as films, lectures, a variety of curses, celebrations
in honour of Second World War veterans who lived in the
neighbourhood, and celebrations in honour of sports teams.
The following declaration ds~onstrates the high degree of
activity of these committees:

"There was freedom in those days ! After it was

legalized, the party's platform was social reform. I
followed the struggle,'but was never a party member.
Before the party was legalized, neighbourhood
committees were formed and began to offer night
classes. When I went to sign up to teach a class, the
supervisor said to me, 'Look, Dona Brites, these
classes are run by communists. I hope you know what
you're getting yourself into'. 'I'm only going there
to teach people how to read and write. There's nothing
communist about that', I replied. We had as many as 87
stUdents. I taught for two years at night. The
stUdents were usually factory workers and household
servants. They had to work very hard at their jobs.
It's very difficult to learn at that age ••• We were
able to put together a library for children with many
donated books. The children read. It was a dream, and
it didn't last for very long. Right in the ~iddle of
things, the party was outlawed and the comm~ttees
\::lere shut down... I was always a grade school
teacher, interested in children. When teaching was
involved I was interested. When theres was no
teaching'to be done, I was not intere~ted. Whe~ they
closed the committee schools, I lost ~nterest ~n the
party" (32)
 375

It appears that those who j~ined the committees viewed

them as a success; it was not that way, however, for the
organizers. In a report presented at the Communist Party
convention of January 1946, Pedro Pomar complained "that the
committees failed to broaden their struggle ••• that they did
not reach the masses", mainly because according to him, the
local leaders tended to centralize and bureaucratize the
work of the committees, creating an organization "which did
not get actively involved in the struggle"(33). The
communists seemed to fear that the committees might
des integrate , either by becoming too identified with the
party (since they wanted them to be "multiideological" and
open the way for a "national union"), or because the
committees' activities seemed to violate the line of "peace
and order" adopted by the party. Squeezed between this line
and the need "to speak to the masses in their own
language"(indeed we must be the most stubborn defenders of
their j ust demand~ , so as to win their trust entirely"), as
Prestes reommended (34), the committees seemed to oscillate
between their commitment to the people and their need to
follow party directives, which included allowwing themselves
to be used for electoral purposes.
The democratic neighbourhood committees certainly
attract portions of the impoverished mi~~le classes, whose
'discont~nt was not vented in the popular riots but found a

more ordedy means of expressions. The communists had no

interest in promoting the popular riots, although they were
 376

always accused of doing so. Their successf~l emphasis on an

orderly grassroots organization that would politicize
people's daily lives inspired similar responses in other
sectors, which feared the growing influence of the
communists and undoubtedly envied their organizational
success. In mid-1946, in a climate of deepening crisis, the
Catholic Church reactived its own grass-roots organizations
(the Workers' Circles Societies) and set up an ambitious
welfare assistance program. The aim was to establish infant
welfare and maternity centres for the "depressed"(sic)
classes, in cooperation with the National Infancy
Department: to set up schools in every parish (in urban and
rural areas) in conjuction with land-owners and local
authorities: to give assistance in every parish (mobilizing
the Catholic aid society of Saint Vincent de Paul) to women
with dependent children:
.,
to provide medical and dental
clinics in every parish; to launch a widespread campaign
against illiteracy and provide night classes in the
parishes: to teach Catholic doctrine with an emphasis on
commitment to the poor and cooperation between employers and
employees; and to gain the support of the press and radio.
They copied, to a great extent, the people'committees of the
communists; they even recommended setting up local parish
organizatlons for workers linked by a central structure
(35). As the labour attache at the British Embassy noted,
the Catholic project sought to be as "comprehensive, much
advertised and attractive I. as the PCB program (36).
 377

similarly, the industrialists fouded SESI (Industry Social

Service), which set up depots in working-class districts to
provide food at reasonable prices. The SESI project also
intended to open well-equipped centres with accommodations
for medical and dental services, day-care centres, indoor
recreation, legal advisory services, a library, a cinema,
classrooms for adult education, etc. They also thought of
hiring social welfare profess'ionals to visit workers at home
and in the factory and promote workers' cooperatives. Unlike
the other two projects, that of industrialists did not calli
for the active participation of the workers (not even from
those labour leaders who supported the government); they
mahtained exclusive control over the design and management
of the project, even though it was financed with substantial
use of public funds, toqether with business contributions
(37). It is possible that the idea for the SESI began wi~

the "carta da Paz Social" (Social Peace Letter), a manifesto

produced by entrepreneurs in an important meeting held.July
1945, at which the "menace of pauperism" was discussed (38).
The manifesto was followed by a series of highly-publicized
meetings of the FIESP, the Sao Paulo state federation of
industry, widely reported in the newspapers during october
1945, at which the "social services offered by Sao Paulo
industries +:'0 their ~mp~oyees" - cafeterias, day-care
centres, housing and health care in the large factories
were described (39). The SESI, which was the largest
project, must have been inspired by the pressure of popular
 378

rebellion in the face of the constant increase in the cost

of living and the threat of communist activity as perceived
by business.

All this represented an arena of political struggle

thet not only spread throughout society (and was not limited
..
to the state apparatus), but also involved the working
class. The 1945 elections for state government. and the
1947-48 municipal elections undoubtedly obliged all

organized political forces to struggle to win the lower-

class vote. But the political presence of the working class
went far beyond the fight for votes; it is notable how the
lower classes occupied the space created by return to
domocracy and made themselves visible far beyond the limits
of a classical political clientele. The best proof of this
can be found, first of all, in the ways in which working-
class groups joined
., up with available political
organizations, and secondly, in the way they used, in their
collective demonstrations the political resources they
already had.
In both cases, they demonstrated an impressive loyalty
to that which is pejoratively known as "immediate needs",
that is, the search for social rights and the dignity in
their daily lives that the dominant elites always denied
them , a search which was disrupted by the s'td.te and taken
advantage of by the political establishment. It was also
clear (to all political forces) that the lower classes
possessed an autonomous cultural expression dealing with the
 379

conditions of life in the city and society's perspectives

for the future, independent of the forms of political
behaviour designed to channel it. The events of post-war
years demonstrate the fear and ineptitude of the political
parties and the state in the face of this vision, such that
only through violent repression did the Dutra government
succeed in putting an end to the overflowing "spontaneity"
of the masses or the "disorder that was threatening the
peaceful nature of the Brazilian people ll , sweeping away at
the same time the political organizations that had tried to
direct them. Where and how does one read this collective
cultural expression which took possession of the space
created by economic and political crisis?

2. street politics: a defence of social rights

Social rights - intensily sought after but expressed in

many different ways by the working class during its
development in a society with as great a degree of
..
inequality as found in Brazil - had, during the 1930s, been
established as the responsability of the state, that is, the
state endowed society with these rights. They did not take
the form of liberal citizenship, but of workers' rights: the
state appropriate the experience of factory life and
transformed it into "bestowed" rights. This was the concrete
historical experience lived by the nations's urban workers,
who were taught by the state to give up their autonomy in
 380

exchange for a new form of discipline and obedience _

virtues that would guarantee them an equal place in the
production and reproduction of society. The social laws
(pertaining to labour and unions) had since 1930 been
authoritarian agencies of adjustment which tended to produce
less inequality and, at the same, offer space for working-
class resistance, even when concealed and silent. The
political reality of society 'for the working class, which
had already altered substantially (but nor entirely) the
position of workers vis-a-vis their employers and the path
they needed to follow to win their rights, could be seen in
the relationship between labour and the state.
When, in 1945, the figure who personified this movement of
the state in the direction of the working class began to
fall from power, all the ambiguities and the repressed
dynamic of this historical experience emerged. The electoral
.I

campaigns took place in a climate of aggression, expressed

by different working-class groups, and were as violent as
some the heroic strikes of that year or the above-mentioned
protests against the high cost of living. Beg~i~ng at the
end of March, the rallies of the opposition (in favour of
the Eduardo Gomes candidacy) were disrupted "by workers
holding a portrait of the head of the state"(Campinas, March
1945); by "worxc-.rs shouting in protest, 'Long live President
Vargas'''(Belo Horizonte, March 1945); by massive outbursts
of booing and hissing that created disturbances and provoked
the intervention of the police (Rio, April 1945; Sao Paulo,
 381

April, May and June 1945) (40). The working class also took
part in a number of streets incidents, such as
demonstrations in front of the offices of opposition
newspapers, which involved the active participation of
passersby, even at the risk of violence, gunfire and
imprisonment (41) • Incidents occurred frequently around the
figure of Getulio Vargas, for example, in front of portraits
of the president found hanging in bars, in waiting rooms of
government agencies and in places like Boy Scout centres,
often resulting in fistfights(42). If all this can be taken
for granted in an election campaign - especially after years
of dictatorship - what is most striking in the newspaper
reports of the period are the massive numbers of people who
attended the rallies and the degree to which those present
participated actively in incidents of violence, surpassing
the limits of simple curiosity: the image is one of crowds
of people shouting and fighting with each other.
Even more impressive were the broad election campaigns
which appealed to the masses, who enthusiastically joined
them in all cities of the country. The amnesty campaign for
those accused of political crimes, which was organized by
the communists, by the opposition and by many committes of
professionals, students, women and workers, mobilized large
portions of the population with great rallies cc~ered by
radio and the press. The appearance of these rallies
differed in many aspects from those of the Estado Novo:
waving flags of the allied nations and banners calling for
 382

peace, the masses exchanged portraits, banners and slogans

referring to the other great figure of the time, the symbol
and hero of the popular struggle: "We want Luiz Carlos
Prestes to be set free". When the amnesty was approved under
internal and external pressure, the people took to the
streets in all the major cities to celebrate. Also in April
and May, rallies were held in a number of large and medium-
sized cities throughout the country, with or without
favourable references to Vargas, to commemorate the Allied
victory in the war. In July, the masses turned out in droves
to welcome the first Brazilian troops returning from Italy.
Representatives of the government, the conservative
opposition and the communists were all present at this
commemorative celebration; although it could have been
interpreted as a demonstration against the domestical
dictatorship, the participation of the masses appears to
have stressed, above all, the courage of the soldiers who
volunteered to fight in Europe.
Mass street demonstrations were among the preferred and
efficient ways for the lower classes to make a political
statement, even though the newspapers never gave estimates
of the numbers of people present at the rallies. (They
always said there were "thousands".) The masses in the
streets and their expressions of antagonism or enthusiasm
appeared, therefore, to be one of the main factors
determining the strength and visibility of the various
 383

political currents of the time; it was thus a major factor

in their political strategies.

For the population as a whole, however, these events

appeared as a sort of collective catharsis for those who had
for some time been denied the right of political protest. It
is even possible that the same people who attended the
second carefully planned massive rally of the Communist
Party, held in July 15, 1945 in the Pacaembu stadium in Sao
Paulo (100,000 people in an enormous expression of popular
sentiment), had also attended the Catholic gathering held
the day before at the "Prac;:a da Sen (Cathedral Square) in Sao',
Paulo, to receive the image of Nossa Senhora Aparecida (a
Catholic saint with an enourmous popular following, also the
"patron saint of Brazil") (43) brought to the city in another
well-planned public event by the Church, which was clearly
designed to counter the appeal of the communist rally(44) •
.,
It was the queremista movement that demonstrated most
clearly the realism of the masses in simultaneously
supporting various causes, and this form of political
participation revealed as much a stubbornness in the defence
of social rights as a dependence upon these rights being
guaranteed from above. The movement was undoubtedly
organized from the top down by the government bureaucracy
and the official la~jur bosses who had been mobilizing since
March to confront the conservative opposition(45). There was
something very important, however, in these tributes and
reactions, which constituted the central point of the
 384

speeches: an appreciation of workers/rights, understood as

rights of all citizens. It was common to hear statements
--
such as "the worker today is no l"Onger a social outcast,
driven away by machine-guns fire as in the old days. Today
the worker can be a respectable citizen, thanks to the wise
legislation of the President ••• "(46) or " ••• the man in the
street support him because he's the president who has always
supported the man in the street ••• " ( 4 7) •
In August, when queremismo became a mass movement in
several major cities (with bigger and bigger rallies), it
repeatedly came out in favour of'~abour rights; it was
suggested that attacks on the president's power also
threatened these rights. When the communists joined the
movement and changed the slogan from "We want Getulio" to
"Getulio with a constituent Assembly", the speeches adopted
. . Indepenaly
a more radical tone based on class 1dent1ty. ~
of
the enourmous controversy which extends to the present day
over Getulio's alliance with the Communist Party, what
should be emphasized is that queremismo appeared to propose
a radical separation between the world of the workers - the
rights they have won and have' 'yet to win - and the world of
the elites, "those who live in abundance, the exploiters,
the creators of trusts and monopolies"(48). Even the
Brazilian Labour Party (PTB) , which was part of the
governing coalition, dared to suggest that in the future,
"through the strength of public opinion", labourism would be
able to "win workers right to make the laws themselves that
 385

will guarantee social peace and pres'erve intact the

collective wealth of society" (as the British Labour Party,
according to the speeches of the PTB, had demonstraded in
England) (49). It is unthinkable that the more than 100,000
people which queremismo managed to bring together at its
?

final rallies in october did not feel drawn to the illusion

of political power, which they hoped to use against those
who exploited them.
When Getulio Vargas was deposed in a military coup led
by his own generals in late October 1945, there were no
popular demonstration in his defence. The labourist and
communist leadership had partially disappeared from the
scene (or were lost in their own illusions) (50) ever since
the army outlawed political propaganda and rallies several

days before the coup. Lacking the organizational autonomy

needed to express., their views at this time, the lower
classes made the deposed dictator and his supporters pay the
political cost of their exclusion from active participation
in public life.
Reaction, however, came soon afterwards by means of the
workers's movement. Remaining loyal to the traditional
issues born of the daily routine of work and survival, the
working classes exploded in a wave of strikes that "went .
beyond the limits established so far( ••• ) and provoked
reactions throughout the political system", in the words of
Weffort(51). Through these strikes and the impact they had,
workers were able to express their .
collect~ve expe rience
 386

with the Estado Novo regime and its desintegration and

demonstrate a moment of working-class autonomous action
neve~before imaginable.

3. The 1946 strike wave: working-class organization at issue

During the final days of December 1945, more than

20,000 workers at the Light & Power Company went on strike
in S~o Paulo, to the general surprise of the unions that
represented them. The workers' union had been in the process
of negotiating with the company for higher wages since the
end of Septemcer. During the month of October, these
negotiations and those of other sectors (bank workers, hotel
workers, bus drivers, telephone, electrical and gas workers)
I

were proceeding with hearings before federal labour courts.

Since no compromise agreement was reached (the employers's
proposal was unacceptable), a temporary solution was agreed
upon, according to which the government promised to give
workers a bonus equivalent to one month's wages: a Christmas
bonus. Decreed on December 21, the bonus seemed to be
guaranteed for all electrical utility workers. Meanwhile,
meetings (not only of Light employees, but also gas and
telephone workers) and small demonstrations served to
express the anger of these workers(52).
 387

On the morning of December 28, the Light workers

learned that the government had signed another decree-law

,
revoking the bonus. They immediately left their offices,
trolley-cars and workshopsiat 10:00 A.M. the city's primary
means of public transportation (with a daily volume of 1.2
•
million passengers) had stopped running. While the OOPS
(political police) mobilized its forces to control the
strike, the workers formed a 'commission to speak with the
appointed Federal governor and ask him to convince the
federal government to reinstate the bonus. That night, the
unions involved in the (legal) negotiation issued a
statement denying that the workers were on strike, affirming
their faith that the government would take action and
appealing to the workers "to go back to work during regular
hours and wait in an orderly fashion for the outcome of the
neqotiations ••• "(53). The same thing happened in Santos,
J

Campinas and Ribeirao Preto in the state of Sao Pauloi in

Ribeirao Preto, the whole city was left without electricity.
For three days, the strike spread not only to the
cities of the interior of Sao Paulo state, but also to the
state capitals of Porto Alegre, Maceio, Fortaleza, Vitoria
and above all, Rio. For three days, the unions desperately
made appeals for an end to the strike, in an attempt to show
"that "the strike ••• is not the appropriate means for
resolving the problem ( ••• ) it cannot count on the support
and symipathy we need( ... )the unions have a direct permanent
understanding with the authorities, especially with the
 388

Labour Ministry, and we hope to resolve the situation

shortly ( ••• ) If you do not go back to k
wor , we will achieve
nothing, because a strike is only just and legitimate once
all the reasonable resources of conciliation have been
exahausted. So everyone go back to work. This is our order.
Don't listen to those who don't think ••• "(54). Any
resemblance to the terms used by businessmen and government
bureaucrats may be a mere coincidence. The problem is that
this language was used by the unions controlled by the
Communist Party, in accordance with its line of "peace and
order". (55)
How could the Light workers organize without their
unions? The major newspapers published small articles
describing where they found the space to meet and organized:
in the street.

"Improvised'meeting held underneath the Viaduto do Cha

bridge. The strikers gather in the vicinity of the
Light building in Xavier de Toledo street. That is
where they meet to exchange ideas and make decisions.
The location, however, is out in the open. Yesterday's
rainy weather forced the strikers to go elsewhere so
they could discuss their situation without being
bothered by the rain. That is how they ended up
gathering beneath the Viaduto do Cha, where they
improvised a meeting to air the views of those in
favour of returning to work and those oppose~; the
majority of those present backed the latter ~01nt ~f
view. They decided not to go back to work unt1l the1r
demands are met"(56).
The "improvisation", as the newspaper called it, did not
prevent ce~rtain workers from going to the offices of the
union to learn how the official negotiations were
progressing. But on the following day Ita large group of
 ..
'

389

strikers gathered at th~ Anhangabali", where, "despite ~

decision of the unions, the strikers did not want to return
to work". The paper added that the debate beneath the
Viaduto do Cha "took place in perfect order", as was
confirmed by the OOPS itself, which "sent a group of police
officers, lead by a strike specialists, to every gathering
of strikers" (there were other meetings in front of tram
stations). On the final day O£ the stoppage, the strikers
met in the lounge of the Bras Hispanic Club, at the request
of a "comission in favour of higher wages", which had been
elected in the street by "about 5,000 Light workers"(57). In
Rio de Janeiro, the chosen meeting-place was the Largo da
Carioca (Carioca Square), where "a large group of interested
participants" signed a petition, which they planned to
present to the provisional president, after marching to his
residence at Catete Palace. In the end, government prom1s.ed
. .,-..

to reinstate the bonus (which was only paid in January 6th),

and the strike ended, once again, as the result of an
autonomous act on the part of the commission of workers and
...
employees; the decision was voted on at a meeting convened
at the same place(58) •
With few exceptions, the Light strike of December 1945
provided a model for the 77 other strikes that ocurred
during the first three month~ of 1946 and the nearly 40
others that were reported in the newspaper through the end
of the year (59). In the same way, the grassroots
organizations which were mobilized around issues dealing
 390

with the problems of daily life was responsible for the slow
but steady vitality of the workers' movement after 1947, a
period of intense repression (which began after
the PCB was out outlowed - nearly all the active workers'
qroup came to be identified as "communists" and also
?

suffered repression) •
How can one make sense of the organizational autonomy
of the workers? How can one understand the high level of
energy revealed in their strike movements, the efficiency
which which they continued to operate with~~t the unions
and the threat they presented? The answer to this question
lies in knowinq what happened to relations between the
workers and the unions after the dawnfall of the Estado
NOVO, from the po~ of view of their relations with
employers and with the qovernment; and how this experience
coincided with the decision to return to democracy when the
J

dictatorship collapsed and society went on the move.

Second~y, it is necessary to analyse the meaning of these
independent strikes, as well as the mechanisms used by
workers to carry them out.
The union had been profoundly affected by the Estado
Novos's success full policy of stripping them of their
legitimacy· as workers' representatives in the public and
collective sphere. The unions were prevented from taking an
active role even in the inner workings of the formulas
establlished by the dictatorship, as in negotiating
collective work contracts. Although the lawyers at the
 391

Ministry of Labour saw such nego~iation as a means of

promoting "class co-operation", a phrase oft-repeated in
official speeches, the refusal of industrialists to accept
,
this (or any other) of collective bargaining had led to its
demise in practice. Remaining unresolved disputes went to
...
the Labour courts for arbitration in the form of individual
litigation, as collective disputes had been outlawed since
1944. On the face of it, the Labour Courts judged these

individualized class conflicts according to a serict

interpretation of the law but, as has already been seen, the
law itself allowed room for the most varied interpretations
which, in the qreat majority of cases, went in favour of the
the employers. The unions were in fact powerless to
represent the collective experience of work at grass roots
level: strikes were illeqal, the law and its application was
partial and mutable and, last but not least, union
• • 1"'\
organization itself was entirely proscribed by the M~n1st.ry

of Labour (see the 1939 Union Law, chapter III). What was
there left for the unions?
Nothinq, except to provide a framework for the
.
containment of workers, the state bureaucrats would have
replied. Union capacity to mobilize at shop-floor level was
espeqiality impeded. The role government had reserved for
~he unions was thac of agencies for' reproducing the work-
force and not organisations for influencing productive
relations within the factories. The unions were charged with
setting up credit and retail cooperatives, with providing
 392

medical and dental care, legal advice and schools, despite

the fact that an official welfare system already existed for
every working category.
The state model for unions was reinforced by the
institution of a"nUnion Tax" in 1943, an obligatory
contribution deducted from each worker's pay irrespective of
whether he was a union member or not, as individual
membership in the union was not necessary. This tax was the
equivalent of one day's pay per year for every registered
worker. The funds were levied and administered by the
government, which allocated 60 percent to the·relevant
union, 20 percent to workers' federations and
confederations and 20 percent to a central union commission
for distribution to the weaker unions. The unions were
expected to use these funds on social services.
It was the .,"union tax" which established the figure,
which exists to this day, of the pelego (literally, the
sheepskin blanket used between the horse and the saddle, by
extension, a "buffer") - union leaders entirely dependent on
the power of the state and totally out of touch with the
grass roots. As has been shown exhaustively by all writers
on state-union relations in Brazil, the pelego was a general
without an army, who represented nothing more than the
states' desire to reign over empty unions. In 1943 the
government began to take notice of the results of such a
system, especially in relations to workers in larger cities
and in the more visible work categories. (60)
 393

Consequently, in 1943 the government set up another

"union guidance" commission to campaign (without much
success) for mass participation in unions. The government
mobilized its full propaganda arsenal, from the President
himself to oblig~tory radio programs. The campaign consisted
of repeated exhortations and didatic sketches des'lgned to
instill a collective consciousness in workers - as if this
.
was something which they had hever experienced.
But even in the Estado Novo, a collective spirit was
not entirely lacking. A veteran communist and shop-floor
militant in the early 1940 (when the Party leaders were
imprisoned and virtually incommunicable, leaving lower ranks
to 'improvise' party action) remembers that "the main form
of struggle at that time was the 'memoriais', letters sent
to authorities, particularly to Getulio Vargas and the
Minister of Laboqr. These letters denounced low salaries,
violations of labour laws, the inefficacy of inspectors and
the sabotage of justice when the sentences of the
Arbitration Councils (Juntas de concili~cao) were ignored.
These letters also asked the Ministry of Labour to set up
channels of communication with unions so that these could
put forward suggestions for correcting the failings. As can
be seen, we limited outselves to actions scrictly within the
legal framework, which brought positive results because
after a certain time they began ro allow general meetings
between Union Boards to draw up suggestions. This at least
legalized contact between unions. At the time, that was a

---_.
 394

great step" (61) • Besides this,he mentioned the existence of

factory commissions, which had been set up earlier and which
could put forward demands and denounce non-compliance with
labour laws.
But even the Union Tax did not completely eliminate the
?

former combativity of the workers. The unions were forced

into great efficiency in providing welfare services - social
.
assistance was itself a moti'Ve for mobilization, given the
impoverished daily life of the workers (62.) It is also
important to be aware of the fact that, while the Union Tax
created the pelego - the bureaucratic, corrupt, complac~nt

union official, who was happier with few members in his

union and avid for favours from the Ministry - many unions
persisted in following their ~ paths. This seems to have
happened principally in the utilities sectors (transport,
ports, electricity and gas) and in companies.located outside
the main cities. One example was the union at the Morro
Velho Mines, in the city of Nova Lima, Minas Gerais state.
Management was reactionary and colonial (the mine was
English-owned from the nineteenth century onwards), the
mines functioned as a company-town and were notorious for
the exploitation of their workers. However with the help of
the Communist Party, these mine workers managed to keep
thei~ union alive "through their daily efforts at
organization", in the words of Grossi, who recounted this

part of their history. She is convincing in explaining that

this action "acquired an importance above that of the

---- ..
 395

policial and bureaucratic meechanisms" which surrounded the

workers. This union maintained general assemblies for
decision-taking, regular re-elections of officials, a
clandestine press and hiding places for holding meetings in
private. Externally,
...
however, they were allies of the
government and used all the available forms of legal
campaigning for their organization. (63)
The ever present, immutable slave-master mentality of
the factory owning-classes of the interior explains the use
the unions made of the space created by their employers'
conflicts with the government. The most extreme example of
this, which has now come to light thanks to the research of
Leite Lopes (1986) was in Fabricas Paulista, in Pernambuco
state, where the owners refused to accept unionization and
even met the state interventor and once all-powerfu~l

Minister of Labour, Agamenon Magalhaes, with force. The

J

owners threatened to close the factory if union and labour

law was enforced in their premises. This attitude kept the
spirit of resistence burning, reinforced by the coercitive
working conditions and the standard of housing offered by
.this company town. The local union was founded -
unsuccessfully - four times between 1932 and 1942,
demonstrating a continually renewed sense of struggle(64).
It is therefore clear that the ~~ate union legislation
in the Brazil of the Estado Novo did not wield the same
effect everywhere, nor silence the working class movement
forever. Mobilization did not even die out completely in the

.. ~-------

---~;---- -
 396

main unions, which carried more political weight. Many ~ad a

long standing tradition of struggle, organizationd and,
--
sometimes, clear political loyalties. There would have been
no need for a Minister of Labour interventor to have taken
over the running of Leopoldina Railway Workers' Union from
..... 1939 to 1944 if its 14,000 workers had been dominated. The
history of santos dockworkers' union recounted by Sarti
(1975) shows that, despite the destruction of the radical
character of its mobilization prior to ,1939 (legendary in
the history of the Brazilian working-class movement) and
despite the innumerable crises of administration, finance
and internal political direction which the union went though
until 1945, it still obtained an important and unique
victory in the history of Brazilian unionism: the full
control of its labour market (althouh in time this led to an
exaggerated corporative mentality) (65). And even among
J

those unions which were less efficient in terms of

representation and action, one always finds intermittent,
veiled criticisms and pathetic demands for better salaries
and working conditions even though these usually took the
form of praise for the government.
Thus, when space began opening up for public expression
(with the crisis of the dictatorship), it followed that this
heroic sense of class independence, denying paternalism and
the bureaucratization of life, would begin to make itself
heard outside the limits of the official unions. It was
indeed mantained, in the traditional form of working-class

---
 397

expressetion in the country: though small wildcat strikes-,

of short duration and in street demonstrations. From March
1945 (when workers at the Sao Paulo state railway companies
, '
the Paulista and Mogiana, struck for better wages) to the
end of October (~hen Vargas was overthrown), there were at
least 20 strikes important enough to be reported in the
press(66). Other working categories carried out campaigns
that may also have resulted in strikes. The majority of the
strikes were in transport sectors, particularly in railways
and ports, followed by strikes amongst bank workers in trade
and commerce. Factory workers seemed less ready to strike,
although Sao Paulo textile, -glass and metallurgical workers
held some stoppages.
Most of these strikes seem to have broken out
spontaneously, although it is known that the MOT, the
workers' arm of PCB, mobilized persistently at rank-and-file
J

level in the period. But the MDT did not attack the legal
union structurem, mainly because, from its points of view,
political power and union unity could be better achieved
from within the legal structure as long as thi ideological
content (that is, heteronomy of the State) could be changed
(67). Thus, the MDT's mobilization at grass roots level

did not include support for strikes, especially when the PCB
was leg<-.:ised and its battle cry became "collaboration" and
"order and .
tranquil~ty" h;stor;an
• As..&. . &. Marco Aurelio Garcia

Shows, "the ambiguity of PCB policy, especially from 1946

onwards, appears in the contradiction between its
 398

organizations efforts (in factories, trade unions,

neighbourhoods) and the tactics of anti-fascist unity,
defended by the leadership in accord with the policies
adopted by all the communist parties in the world during
this period. Whi:e Prestes and the central Committee sought
to convince Dutra and the liberal opposition organized in
the UDN to accept the 'National Union' line which they
defended, the rank and file o£ the party, taking advantage
of the existing climate of political freedom, encouraged
movements on behalf of demands which had been repressed for
almost ten years. A split appeared between the 'movement-
oriented' PCB, which responded to_the pressure from the
working-class and popular rank and file, and was put to the
test by the spontaneous movement arising in the factories
and neighbourhoods, and the ruling structure of the party
which had no hesitation in ordering .'belt-tightening' or in
~

submitting 'corporativist' demands to more general political

objectives"(68). The fact is that.MUT's militants were
clearly embarrased at having to explain their new anti-
striu policy to workers (" ••• it was useless trying to
explain to the workers", "says a veteran PCB militant, "the
sensation we got was that we would have to lock the factory
doors in order to prevent strikes breaking out. Many of our
comrades were shouted down and some beatel1 up when they
tried to explain the new policy to workers. On this point,
the workers won"(69). Thus, the point is that strikes, at
 399

that moment, were not supported by anyone, whether PCB, PTR

or the union themselves.

The spontaneous working-class movement put the unions

in a peculiar position which lasted from March 1945 to the
nationwide bank workers strike of F*ebruary 1946. Once a
strike had broken out, the unions were. called in by the
workers to mediate the dispute, negotiating with the
employers' sindicates and with the assistence of Ministry of
Labour representatives. Union leaders not only opposed
strikes but always insisted on obeying the legal procedures
for resolving labour disputes. Considering the workers'
readiness to strike, this attitude could have led to a
serious distancing of union leadership from the rank-and-
file. It seems, however, that this did not fully happen. As
soon as a strike was under way, the strikes would call the
union leaders to .,a general assembly to discuss the terms of
negotiation apparently confident in the action of the
leaders. Generally these urged the workers to return to work
while negotiations were in progress as the first condition
for getting the dispute on a good footing. In more than half
the strikes during this period, workers obeyed and agreement
was reached relatively painlessly. But in many cases the
strikers refused to make such a gesture of confidence: in
the repeated strikes in the port of Santos, authorities had
to call the Fire Brigade in to replace the striking dockers.
A miners' strike in Sao Jeronimo, Rio Grande do SuI, which
broke out in April 1945 and went on intermittently until

-.---- -.
 400

March 1946, resulted in federal intervention and military

occupation of the mines, which suggests that workers
fiercely resisted attempts by the government, employers and
the Communist Party to get them back to work.
The outburst of worker protests after the war - with 60
strikes registered in the first two months of 1946 alone,
plus 32 more strikes through May 1947 and 25 in 1948-49 (70)
demonstrates the extent to w~~ch mounting tensions over
factory life and worker living standards could sustain the
movement's energy level and, even more importantly,
determine the shape it took. Any effort to suppress this
protest - either in the name of ~peace and order", of
ftredemocratization" or of the possibility of forming a
central union confederation with greater political power in
the future - did not make any sense from the point of view
of the workers, who, after all, would have to pay a high
.I

political' price. In short, what were the union and party

leaders asking for at that time? They were asking the
workers to keep quiet, to once again restrain their demands
for higher wages and better working conditions, to suppress
their anger in the name of a political party, in the name of
the Constituent Assembly, in the name of progress.
The very difficult experience of workers during this
period, the A!!tf:!nt to which they lived t.he dictatorial
repression of the Estado Novo throug the immeasurable
increase in exploitation and the suspension of labor rights,
could never inform such a notion of politics, nor find
 401

expression within a "rational framework". How could they ask

workers to adhere to a policy of conforming to the rules of
an ambiguous game with the government and the employers
and be silent, once again, about their experience? Why was
necessary to develop a labour policy that ignored the
concrete interests created by the very form of capital
acummulation followed by industry; that is, why formulate a
policy that ignored a way of aife and a space for
citizenship that this acummulation created for the nation's
wage-earners? The social pressures for the democratization
of political instititions, in these circumstances, did not
distinguish between the relations of domination and
subordination (in the productive sphere) and the compressed
levels of social reproduction. In other words, there was a
simultaneous expression of the various collective grievances
with respect to the devalorization of the labour force, the
.'
extremely low level of wages and the high cost of living,
which was related (by groups, individuals and the
newspapers) to the authoritarian and dictatorial government
about to be overthrown. Many social groups, including the
middle strata of salaried workers, felt a real antagonism
toward the dominant group who had profited from the war and
felt that they had been left with the other side of
industrial prosperity: shortages and high prices(57j. Onl~ a
form of political resoning informed by an institutional and
rhetorical notion of "efficiency", which fed upon a
predetermined conception of political possibility, could
 402

have repudiated either this dynamic of the workers' capacity

to mobilize based on their experience.

The strikes that occurred in the years 1946-49 sugqest

that the labour movement was seeking the political basis for
the long-awaited democracy in the surrounding circumstances
of the tine, and that this search could not fit within any
preformulated theory. They also suggest that the workers
ever since the timid struggles through which they presented
their demands in 1944, had collectively interpreted their
experience during the period of the Estado Novo based on the
relations of daily work in the factories, the forms of
exploitation they suffered and the impoverishment they
experienced. What counted in these strikes and mobilizations
was not the ideas on democratization, the communist platform
or the arguments against totalitarianism, but the
contemporary social practices of workers actual relations in
daily life of many different productive environments. That
is why the communists failed (in relative terms in some
cases, but in absolute terms during the first few months of
1946) in their attempt at political action. An attempt which
ignored the workers' experience of submission to the regime
of the factory, in a society where this submission provided
the space for rights "bestowed" by the state and
I sfstematicall Y ignored by employers (based on the concrete
conditions of Brazilian industrialization). The apparent
transparency of work relations in the factories and the
apparent evidence of the suppression of union activity
 403

through repression and through the corporatist programme of

the state made it difficult to perceive the work-place as a
symbolically created cultural space which equipped the
workers with their own interpreetation. The notion of ,
"economic demands", which has always been taken for granted,
can be anything but transparent.
How and where does one look for this experience in the
event of the postwar years? First of all, in the common
observation that the most well-articulated strikes and
labour conflicts involve a "spontaneous" form of
organization, that can be seen, in the words of Ricardo
Maranhao, as "a strike which is aqreeded upon and put into
practice by workers in the same sector, without any
orientation or interference on the part of unions or
political parties (71). In the case of the Sao Paulo strikes
of 1946 studied by
.,
this author, "only twelve of them were
organized by the respective unions", while the majority were
carried out independently or even against the advice of the
unions (72). Secondly, what does this independknce mean? At
the level of a general theory of what should be role of
unions, it does not mean anything in particular; the unions
certainly were not very efficient in representing the
interests of their members. This can be traced to many
factors, mainly the g~~ between the unions and the
shopfloor, as well as the bureaucratic nature of the
official structures of post-1930s Brazilian trade unionism.
In this case, it would be logical to think that in unions
 404

where the leadership 'was not appointed by the government,

the tendency would be to emphasize workers' struggle and
strikes or otherwise attributed their distancing from the
movements to the misguided orientation of the party (in this
case, the PCB). The events of 1946, in particular, show that
? .

this is only part of the story in explaining the strikers'

independence from their respective unions, because, as all
evidence indicates, (and this', is the fundamental point), it
was not the unions, whether they were "good" unions or "bad"
unio'ns, but the factory organizations, which constituted
the workers' primary forum for political organization and
expression. In all the statements, newspaper reports another
evidence on the strikes of the postwar years, the factory
commissions app~ed as the decisive forum of debate,
organization and mobilization for strikers, defining the
workers'demands as
.,
both content and practice; they were,
therefore, the decisive forum for the collective emergence
of the workers as actors with their own separated identity.
Fourthly, it is important to take a closer look at the form
this commissions took: they had many different names
(factory commissions, wage commissions, union commissions,
strike commissions and factory groups), lasted for
different periods of time (some as long as workers were .on
others tending to become institutionalized and'~heir
members regarded as leaders for the particular word
category) (73), had different ways of operating and, above
all, had different ways of interacting with the unions, the
 405

parties and the employers. Fifth, their movements repeat the

old "little struggles", the concrete claims relating to the
work process and their authoritarian management. These
, ,.

themes were linked (according to professional category, the

degree of contact with party militants and the receptiveness
of the unions) with ."large mobilizations" of a political-
institucional character. Although, by March 1946 onwards,
the PCB came to support some of these strikes, it is
important here to understand that it was not the party-union
relationship (and even less so its rhetoric) that shaped the
dynamic of these movements, managing them "correctly or
incorrectly", but that parties and unions have to enter the
universe of class experience to be able to put themselves
forth as leaders of the struggle. When they did so, they
were "effective"; above all, unions were able to confront
creatively difficult situations of repression and adversity.
When parties and unions did not accompany the actual lives
of the workers and the forms of struggle they proposed -
preferring instead to define themselves in relation to the
political-institutional structures of the time - they lost
all their power and influence and, in some cases,
practically liquidated the labour movement and its capacity
to mobilize. The political history of the Minas de Morro
Velho in the st3te of Minas gerais provides an example of
this last point (74)
During 1946 and the first five months of 1947, this
immediate and profound class experience was present in every
 406

politic~l event that involved the participation of the

working class. The autonomous origin of these strikes and

mobilizations as well as its organization ala·rm e d government
and ent repreneurs: ~· t ~s
· clear from the newspapers that,

industrialists' and commercial entrepreneurs' old obssessive

?

terror of the workers' movement had re-emerge~. They were

frightened by the level of organization and by the
innumerable meetings, street campaigns, marches and
carnivals (and not least by the workers' courage in the face
of repression) through which the strikers sought public
support and financial aid for their movement. They knew that
repression was no longer a viable solution; aftp~ all, a new
constitution was being drawn up, and it would have to
recognize the workers' right to organize and strike.
Moreover, this same Constituent Assembly was daily debating
the economic crisis
.,
of the country, questioning the role of
the "productive classes". This was not the climate in which
to call for severe repression, although the bottom line in
all strikers's demands was a guarantee against revenge by
employers, that is, against firings, the arrest of leaders
and police violence.
The fact that the new government started to rebuild and
strengthen Vargas's union structure shows that the labour
movement of 1946 was movin~ out of the official and
bureaucratized sphere of subordination. Dutra's government
greatly tightened up the authoritarian aspects of trade-
union life. It forbade a new union election, extending by
 407

decree the existing mandate of the official union leaders.

It cancelled some important liberal reforms passed by the
transitional government from December 1945 to January 1946
(which re-established free union organization, the right to
more than one union for each trade and professional category
?

and, mainly, the right to strike) (75) and reinforced

labour's subordination to the Ministry of Labour. Finally,
it provided conditions for strenthening the PTB party, the
real "class collaboration" line of the labour movement.
As for the PCB, its legal registry as a political party was
suspended in May, 1947 and its deputies and senator
parliamentary mandates were removed in 1948. As explained by
Garcia, "The dominant classes took advantage of PCB
political contradiction. Conservative sectors, many of them
compromised by their association with the Estado novo, and
the trade-union bureaucracy of the PTB, which felt
.I

threatened by the PCB, pointed out the 'duplicity' of the

party in defending rethorically a policy of social peace an~

national union, and in practice, encouraging strikes ••• The

PCB ended up being pushed into a position of supporting the
movements on behalf of the economic, political and social
demands. Such support, however,was timid and its timing
served to reinforce this ambiguity. This hesitancy was to
have direct consequences for the PCB .•• "(1F-).
Nevertheless, the working classes did not remain quiet. They
took part in organized protest and opposition elections
rallies, where they courageously faced violent repression.
 408

(AS the British labour attache puts it in a report on a PCB

meeting in Rio in May 1946, there were "the military police,
the ordinarTPolice, the plain-clothes police and a number
of mounted police ••• as the police came near to the crowd
there was many an insulting remark shouted at them") (77).
They took part in bread riots (Rio, august 1946), attacks on
confectionary shops and other commercial establishments,
notably grocery shops (Sao Paulo, August 1946),
transportation riots (Salvador, Niteroi, Rio and Sao Paulo,
september 1946); they faced prison terms for strike actions
(Sao Paulo, '~946-47); and they arranged boycotts by
consumers (Porto Alegre, Rio, Sao Paulo and Belem) or
organized "housewives' campaigns" to put pressure on local
stores (Rio de Janeiro, 1947» (78). In all these instances,
the population was organizing to defend its living and
working conditions.
J

The outlawing of the PCB was followed by a period of

harsh repression of any organ~zational or protest activity
on the part of workers.It was also a period of wage freeze,
in spite of a continous rise in the cost of living(79). The
unions once again fell into the hands of the official union
pelegos, who once more directed their efforts at
demobilizing the workers. However; as Maranhao demonstrates,
"the making of a certain tradition of struggle during tr~

previous years in certain sectors of the working classes,

independent of parties" (80) or any other political
organization gave the movement enough vitality to survive
 409

until 1950. The independent heroic strikes with their

"sophisticated" organization, in the words of Maranhao, were
not alien to other forms of social protest, as the largest
,
and most well-executed transport riot of the period in the
city of Sao Paulo, in August 1947 (81), which demonstrated
...
the people's refusal to conform once again to the norms of
silence and supression.

4. The unsolved patterns of factory exploitation: old

themes. old struggles

The practice of collective protest shows that workers

exercised public expression directly on the horizons offered
by impoverishment and declining real wages. They apparently

excluded the dimension of institutionalized politics (in its

J

given form) and held little belief in the capacity of

representative parliamentary and party action to influence
rights established by the law, which was the domain of the
state. Nevertheless,this realism did not deny workers
.
expectations of what was promised by labour legislation.
Thus, the symbolic belief in labour rights and the
frustration of seeing them effectively unrecognised in the
social sphere, without doubt h:-d. a direct bearing on the
explosive manner in which workers made themselves heard.
Once again, the focus of workers exasperation with
state lay in the industrialists non-compliance with labour
 410

laws. A look at the factory conditions tha~ existed after

the war, following 40 years of working class struggle and 15
years of labour laws becomes fundamental. What we see
spirits us back to the times of the oligarchies of the First
Republic, as if the ghost of these times haunted the still-
.,.
brutal work relations, which seemed to bear no relationship
to the official history of the post 1930s interventionist
state. ..
Let us begin with the industrialists. Even at the peak
of the industrial crisis brought on by the end of the war,
did not change their attitudes to industrial production. In
1946, CETEX (a state agency for the distribution of textile
products) prohibited exports of Brazilian textiles. Its
decision was based on the fact that,given the re-emergence
of international competition, it was unlikely that post-war
boom international markets would still absorb. the low
quality Brasilian product. CETEX wisely envisaged the
dome~tic market as being the great market for Brazil, to be
conquered on a definitive basis. It was not a difficult
task: given that the markei was a low-income one, it would
not involve improvements in the low quality of the textile
products. Even so, industrialists protested fiercely,
rejecting almost unanimously the official analysis which
stressed the long term benefits of this measure. Once again,
the "high-profit-per-unit mentality" surfaced, but they
forced to accept the decision.
 411

Factory owners then began. to insist on measures to

compensate for their sacrifice: government assistance in the
form of protectionist tariffs, subsidies for machinery
replacement and the continuation of the mode of labour
exploitation to which they were accustomed. The first two
?

demands were openly voiced in the discussions between the

textile sector, CETEX and the government, which lasted from
1946 to 1950 (82). The third cnly becomes evident through
denounciations which appeared in the press, particularly in
the worker's newspapers.
In December 1946, a report by the Britis~ Embassy on
the conditions of Brazilian industrial production-emphasized
that "the establishment of a modern system of factory law
legislation in Brazil is unquestionably surrounded with
difficulties, since Brazilian industry is new, growing fast
and scattered mostly in small units over a vast territory.
J

Qualified technicians are scarce and labour is extremely

backward ( ••• ) with a few rare and notable exceptions, the
level of working conditions in Brazilian factories is very
low, the progress of welfare, sanitary and safety equipment
and conditions depending, to a large extent, on the outlook
of the employees. Workers syndicates ••• are not strong or
educated enough to achieve any material improvements ( ••• )
th~ wajority of Brazilian employers are still driven by the
prevailing fever for large and quick profits and fail to
realise the false economy of cheap but bad working
conditions" (83). This is a description which could have
 412

been written fifteen years before, without any noticeable

difference in industrial procedures.

The portrait of working conditions necessarily takes in

the relations between workers and the state. From 1946 to
1949, denounciations appeared in the workers' press, and
..
occasionally in the national press, against the non-
observance of the work schedule and the right to weekly
rest. This last item had, for', the first time, been proposed
as a paid weekly rest in the 1946 Constitution. Once again,
the employers resisted the law in every way they could, as
can be seen from workers' protests, lawsuits and strikes
during the period. But this time, the government was not-
even interested in trying to enforce the law. The same
British labour attache interviewed the new Labour Minister,
Morvan Figueiredo, in 1946. Figueiredo revealed that one of
the "pressing problems of the Ministry at the moment is the
proposals, in the new Constitution, promising the right to
all workers of payments of wages for Sundays and holidays
( ••• ) Workers unions under Communist leaderships are now
agitating strongly for this right to be exercised at once
and, in several cases, labour courts have awarded payment
for Sundays at particular undertakings. The cost of this
provision, if fully applied, would amount to near 20% of the
national wages bill of industry ••. '~ {84). The Minister thus
reveals here the extent to which the workers' basic rights
collided with the mode of industrialisation undertaken. In
the same interview, he told the British labour attache that
 413

" .•. Brazil finds itself with a social legislation which is

too advanced for the reality of the present economical and
financial structure of society" (85) •
Thus, at least until 1949, the workers and the labour
movement still struggled for their most basic rights. In
•
september 1946, the Union Congress of Workers in Brazil,
adopted a resolution which demanded that "the maximum eight-
hour working day be respected: and not extended: that the
articles and paragraphs in the present labour legislation
permitting the system of extra hours be revoked: that time
lost in special (medical) treatment when the worker is
employed should not be considered as an absence and must be
paid; that a general tolerance of fifteen minutes should be
allowed (in clocking in) without wage loss: that the worker
should be allowed to start work up to one hour after the
beginning of the working day, deducting only the lost
J

time ••• "(86). But the hardships of the working class did not
move the Minister. On the contrary, he came up with the idea
of manipulating workers' rights, proposing that the
constitutional right to a paid weekly rest-day be granted
only to those workers with no absences and who arrived
punctually. (87)
In June 1947, "with apparent reluctance and concern
about the possible effects, and in complete contradiction to
his wage stabilization policy, the Minister of Labour
carried out his Constitutional duty, as required, of
Submitting a bill to the Federal congress qualifying Article
 414

157 of the Constitution"(88). This Article stipulated that

all workers receive full wages for th e~r
· weekly rest period

and also for public holidays. The Minister's bill provised

that the benefits date from the issue of the law (the'labour
movement demanded it be back-dated to 18 September, 1946,
the day the Constitution was enacted) and that these
benefits only be payable to workers who could prove full
attendance in the previous pay period that is, 100 percent
diligence. (89)
It is clear that this measure was a response to pressure
from industrialists who were finding it harder to keep
workers under the sort of conditions which reigned in the
factories. Workers fled the factories to escape the workinq
conditions. Reporting on the problem in 1945, the Director
of the National Labour Department referred to an
investigation made by the Ministry of Labour's Division of
Hygiene and Work Safety in a textile factory in Rio de
Janeiro. In that factory, "in 477,680 hours of activity, in
one month, there was a loss of 16,552 hours 'without just
case', that is, an average of 3.2%. In an annual total of
5,732,160 hours, which represent one year of labour, the
loss would be approximately 200,000 hours that is, the
normal work of nearly 80 workers ( ••• ) Taking the Federal
have
Distri-t'~ average as general for the cont~y, we would
•
for a mass of workers amounting to 1,300,000 men 1n
to
industry, an unjustifiable loss of work corresponding
more then 40,000 men!" . The reasons given for this high
 415

level of absenteeism, according to the inquiry, were the

following: "Unable to recall the reasons, 70; train delays,
10; lac]('of material in the factory, 24; death of a family
member, 8; headaches, 4; pregnancy, 2; fall, l;dealing with
private matters, 8; taking a child to the doctor, 7;wife
...
giving birth, 5; torrential rain, 1; abortion, 3; stomach
cramps, 7; birthday, 1; visiting parents, 2; visiting child
at school, 3" (90) •

As a result of the impossibility of forcing the workers,

through other mechanisms, to be both punctual and ever-
present at work, "prizes for diligence" and attendance
bonuses were established in the form of wage additions.
Those who were absent during the week, or who arrived late,
not only lost their wage bonus - 20 percent of their wages -
but were also suspended from work for periods ranging froom
two days to a week. This tough form of discipline reached to
the core of working-class life, through the blatant
manipulation of its principle means of survival: the wage.
The logic of this type of exploitation rested on resisting,
at all costs, the wave of worker protests against the "the
new form of exploitation which (enforced) attendance
represents" (91) and was unmoved by the constat ion that "if
there are absences, it is because of illness and
. · h requires 1ays
ma 1nutrition, or to acquire documents ,.:nl.c
of misery and patience ••• " (92)
Furthermore, there were cases where it is clear that
the spirit of the labour laws and, more practically, their
 416

enforcement, were far from employers concerns: itA machine

operator from the Usina Estrela (sugar refinery) came to the
newspaper saying he worked 12 hours a day except Sundays.
He demanded obedience to the laws of the country ( ••• ) the
factory overseer, however, had told him that if he wanted to
work according to the law, he should leave the factory"
(93). From 1946 to 1949 workers in sugar refineries, coffee
and wheat mills, mines, rail and bus transport, glassworks,
utilities and, less frequently, metalurgical industries all,
to a greater or lesser extent, protested against the extra
hours, the non-compliance with the paid weekl~ rest, against
suspensions and fines ande the non-payment of bonuses. (94).
That is why in 1947, the Labour Ministry received the
following evaluation by the British Embassy: "Under the
present regime, which is in theory well-disposed to social
reform on moderate lines, the inertia and muddle are such
that the actual application of the programme, so far as it
depends on Government participation, is likely to be long
delayed"(95).
And what about the daily conditions of work? The same
blackmail of bonuses and fines attests to their character as
a mechanism of productivity control. That is, if the word
"productivity" can be used in a contest in which the worker
held sole responsibility for the technical deficiencies of
production, ranging from low quality raw materials, to the
repair and maintenance of the old and frequently defective
machines. In other words, productivity was a workers'
 417

domain, since o~y they seemes to be familiar with the real

technical conditions of production processes. In these-
terms, productivity control was imposed through paramet~s'
independent of the real productive capacity of factory
equipment. This explains the use of bonuses, a type of
..
punishment which was both direct and arbitrary. This use of
bonuses, as punishment, was unconstitutional to the extent
that it made factors which haQ nothing to do with legal
definition of the vage interfere with the wage process.
Wages in Brazil had been conceived in terms of the
maintenance of the worker as a person, and not in terms of
his or her productivity.
In September 1948, one of Brazil's largest factories
provided an example of the way wages, fines, bonuses, and
productivity were related: "In the Fabrica Velha Paulista
(Recife, Pernambuco)
.,
belonging to the Lundgren family, the
worker is submitted to a system of two and three day
suspensions for not creating mi~les for the manager C••• )·

The cotton used in production consists of three different

types of fibres. The management mixes the three qualities
and even used the waste off the shop floor, thus harming
production and demanding, absurdly, that quality material be
manufac~ured under poor conditions, with inadequate raw
materials.~he workers are further required to give one hour

of free labour to the bosses daily, cleaning the machines.

In doing this, they lose six hours of work each week" (96).
 418

This did not occur only in Rec;fe but

• also in Sao Paulo
and Rio, the most advanced and progressive cities in the
country. In July 1946, the Vanguarda Socialista newspaper
denounced the Maria Candida textile factory in the interior
of Sao Paulo where workers have to work more hours than the
slaves of the old colonial plantations (fazendas). The boss
has all the local authorities in his hands and relies on
them to force his emp~ees to:work as many hours as he deems
necessary - usually twelve - persecuting and firing those
who rebel ..... (97). In June 1948, there was a strike in the
.
Matarazzo silk factory in Campinas demanding, .aniPng other
things, the payment of the weekly rest-day and the abolition
of overtime. In November 1948, a strike in another Matarazzo
factory (Tecelagem Brasileira of Sao Paulo), demanded the
abolition of sa~day night work, and protested the
director's intransigency (98).
J

Another indicator of the brutal rules prevailing in

factories was the high rate accidents at work, something
which was to gain particular emphasis in the working-class
press during this post-war period. (82). Work accidents were
already so frequent in 1919 that they became the subject of
the first industrial labour law in Brazil. This law included
"work accidents" in the legislation on social assistance and
welfare - the discussion was centred on the Zorms and
amounts of monetary compensation and on the bureaucratic
processes for legal procedures. This tendency to/"monetize"
the problem, instead of' preventing it by improving factory
 419

conditions, became even more evident from 1935 onwards. At

that time, the operational norms of insurance against work
-
accidents were establiched, insurance companies and
societies being set up for
,
the purpose. (99)
It is important to stress the non-preventive character
of the causes of high accident rates: the existence of
preventive measures would have implied both the
modernization of factory equipment and the improvement of
installations - something which, as has already been
mentioned, did not figure in the logic of the plans of the
industrialists of the period. And the ineff1ciency of the
Lah~ur Ministry continued. It was observed in 1946 that
"Mention must be made of the relevant Brazilian
legislation., of which the earliest laws were only concerned
with compensation and insurance against accidents. The basic
legislation is found in the Consolidation of Labour Laws
(eLT) of 1943, which, although advanced in spirit,
comprehensive in scope and modern principles, has been
applied only to a small extent and must be regarded, at
best, as a target, than as an easily attained goal. It is
laid down, for instance, that no new factory operate until
it has been inspected and approved, but the necessary
personnel and organization is not there to put such
instructions ~nto effect. Similarly, a serious shortage of
doctors and hospitals frustrates a scheme for the
rehabilitation of injured workers"(100).
 420

The results can be seen in the enourmous number of work

accidents reported in the police columns of the 0 Estado de
S.Paulo e Correio da Manha , as well as in the denunciations
in the workers's newspapers. Taking the months of May and
June, 1945, as an example, 25 accidents involving workers
were reported, of which 13 were due to the minimal security
in the work place: explosions of smelters in foundries,
chemical explosions, hands and fingers maimed in obsolete
machinery, poisoning and burns from chemical products,
overheated machinery and falls from scaffolding at building
sites(IOI). Assuming that only the most serious accidents,
such as those cited above, were reported in the police
columns, the following observations made by an outsider
about daily life in the factory, is even more
interesting:" ••• it is less well known that a very large
proportion of manual workers usually either go barefoot or
wear flat wooden sandals with the result that foot injuries
are the greatest single cause of acciden~s(102).

Thus, until 1949, denunciations about unsafe conditions of

work, continued. One interview, given by the CUrator of the
Labour Court's Work Accident Branch, in June 1947, revealed
that in 1946, there were about 64,000 work accidents. The
interviewee revealed that "the employers cheated the law in
several ways, t~rough re~is~ering lower wages in the
employment cards than those really paid, (or) not sending
the injured worker to the insurance companies posts
(103).Correctly, the Vanguarda Socialista newspaper
 421

commented that "the compensations for acc';dents

• • • • are so low
that they are an incentive for the company not to take
protective measures to protect and safeguard the workers. As
is known, the maximum wage was fixed at 24 cruzeiros for
purposes of compensation, which proves that even in the
elaboration of the law, its authors were not concerned with
helping the injured worker, for only 70% of the wage was
alloted to a victim under medical treatment, to provide
subsistence for his family, not to mention those whose
normal wages were less than the maximum compensation wage.
Most of the time, this fact forces the worker ,to accept any
kind of deal with the boss, and to return to work before
finishing his treatment"(104).
The large number of work accidents is the most obvious
sign that the working conditions required by law were far
from the reality of the factory in the 1940s as they were in
"
the 1920s. Between 1945 and 1949, denunciations appeared in
workers'newspapers showing the same style of savage
exploitation of labour, as if the world of the daily work
remained untouched by the labour rights. Moreover,
supervision in factories was exercised by the police, on a
daily basis, within the factory, showing that the old
"social question" continued to be a police matter. There was
even a case of a u.s. factory manager who complained of
superfluous jobs which unnecessarily increased the payroll -
in which he included the police(105).
 422

The presence of the police seems nevertheless to be

more apparent during strikes. In these occasions, "outside"
police detachments already knew who was who inside th
f e
factory from information supplied by the police members
within: "The workers' arrests ins';de
.... the work P1 ace itself,
in the Pernambuco Tramways, has revealed that the brutal
system of policing that exists in that company ( ••• ) Only
last Saturday, five workers were imprisoned in the Usina
Eletrica by the detachment in service there ( ••• )yesterday
afternoon, the manager called the worker Joao Augusto, and,
while he was talking to him, the OOPS (Political Police)
were called in, seized him and took him away. Even as we
write this report, there is no further information about
Joao Augusto, whose whereabouts continue to be unknown"
(106). Even potential conflict was resolved this way: "Last
Thursday, unexpectedly, the worker Ermenegildo was taken
J

prisioner by several police officers. Afterwards, in the

police station, he found out that he had been arrested for
'sabotage'. Because they could nor prove anything against
him, he was released four hours later( ••• ) According to what
we were told, there (at Great Western) whenever there is a
worker working, there is a police at his side ll (107).
That these denunciations were not voiced only during
strikes and periods of political crisis, is demonst-at~d by
the views of the British labour attache on the subject, in

November 1946: "What is continuing .•• so ....;t appears from

recent examples, is the frequent interference of the police
 423

in the everyday business of the syndicates and in the field

of industrial relations. A few examples are given below to
show how interference is not by any means confined to
subs~rsive political questions ( ••• ) A private confidentail

report has recently come to hand of a case in Sao Paulo,

where 12 sorters in a textile mill employing 400 workes r
beqan a "qo slow" strike. The firm, in this case, made a
report to the Department of P01itical and Social Order
(OOPS) and a younq deleqate at once interviewed the workers
and promptly induced them all to sign a confession of guilt
of 'sabotaqe'! If the workers offend aqain, they can be
dismissed by the firm without the usual heavy indemnities
pay. It is said that this case is by no means an isolated
one and it seems obvious that the deleqate and the OOPS had
developed a technique of 'industrial relations' for dealing
with such situations( ••• )It should be pointed out that those
actions by the police are apparently quite independent of
the Ministry of Labour" (108).

The impossibility of labour legislation

becoming a meaningful reality for a large number of workers
was largely explained (in analyses, essays and the press) as
the result of the scanty mobilization of workers in
validating these rights. Some observers of the period have
attributed what they perceive as "the workers' lack of
social interest" and "absence of a strong spirit of
association", to "the very low level of . "
educat~on an d to
their "lack of the necessary qualities for modern industrial
 424

organization" (109). Even the"scale of values" held by

Brazilian workers has been interpreted as indicating "a
psychological propensity for lack of discipline and
education and toward a preference for leisure, once minimum
expenses are covered ••• "(110). The left too tended to blame
labour exploitation on the workers themselves and their
"character traits", for, it was also convinced that
Brazilian workers did not posses a clear idea of themselves
as a class(111).
Sociological analyses blamed the rural origins of much
of the work force which had migrated to the cities during
the 1930s and 1940s. As is wel~ known, the size of the
migration in the 1940s was almost double that of the
previous decade. As a result, all the industrial centers
grew at an extraordinary pace, exemplified particularly by
Sao Paulo which in 1920 had a population of 587,000 and
J

reached approximately 2.230,000 inhabitants by 1950.

Similarly, the industrial labour force in the country as a
whole grew from 780,000 in 1940 to 1.260,000 in 1950. Thus,
....
the impact of migrants was such that a "new" working class
of recent rural origins was shaped alongside the then small
number of second generation immigrants and the
already'urbanized workers.
· has been argued that the migrants'
Moreover, 1t c~ltural

background reinforced the workers' subordination to

employers and the state, hence projecting their previous
relations of subordination. The total absence of rights and
 425

continued impoverishment prevailing in the countryside led

them to perceive the few improvements they achieved in the

city as being a concession from those in power. This is why
discussions in the literature usually point to the migrants
as the main source of internal divisions in the working
class. According to this debate, the working class had been
weakened even more by the presence of these unskilled recent
workers who had no factory exPerience, and who were focused
on their own urban integration through improving their
consumption patterns. Hence they are perceived as having
undermined the latent ability of the working class to
achieve aut~nomy(ll2).

Finally, political analyses explained that the new

industrial proletariat with a strong migrant component had
"completely forgotten" all the notions of independent
organization that., ha~ existed in the past(ll3). As a result
they could only envision state protection as the means to
promote their rights. This allowed the new working class to
legitimize its relationship to the state through what is
known as "populism" - that is, the individual and
paternalistic pressures exerted reciprocally by the workers
and personalist politicians(ll4).
Nevertheless, post~war history seems to show that the
question is, at the very least, considerable more
complicated than it appears. In the'first place, far from
pointing to a lack of working~class mobilization in defence
of its rights, this period exemplifies modes of collective
 426

expression and organization, firmly centered

on the demand
for these rights. Secondly, far from distancing themselves
from their working'class condition,workers returned to the
original sense of their struggles for demands now
,
strengthened by the experience of State legalisation.ln the
third place, the principal factor of subordination was not
migration: first, most of the previous rural workers had
already been submitted to urman waged labour prior to
arriving at the factory gates. They rarely went directly
from the rural areas to the factory, although some
exceptions to this may be found (115). At the same
time,there is no evidence that migrants did not participate
as actively as the rest of the workers in the protests and
strikes of the period, regardless of the differences in
their approach to urban integration. Indeed, instead of
looking to migration as the principal cause for
working'class weakness, one must turn to the brutal working
conditions and the factory system itself as the main reason
for the subordination of the workers. More specifically,
while the peculiar combination of labour laws and violence
,
explains the action of the working class, it also serves to
point to the obstacles it encountered along the way.
Finally, there was no lack of group action amongst workers.
Confront~d Ly the disor~~nization generated by the s~ate,

they continuously renewed their attempts at collective

action, although admittedly these attempts proved
fragmented.
 427

* * * * * * * *
In 1950, Getulio Vargas was returned to power , W1nn1ng
· . 49.0%
of the vote. There is no doubt that almost the totality of
the working-classes voted in his name(116). How can his
triumphant return to power be explained?
While analysts have pointed to the continuation of the
same power alliances based on populist electoral and union
machines that had prevailed d~ring the dictatorship, this
explanation seems only partially correct. For several
elements served to create the worst period in the working
classes struggle for justice: the violent wage freeze
between 1945 and 1950, inspite of the rise in both
productivity and the cost of living; the maintenance of the
Union Laws, now fi~y entrenched by the 1946 Constitution;
the continued violent repression of any autonomous working
class action; the same old struggle to guarantee employers'
J

adherence to the labour legislation. Indeed, the period of

Dutra's government served to make the Stat~promoted

disorganization of social justice clear to the workers.

since his last word for Dutra candidacy in 1945

(responsible for the the latter's victory) Getulio vargas
remained deliberately silent in Rio Grande do SuI. From
there, he watched the relative decline of the conservative
political parties in 1947 and 1948 state and municipal
elections, when 6 million of voters (among 22 million
adults) showed, for the first time in Brazil, the urban
character of elections. Moreover, he watched the government
 428

supression of the PCB after its.sucess in electing members

to state congresses and lesser legislat1've 0 rgan1za
' t '10ns
(besides PCB decisive support for the victory of Sao Paulo
populist leader Adhemar de Barros for state governor
apparently, in exchange for the release of communists in
prison and press freedom). By 1948, Vargas started building
support in urban centres through strengthening the PTB and
the trabalhista (a kind of 'labourism') line of politics. In
his campaign, Vargas stressed legal welfare, labour laws,
working-class political activity (now considered as a
necessity) and economic nationalism. The PCB had advised its
members to cast blank ballots.
All this suggests that Vargas himself (and the way he
presented PTB) , was endowed with an essential political
meaning: that of the social and labour rights invested with
legal power. In a ., period of repression, when parliamentary
politics met actual poverty with indifference, amidst the
dismantling of social services and labour rights at
shopfloor level, Vargas represented a symbol of principles
long sought and struggled by workers, even if they uneasily
fit power structures practices.

NOTES

1. On the downfall of the Vargas dictatorship, see: Virgilio

de Mello Franco, A campanha de UDN(1944-1945), Zel10
Valverde Rio de Janeiro, 1946; Carone, Edgar, 0 Estado
NOVO(1937-1945). Rio de Janeiro, DIFEL, 1976; Basba~, d
Leoncio, Historia Sincera de Repub1ica(l930-1960)~ R10 e.
'
J ane1ro, ", - '1'
C1vl.11za~ao Bras1 el.ra,
1974·' Sl.'lva , Hell.o, _ 1945.
Y
Porgue Depuseram Vargas, ,
Rio de Janel.ro, C"l.Vl. lizat"'ao
y
 429

Brasileira, 1976; Souza, Maria do Carmo Campel10 de, Estado

e Partidos Politicos no Brasil (1930-1964), Al fa-Omega , Sao
Paulo, 1976.
2. In 1943, . Vargas government tried to stimulate
unionization through a special agency, the Comissao Tecnica
de orienta~ao Sindical. The campaign was, apparently, a
failure (although numbers are not reliable). In contrast,
the sucess of the 1945 MOT campaign is registered in some
texts but I could not locate statistics. Cf. Weffort,
Francisco, "origens do Sindica1ismo Popu1ista no Brasil (A
conjuntura do Pos-guerra)". Estudos CEBRAP 4, April-June
1973.
3. 0 ·Estado de S.Pau10, 1/9/45
4. Correio da Manha, 6/5/45
5. 0 Estado de S.Pau10, 8/15/45
6. COrreio da Manha, 3/21/45
7. 0 Estado de S.Pau10, 10/27/45

8. correio da Manha, 3/21/46.

9. correio da Manha, 2/23/46
10. Correio da Manha, 2/23/46
11. correio da Hanha, 2/22/46.
J

12. correio da Manha, 2/23/46.

13. Correio da Manha, 1/16/46
14. Correio da Manha, 3/13/46
15. o Estado de Sao Paulo, 10/3/45
16. Correio da Manha, 3/26/46
17. Correio da Manha, 2/13/46
18. Correio da Manha, 12/12/45
19. correio da Manha, 3/3/4E
, 't G ra1 ·Regort. December 31st,
20. Bahia consu1a~ Dlstrlc f~~e. F0371/44806-5280.
1944, p. 1. Publ~c Record 0 lce.
" - Paulo".
s Unsuccessful visit to Sao.
21. R.G.stone, varga RO.F0371/44806-5280.
December 28, 1944, p.39. P •
 430

22. M.A. Denton-Thompson. January 12, 1945, p.2. PRO •.

F0371/44806-5280.

23. British Embassy, Rio de Janeiro. February 2, 1945.

PRO:F0371/44806-5280 (AS687/52/6).
24. 0 Estado de S. Paulo, 4/6/45.
25. 0 Estado de S.Paulo, 3/5/45; 6/12/45; 7/15/45.
26. 0 Estado de S.Paulo, 10/6/45; 10/12/45; 10/13/45;
10/16/45.

27. On textiles entrepreneurs~ unpopularity, see stanley

stein, op.cit., pp. 168-176 • .
28. Luiz Carlos Prestes, "Uni&o Nacional para a Democracia e
o proqre~s~". spe7ch made ~t Estadio Vasco da Gama, May 20
1945. Ed190es Hor1zonte, R10 de Janeiro, 1945.
29. idem.
30. idem.
31. 0 Estado de S.Paulo, 7/9/1945
32. "Lembran9as de D.Brites" (dona Brites Memories). Bosi,
Eclea, Memoria e Sociedade: Lembrancas de Velhos. Sao Paulo,
T.A.Queiroz, 1979.
33. "Trabalho de Massas". Address delivered by Pedro Pomar
from the Executiva Committee of the Communist Party of
Brazil to the "Pleno Ampliado" of the National Committee.
Hoje, 1/15/46.
'34. "Informe Politico addressed by Luiz Carlos Prestes to
the Pleno Ampliado of the National Committee". Hoje,
1/15/46.
35. Programme of the Catholic Social Action.
36. British Embassy, 17th June 1946. PRO:AS-3784. 3/65/46.
37. Programme of SESI.
38. In May 1945, industrial and co~erci~l entrepreneur~
organized an economic conference wh1ch d1scus~ed eco~om1c
planning, standards of living, agricultura~,· 1ndustr1al an~
commercial policies, energy and transport 1nvestments and
also labour and social policies. Its final documen~ was a
declaration called "Social Peace Letter" and was s1gned by
the head of the conference, Joao Daudt de Oliveira, an
influential industrialist and friend of Vargas.
 431

39.0 Estado de S.Pau10, 10/5/45; 10/11/45; 10/12/45;

11/9/45.

40. 0 Estado de S.Pau10, 4/3/45; 3/6/45.

41. In one of these clashes in Recife, a student was shot (0

Estado de S.Paulo, ~/6/45). Some opposition papers accused
the g~vernment ~f d~rectly provoking armed confrontation. See
Corre~o da Manha, 5/5/45 and 6/9/45.

42. 0 Estado de S.Paulo, 6/8/45 and 3/6/45. Correio da

Manba, 5/5/45.

43. Although the e~pirical evidence supporting this claim

~ay be.deem7d frag1le - the fact was mentioned in one single
1nterv1ew w1th an old worker who took part in both events -
one could argue in favour of it that the association of
religion and politics, especially among popular classes, is
not uncommon in Brazilian history, from 19th century
messianic movements to contemporary politics. Paradoxical
though it may seem, left winq party'allegiance and left-
oriented union action not only coexist with deep-rooted
religious beliefs, ~ey are also frequently compounded with
them.Cf.Roberto da Matta, "As raizes da violencia no Brasil;
reflexoes de um antropologo social"in Paulo Sergio Pinheiro
et al., A Violencia Brasileira, Sao Paulo, 1982; Marlise
Meyer and Maria Lucia Montes, Redescobrindo 0 Brasil: a
Festa na Politica,Sao Paulo,1985; Celia G.Quirino and Maria
Lucia Montes, Constituicoes brasi1eiras e cidadania, Sao
Paulo, 1987.
44. The communistJParty was very successful with this
Pacaembu rally. Newspapers published calls for meetings
which gathered new and old adherents a month 7arlier •. A
newspaper like 0 Estado de s.~aulo had a spec1al.sect1~n_for
calling the people and advert~sed the rally, ent1tled Sao
Paulo to Luiz Carlos Prestes". The Catholic demonstration
was also very much advertised. See 0 Estado de S. Paulo
7/3/435; 7/6/45; 7/8/45; 7/9/45 until July 14. This paper
calculated that 50 to 60 thousand people came to see the
Virgin's statue and more than a 100 thousand to see Prestes.
45. Quoted in Carone, op.cit., p.322-333.
46. 0 Estado de S. Paulo, 13/6/45
47. 0 Estado de S. Paulo, 7/3/45
48. Address by a union leader to Getulio Vargas in a
demonstration in the Catete Palace gardens. 0 Estado de
S.Paulo, 19/9/45.
49. Speech by Hugo Borghi, organizer of the queremista
movement and later of the PTB. 0 Estado de S. Paulo,
23/10/45.
 432

50. " The only strike attemp in Var '

he was overthrown) seems to ha ga s support (on the day
Rio Light. This attempt howev~~ b::n the 2,hour stoppage at
Vianna (an official rep~esentati~e o~ ~~~a~t~~~tbY ~~gadaS
Labour). It was ,frustrated by a communist veto ~e MOT 1
reappered after the storm and even so to ad ~ t' on y
" We ff ort, Francl.sco,
to Work ers. · ' , p.87.Vl.se pa l.ence
op.cit,
51. idem, p. 87 and 89.

52. Cf. Q Esta~o de,S.Paulo, 3/10, 9/10,10/10, 24/10 1945.

~efore the strl.ke~ l.n October 1945, a Light worker was
Judged bY,the Natl.onal Defens 7 Tribunal for organizing a
stoppage l.n May of the same year.
53. Labour Union leaders'note (Electricity Workers Union of
Sao Paulo) published in the news papers.o Estado de Sao
Paulo, 28/10/45.
54. idem, 29/10/45
55. A good analysis of the positions of MOT-linked unions is
found in Weffort, op.cit ••
56. 0 Estado de S. Paulo, 30/12/45.
57. 0 Estado de S. Paulo, 31/12/45.
58. COrreio da Manha, 30/12/45.
59. See the strika list in Appendix.
60. Werneck Vianna points to a mass desertion to workers
from unions in Rio de Janeiro. He calculated that the number
of unionized workers fell from 35% in 1935 to 18% in 1941.
In Sao Paulo, 168 unions had only 44 thousand members. Cf.
Luiz Werneck Vianna, Liberalismo e sindicato no Brasil, Rio,
1981
61. Rolando Fratti, "Contribuicao ao estudo do movimento
operario". Debate, n.20, November 1975, p. 19.
62. idem, p.2l
63. Grossi, lone, A extracao do homem:as Minas de Morro
Velho. Rio de Janeiro, 1981.
64.Lopes, J.S. Leite. A Tecelagem dos Conf1itos de C1asse na
Cidade das Chamines. Doctoral Thesis, Museu Nacional, UFRJ,
1986.
65.Sarti, Ingrid, Porto Verme1ho.Rio de Janeiro, 1981.
 433

66. See strike list in Appendix.

67. Fratti, op.cit., part 2. Debate, n.22, May 1976.

68. Garcia, Marco Aurelio, "Notas sabre PCB
~:~~ntan. Working paper, Edgar Leuenrot~ Archi~:,a~~CAMP,

69. See note 67 •

.
70. See strike list in Appendix
71. Ricardo Maranhao, Sindicatos e Democratizacao, Sao
Paulo, 1982.
72. idem
73. idem. See also strike list
74. Cf. Grossi, op.cit
75. The best report of these measures is in the British
labour attache document 3999 (7l/93/46)-PRO:F037l-5l90l.
76. Garcia, Marco Aurelio, op.cit.
77. British Embassy, Rio de Janeiro. Political Report, May 4
1946. PRO:F037l-AS-3784.
78. 0 Estado de S.Paulo, January 1947.
79. Considering tae 1940 minimum wage for Sao Paulo as equal
to 100, by 1945 it dropped to 67; in 1950, it was less than
a half what it had been in 1940=40. For Rio de Janeiro,
numbers are: 1940 = 100i 1945 = 89; 1950 = 55. The
purchasing power of the minimum wage dropped from 67% in
1940 to 40% in 1950. Cf. Saboia, Joao, "A Ra<;ao Essencial e
sua utiliza<;ao como deflator do salario minimo". Estudos
Economicos, 14(3), Sept-December 1984.
80. Maranhao, op.cit., p.58.
81. In the begining of August 1947, Sao Paulo was the stage
for a violent transport riot (bus and tram) against a fare
increase. For three days,· groups of people attacked buses
and tramways, damaged seats and windows, and set v 7hicles on
fire. Thiu happened in all the main areas of the c 7ty at the
same time. Popular anger did not stop with the pol~ce and
army repression. Attacks on shops started in the second day.
The government of Sao Paulo left the city, waiting for,the
reestablishment of social order by army tanks and mach~ne­
guns. In all, 400 trams and 100 buses were destroyed. See
Jose Alvaro Moyses "Protesto Urbano e Po1itica: 0 quebra-
quebra de 1947", i~ Cidade, Povo e Poder, Sao Paulo, 1981.
 434

82. See Stein, op.cit., p.173-175.

83. British Embassy, Rio de Janeiro, December 1946.

31/89/46. Fa 371/61204. PRO:413-

84. British Embassy, Rio de Janeiro, January 21, 1947. PRO:

Fa 371/61204. (AS 47/45/6)
85. idem

86. Vanquarda Socia1ista, September 20, 1946

87. Vanquarda Socia1ista, DeC~mber 27, 1946
•
88. British Embassy, Rio de Janeiro, August 8, 1947. Labour
Report n. 25. PRO:FO 371/61205.
89. a Estado de S.Pau10, 7/1/47; Vanguarda Socia1ista,
7/8/47.
90. Jose de Segadas Vianna. a Problema da Mao de Obra no
Brasil. MTIC - ONT. October 1945.
91. Problemas, June-July 1949
92. Acao Oireta, 6/8/48
93. A Luta, 7/16/48.
94. See the militant left-wing newspapers A Luta, Vanguarda
Socia1ista, a Popular, Acao Oireta, from 1945 to
1948.A1though wage demands were included, the workers'
battles were inseparable from a struggle for conditions of
production in the factories.
95. British Embassy, Rio de Janeiro, January 22 1947. PRO:FO
371/61204 - (AS 509/45/6).
96. a Popular, 9/12/47.
97. Vanquarda Socia1ista, July 5th 1946.
98. A Luta, June 23rd 1948
99. Bo1etim do MTIC,n.7, March 1935.
100. British Embassy, Rio de Janeiro, December 20th 1946.
PRO:FO 371/61204-3614. (AS 31/89/56). . .
101. The months were chosen at random. The rema1n1ng
accidents were traffic injuries. correio da Manha e 0 Estado
de Sao Paulo, Mau and June 1945.
 435

102. British Embassy, Rio de Janeir J

Report n. 2. PRO:FO 371/51902-3999 o'(ASU14Y
3 25th 1946. Labour
• 47/13/6).
103. Vanquarda Socialista, June 6th 1947.
104. idem

105. Quoted in CEPAL/UN, Economic

- Survev
- i n Lat1n
· America,
1 949, p. 358.
•
106. 0 Popular, 9/20/48
107. 0 Popular, 3/21/48

108. British Embassy, Rio de Janeiro, November 19th 1946.

Labour Report n.S. PRO:37l/Sl902
109. British Embassy, Rio de Janeiro Labour Report n 20
April 24, 1947.PRO:FO 571/61205-3999' • ,
110.Spiegel, Henry, The Brazilian Economy. Phi~adelphia,
1949.
Ill. See, as an example, the analysis by MOT organizer
Roberto Morena (see note 112 below).
112. Studies on internal migration and its impact on
working-class composition establish a correlation between,
on the one hand, migrant worker = unskilled labour = values
of urban consumption; and, on the other hand, the already-
urbanized worker = skilled labourer = advanced class values.
The left greatly eontributed for this image of migrants, as
can be seen in the self-criticism made by one PCB militant:
"After 1930, and particularly after World War II, there was
a large dislocation of peasants to the cities attracted by
the industrial surge Brazil was experiencing( ••• )More
backward, their conscience did not come up at all to that of
the urban worker ••• Transplanted to a different and hostile
environment, migrants became even more distrusting and
withdrawn (which) made their assimilation even slower. Even
in the Party we used depressing expressions for them. We
used to say that the Brazilian working class was backward
because it still smelled of grass ••• ln turn, they would
answer back,'and you, what do you smell of'?" Roberto
Morena, "Letter to comrades ...... Arquivo Roberto Morena,
Milan, (Corresponderpapers).
113. A good criticism of the alleged apathy and lack of
appropriate consciousness among industrial workers due to
their rural origins can be found in Micha 7l Hall, on.
widening the scope of Latin American w~r~1ng-c1ass h1story:
some general considerations and a Braz1l1an case study.
UNICAMP, 1982. As Hall remarks, quoting E.Hobsbawm," 'the
 436

habit of industrial solidarity must be learned' however much

doubt may exist over the ways in which this process occurs".
ll~. Cf. Weff<?rt, Francisco, Sindicato e Politica. Thesis of
"Ll:~r7-Docenc7a"~ USP, .1972.Also'Weffort, F., 0 populismo na
polltlca brasllelra. R10 de Janeiro, 1978.
115. Cf. Graham, Douglas and Buarque de Hol1anda Fi1ho
Sergio, Migration. Regional and Urban Growth and Devel~pment
in Brazil. 1822-l~70. Sao Paulo, IPE/USP, 1971. Also Durham
Eunice, A Caminho da Cidade. Sao Paulo, 1978 '
116. According to Azis Simao, working-class vote in 1945
President and state governmets; 1947-1948 municipal
elections; and 1950 general eiection~went to the PTB and
the PCB. National working-class vote added 1,5 million,
(while middle and upper classes vote added 4,5 million). It
must be considered that 54% of the adult population over 20
years old were illiterate, and hence inegible to vote ( that
is, 90% of workers, including rural workers, did not vote).
PTB and PCB, together,obtained 1~300 million votes; PCB
retained 95% of its 1947 voters who cast blank" ballots for
President and elected some state deputies(running through
others parties). PTB percentage of the popular vote had been
growing since 1947 elections. See Azis simao for Sao Paulo
1945, 1947 and 1948 elections: "0 voto.Operario em Sao
Paulo", Separata dos Anais do I Congresso de Sociologia, Sao
Paulo, 1955; Soares, Glaucio Ari Dillon, Sociedade e
Politica no Brasil, Sao Paulo, 1973, specially chapters 3
and 4 •
•
 437

CONCLUSION

I.Social scientists and historians concerned with explaining

working'class worlds or labour movements in Brazil, seldom
consider the significant role that the legal provisions
designed to protect rights at work have played in the
cultural and political format~on of the Brazilian working
class. They have tended to concentrate, instead, on the
repressive and centralized union laws, which have set the
limits and potential of working'class organization and
militancy. Yet the formation of the Brazilian working class
cannot be understood without considering the legal
intervention by the state in daily work relations. Ever
since these laws were enacted in the 1930s, they have served
to shape workers' demands for justice and, even if they do
not function as such, they have nevertheless directly
addressed workers'rights. The labour laws enhance particular
political meaning so far as they operated through a specific
form of political discourse. The importance of these laws as
an effective discourse goes far beyond "populism" as a new
alliance between a modernizing State government and the
working classes, which is often considered to be their main
effect. In the thirties and forties in Brazil, the labour
laws were the means of recognizing legally the social rights
of workers who, until then, were not entitled to any rights
accepted by either the ruling classes or the government.
 438

2.The importance of the labour laws ~n

• the history of the
Brazilian working class can be seen ~n
• at least three
different ways: First, the laws detailed the rights and
duties of workers and employers at the factory level, that
is they penetrated the core of the relations of production.
They did so at a time when employers did not care or did not
know what the sale of free labour'power for wages actually
meant, either politically or culturally, a time when
over~exploited working people were trying to raise the issue
of equivalence through the language of labour rights. In the
second place, in spite of differences found amongst workers
and labour conditions allover the country, the demands for
rights were shared by workers. Thus the workers'struggles to
ensure their application from the 1930s onward, point t·o a
common cultural horizon as to what dignity and fairness in
labour issues should be, even if these universal demands
were being raised in different ways (i.e. whether through
structured workers's movements, paternalistic demand
practices, or specific grievances -- all of which can be
found in the 1930s and 1940s,and certainly before).
In the third place, the laws were at the heart of the labour
struggles of the period (and continue to be so today) since,
insofar as the work place was seen as its owner's private
sphere of exclusive authority, employers L~ve rejected legal
social riqhts on the grounds that private property was a
moral class privilege. As a result, labour rights were never

fully guaranteed -- a , '

s~tuat~on wh'~c h was deeply rooted in
 439

cultural terms: common labouring people' s mora 1 code was

pitted against bourgeois "aristocratic" ethics. For
instance, ,the central importance that the struggle over the
Labour Laws acquire~n the 1930s and 1940s can be seen by
the fact that the members of the state~controlled •
un~ons
?

only adhered to them when the unions raised the issue of

social justice, addressing the fight for labour rights.

3. At the turn of the century, when the real process of

proletarization began, this common horizon of rights was
built through rank and file initiative in local industrial
actions, by which workers made meaningful the classical
political ideologies (first anarchism, later socialism and
communism). This situation continued in the 1930~1935

period, when unions lost the battle against the state Union
Law, because the attainment of the rights was made
contingent on adh~rence to state legislation. After 1939,
however, they stayed completely out of their workers' day to
day problems. Even so, workers continued to fight, even
silently, for the same labour rights. In other words, the
labour movement in the 1930s and 1940s developed between a
strong tradition of local strikes organized by informal
groups at the work places and professional and
bureaucratized unions whose presence nevertheless was
required for negotiation. In this fragmented organizational
working'class context, social rights were the broad banner
common to the various organizational spaces and strategies
as well as to the different working~class sectors.
 440

4. At least until 1950, the traditional criteria to

recognize labour as a class, i.e. professional pride, union
membership or political class consciousness did not manage
to build working class collective identity in Brazil. None
of these elements were able to trace the paths by which a
unified working class movement or culture could be forged.
This can be explained by the constant reproduction of the
heterogeneous labour situations ultimately caused by the
country's uneven, combined economy. The class heterogeneity
comes from different technological processes of production
(all "ages" of industrial technology can be found
distributed through different sectors and even within the
same production sector); from different regional conditions
and from the different sex and age compositions of the
labour force; and sometimes the combined presence of these
three factors. In this context, small battles to establish
social rights and make them effective before a society which
refused to recognize its workers' rights to equivalent
access to social justice, prevailed in working class
conditions throughout the period.

5. Thus, the legal intervention that defined labour and

social rights in Brazil provided the grounds for the
dynamics of the period, for it created the basis of class
struggles where culture and politics met everyday life. The
state Labour Laws recognized the broad cultural demands of
justice and fairness in labour conditions. However, their
 441

application was effective only when the labour movement

fought for it, and hence was at the heart of the strikes of
the period. This is why the strikes cannot be reduced to" a
struggle for economic demands. It is also why unions,
political parties and ideologies which sought to mobilize
..
the working class., on grounds pther than this space of law
and culture, failed to link the everyday lives and common
beliefs of working people to institutional politics. In
short, the dynamics of working'class culture and politics in
Brazil emerged from the collision between traditional
cultural ideas of labour and its management and the daily
experience of proletarians in search of their rights. It is
against this background that the peculiarities of the
Brazilian labouring classes must be understood.
 BIBLIOGRAPHY

(IlREPORTS AND MANUSCRIPT DOCUMENTS ,

1mb· p01itiRc~l RdepJ,0rts,and Lab~ur R ports from the British
E assy~ 10 e, ane1ro to H1S MaJesty's 7 Secretary of state
of Fore1gn Affa1rs. March of 1944 to February 1949
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, London. •
2. P~litica1 Reports from the,American Embassy at Rio de
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C13.~om~r'EPedrOt~
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PCB no.traba1ho de massas. Informe da
0
xecu ~va
ao Com~te Naciona1 do PCB · .
1946. Rio de Janeiro, Horizonte, 1946. 'f em Jane~ro de

{IIlOFFICIAL PUBLICATIONS
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, .
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IBGE (Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatistica).

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(III1NEWSPAPERS

(a) Working-Class and Party Press

•
Acao pireta. Rio de Janeiro. 1946 a 1950
A Luta. Recife. August to December 1948.
A P1ateia. Sao ~aulo. 1930 a 1932.
Hoje. Sao Paulo. December 1945 to April 1946
o Momento. Salvador. April to September 1945
o Popular. Recife: August to December 1948
orienta9ao Socialista. Sao Paulo, 1946
Remode1 a 90es. Rio de Janeiro. December 1945 to February
1946.
,
Tribuna Popular. Rio de Janeiro. November 1945 to April
1946.
Vanguarda Socialista. Rio de Janeiro. November 1945 to
August 1948.

(b) Daily Newspapers

o Estado de S.Paulo. Sao Paulo. March 1945 to March 1946.
Folha da Manha. Sao Paulo. January 1945 to June 1946.
Correio da Manha. Rio de Janeiro. December 1945 to March
1946.
CIYlJOURNALS
..
o OBSERVADOR ECONOMICO E FINANCEIRO.
· "A crise de brac;os e a Constituit"ao
y
lt • 2 1 936.
n.,
• "0 tabelamento de generos alimenticios". n.4, 1936
• "0 Salario Minimo e a instabi1idade economico-financeira".
n.5, 1936.
• "A batalha dos teares". n.2, 1936.
• "Produc;ao e mercados". n.5, 1936
• "Dois efeitos da crise economica". n. 5, 1936.
• "As industrias de tece1agem de seda, juta e lane n.13,
1937 •
" Superproduc;ao Industrial?" n. 14, 1937
• "Superproduc;ao de tecidos". n. 35, 1938
• "Industrias de Algodao". n-8l, 1942.
INDUSTRIA TEXTIL
numbers 109 to 119 (January to November 1941)
121 to 128 (January to August 1942)
134 (February 1943) -
146 to 156 (February to December 1944)
175 (July 1946)
179 (November 1946)
REVISTA DO ARQUIVO MUNICIPAL DE SAO PAULO
Araujo, Oscar Egydio, "A Alimentac;ao da c1asse obreira em
Sao Paulo".VOL.LXIX, ana VI, August 1940.
Paula Souza, C., cintra e Carvalho, "Inquerito sobre a
a1imentac;ao popular em um bairro de Sao Paulo". Vol.XVIII,
ano II, 1935.
Lowrie, Samuel." A Assistencia Filantropica na cidade de Sao
Paulo". Vol. XXVIII, ana III,
Katzenstein, Betty, "Observa90es sabre ajustados e
desajustados". Vol. XXXIX, September 1937

Divisao de Ec:Iucaya<? e Rec:-eio, "Alguns casas de tuberculose

nos parques ~nfant~s de Sao Paulo". Vol. LVII May 1939
Araujo, Oscar Egydio, "Pesquisas e Estudos Ec~nomicos". ·Vol
XCIII, October-December 1943.

Lowrie, Samuel, "Pesquisa Padrao de Vida das Familias dos

Operarios da Limpeza Publica da Municipalidade de Sao
Paulo". Vol. LI, October 1938.
Davis, Horace, "Padrao de Vida dos Operarios da Cidade de
Sao Paulo". Vol XIII, 1935.
Arauj 0 , Oscar Egydio, "Uma pesquisa de padrao de vida II. Vol
LXXX, 1941.

REYlSTA DE ORGANIZACAO CIENTIFICA (IDORT)

"Jornadas de ~imentayao". n.116-120, August-December 1941.

Martins, Luiz D. "Casa e Salario". n-126, June 1942.
Azevedo, Aldo Mario, "Economia de Guerra (Salario e
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util"izayao dos re'feitorios". n-183, ano XVI
SAPS - "Conselhos de Alimentayaoll.n. 185, 1948.

PROBLEMAS - 1947 to 1949.

lV) INTERVIEWS
Conversations with 6 old workers from Sao Paulo about their
life memories. Tape-recorded.

(VI) BOOKS
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Barros, Alberto da Rocha, Oriqens e Evolucao da Leqislacao

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Bausbaum, Leoncio, Uma Vida em Seis Tempos. Sao Paulo, Alfa-
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.. ~g~~~B~alrnlSC~ay;r~i~o~e~m~s~&~o~p~a~u~l~o
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J

Chaui, Mari1ena de Souza, Da Rea1idade sem Misterios aos

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-
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•
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' N.Werneck,
Ed • C'l.Vl.'I'l. Hist6ria
- da Burauesia
-- Brasl.'l'
_el.ra Rl.'o de
J anel.ro, za9ao
. Brasileira , 1964 '
Spindel, Arnaldo, a Partido Comunista na Genese do Populismo
,Sao Paulo, S1mbolo, 1980
stein, Stanley, Origens e evoluCao da industria textil no
Brasil. 1850-1950, Rio de Janeiro, Campus, 1979 (translated
from The Brazilian cotton Manufacture, 1850-1950)
Stiel, Waldemar Correa, Hist6ria do Transporte Urbano no
Brasil, Brasilia, EBTU/PINI, 1984
Telles, Jover, a Movimento Sindical no Brasil, Rio de
Janeiro, Vitoria, 1962
Thompson, E.P., The making of the english working-class,
London, Penguin, 7th ed. 1976
Trindade, Helgio, Integralismo: 0 fascismo brasileiro na
decada de 30, Sa~Paulo, Oifel, 1974
Tronti, Mario, Ouvriers et Capital, Paris, Christian
Bourqois Ed., 1977
Troyano, Annez, Estado e Sindicalismo, Sao Paulo, Simbolo,
1978
Vianna, J. de Segadas, organizacao Sindical,Brasileira:
contendo os dispositivos da CLT e outras lel.~ referentes as
entidades sindicais, Rio de Janeiro, 0 cruzel.ro, 1943
Vianna, L.Werneck, Liberalismo e Sindicato no Brasil, Rio de
Janeiro, Paz e Terra, 1976
\~lla9a, Maria Jose, A forc a de trabalho no Brasil, Sao
Paulo, Ed.Pioneira/EDUSP, 1967
Villela Anibal Villanova e suziqan, Wilson, Politica do Rio
Governo'e Crescimento da Economia Brasileira. 1889-1945,
de Janeiro, IPEA/INPES, Monografia n.10, 1973
Weffort~ Francisco, 0 Populismo
de Jane1ro, Paz e Terra, 1978 na politica brasileira, Rio

(VII)ARTICLES AND PAMPHLETS ,

Alexander, Robert, "Labour Movement · Lat' .
Fabian International Bureau Publica~i~~s, 1~~7Amer1ca'"
Alvim,
. 1. Maria Rosilene, "Trabalho
t _..... .• ;nfant;l
• e repro d uc;ao -
SOC1a' •• 0" • r~alho das cr1an~as
y
numa fa'br;.ca com V1'1 a
operar1a 1n Machado.da Silva (ed), Condicoes de vida das
Camadas Populares, R10 de Ja~eiro, Zahar, 1984
Blay, Eva, "Dormitorios e Vilas Opeerarias: 0 trabalhador no
espac;o urbano brasileiro" in Valladares, Licia (ed)
Habitacao em Questao, Rio de Janeiro, Zahar, 1980 '
Bonduki, Nabil, ~Habitac;ao pop~lar: contribuic;ao para 0
estudo da evoluc;ao urbana de Sao Paulo" in Valladares L.
Repensando a HabitaQao no Brasil, Rio de Janeiro Zah~r '
1983 ' ,

campos, Ney Pedreira, "Antagonismo de interesses" in

Seminario de LegislaQao Social, Sao Paulo, Imprensa Oficial
do Estado de S.Paulo, 1944
Carvalho, J.Murilo, "0 Rio de Janeiro e a RepUblica" in
Revista Brasileira de Hist6ria n.8/9, 1985
CEPAL/UN, "Brazil: Productivity of the Cotton Textile
Industry", chapter II from Labour Productivity in 5 Latin
American Countries, 1951
Fausto, Boris, "Conflito social na repUblica oligarquica: a
greve de 1917" in Estudos CEBRAP n.10, Sao Paulo, 1974
Gertz Rene "operarios alemaes no Rio Grande do Sul (1920-
1937)'ou Friedrich Kniestedt tambem foi um imigrante alemao"
in Revista Br~sileira de Hist6ria n.11, Sao Paulo, 1986
Gomes, Angela M.C., "A representa?ao de classes.na _
Constituinte de 1934" in Reqiona11smo e Centra11zacao
Politica, Rio de Janeiro, Nova Fronteira, 1980
Hall, Michael, "I~igration and the et=t.rly Sao.Paulo working-
class" in Jahrbuch fur Gechichte v~n staat. W1rtschaft und
Gesellschaft Lateinamerikas, v.12, 1975
Hobsbawm, Eric, "Labor History and Ideology" in Journal of
Social History VII, 1974
ses subalternas" in Debate
Ianni, octavio, "Populismo e clas
e Critica n.1, 1973
Kleiman, Mauro, "Acabar com as f .
Provisorios - Uma InterpretaQao ~v~~~s. P~rques Proletarios
Arquitetura n.2, 1978 ra l.ca" l.n Chao, Revista de

Lopes, J. Sergio, "AnotaQoes em torno d .

vida' na literatura sobre classe oper.o.t;m~ 'condl.Qoes de
Silv~ (ed) Condicoes de Vida das cama~~l.ap l.nlMachado.da
Janel.ro, Zahar, 1984 . s opu ares, Rl.O de
.,.

Lopes, J.Sergio, "Fabric::a_e Vila Operaria: considera oes

sobre uma f,?rma de servl.dao burguesa" in Lopes, J.s.Qet alii
M~danca Soc 7al no Nordeste: a Reproducao da Subordina~ao,
Rl.O de Janel.ro, Paz e Terra , .1979
Leme, Regis e D.Karepovs, "'Maria Zelia' - um presidio
politico na epoca de Vargas" in Cadernos CEMAP n.2, Sao
Paulo, 1985
Malloy, James, "Previdencia social e classe operaria no
Brasil (uma nota de pesquisa)" in Estudos CEB~P n. 15, 1976
.
Munakata, Kazumi, "0 lugar do movimento operario" in Anais
do IV Encontro Regional de Historia de S.Paulo, Araraquara,
1978
Palmeira, Moacir, "Casa e Trabalho: nota sobre as relaQoes
sociais na plantation tradicional" in contraponto n.2, Rio
"de Janeiro.
Paoli, Maria Celia, "as trabalhadores urbanos nas falas dos
outros. Tempo, espaQo e classe na hist6ria operaria
brasileira" in Lopes, j.Sergio (ed) Cultura e Identidade
Operaria, Rio de Janeiro, Marco Zero, 1987
Rodrigues, Leoncio, "Sindicalismo e Cl.asse Operaria (1930-
1964)" in Fausto, Boris (ed) Historia Geral da Civiliza~ao
Brasileira t.III, v.3, Sao Paulo, Cifel, 1983
Rodrigues, Leoncio, "a PCB: os dirigente~ 7 ~ or~anizaQao"
in Fausto,Boris (ed) Historia Geral da Cl.Vl.ll.zacao
Brasileira t.III, v.3, Sao Paulo, Cifel, 1983
Rowland, Robert, "Classe operaria e Estado de compromisso"
in Estudos CEBRAP n.8, 1974
Sader, Eder e M.Celia Paoli,"sobre 'classes populares' no
pensamento sociologico brasileiro" in Cardoso, Ruth (ed) A
Aventura Antropo16gica, Rio de Janeiro, Paz e Terra, 1~86
., Bahia de
sampaio Consuelo Novais "Movimentos SOCl.al.S na
, ' . d If • V Encontro da
1930: condi90es de vida do operarl.a_o l.n . em Ciencias
Associacao Nacional de post-Graduacao e Pesgul.sa
Sociais, Friburgo, 1981
seyfert;:.h, Giralda, "Aspect,?s.da proletarizac;:ao do
campe~l.na~o no vale do Ita]al.: os colonos-operarios" in
Comunl.ca90es n.7 do Museu Nacl.onal, Rio de Janeiro, 1982
;-

Simao, Azis, "0 voto operario em Sao Paulo" in Anais do I

congresso Brasileiro de Sociologia, Sao Paulo, 1955
Simao, Azis, "Industrialisation et syndicalisme au Bresil"
in Sociologie dU~Travail, Paris, 1961
Sorj, Bila, "Desenvolvimento e crise de uma politica de
gestao da forc;:a de trabalho: um estudo de caso" in Revista
de Administra9ao de Empresas ~.4
Tilly, Louise, "I fatti di Maggio: the working-class of
Milan and the rebellion of 1848" in Bezucha, Robert (ed)
Modern European Social History, Massachusets, 1972
Touraine, Alain, "Industrialisation et conscience ouvriere a
Sao Paulo" in Sociologie du Travail, Paris, 1961.
vesentini, c. e E~deDecca, "A Revoluc;:ao do Vencedor" in
Contraponto n.l, Niteroi, 1976
Weffort Francisco, "Estado e Massas no Brasil" in Revista
Civiliz~9ao Brasileira n. 7, Rio de Janeiro-, 1966
Weffort, Francisco, "A conjuntura do pas-guerra" in Estudos
CEBRAP n.4, Sao Paulo, 1973
 2. BRAZIL: Total number of workers by production sectors,1920,1940,1950.
r-------------------------~,!~------~~~.~~~--~~------~----~---
'1-'
Pro due t :i 0 n sec tor s 1 9 20 I -,;f,L 1 9;:_4_0__--,--r----tl_._~~_~_~~J
r-r--_______________-+-...;:t...:;o....;t....:a:...:.:....
1 ___ --¥-_."O tot a 1 '~t 0 t a.1 '~~ I

Factory workers ,293,673 3.1 781 .. 185) 5J511,256,B07{ I

ri-n-d-u-s-t-f-i-a-l-w-o-r-k-:-r-e-p-a-i-r-I--------..+---+,~-----·.....o.-,--It-----"+I II

and ma~ntenBnce 874,574. 943,646. 1,023,200

civil construction - - 262,700
9.9
I 5B4 644
' 18.~
I
public utili ties 21,110 54,597 118,750

(I)
mineral extraction 74,650 ~
118,3791 115,661 '1
~I------------------------~-----------~--~~------------~---------'----~
~ t~ade,assets, real 497 548}' i 770,409J' 1 1 ,073,9971
~ est ate, ere d i t , 7•8 I ~2 ~l 0.4
3 transport, storing, 253,587 504,187 6'11,089j
c communication I
III : I
~ do Ttl e ~; tic maid san d 36 3 , 8 79 3.7 i 557 , 294 i 4 675 , 558 1 3. 9
:J prlvate servants I I '

governrnent,education, 6 3.1 938,905' 4JJ 1.270,736 7.4

health p we1fare,etc 354,18

-
"-

Agricul ture
SUBTOTAL
1
6 ,376,888 i66.~ 8,937,295 64A!ilOr254,245fD,1

other

TOTAL
SOurce: Paulo Singer, forr;a ge Trabalho e Emprego '10 Brasil.19?,O-196~
lBGE Census, 1920, 1940 and 1950.
 ~'

3. BRA7t .. Sf!)( com osition of factor

workers 1940 and 1950
..... --
1940
-~-~---~---~------ ~
------ -- ---- - ---------
- sec-to r:t
1950
---,.

Men (~ ) Women (% )
of production Men (%) Women (10 )
...
food and 16.7
drink 4.7 16.3
~ - 5.2
--.---
textiles 29.3 88.0 25.3 76.3
metallurgy 16.0 0.4 21.1 1.8
- .
-
chemics 9.8 2.6 i2.1 6,5
other 28.2
.... 4.3 24.3 10.2
TOTAL 100 (- 58.2) 100 (= 41, B) 100(- 71.4) 100(- 28.t
.......

Source: 1940 e 1950 lBGE Census

4. BRAZIL: \"orkers' distribution by industrial sector, 1940 and 1950

industrial
sectors 1940 (%) 1950 (9t )

food and
11.6 13.2
drink

39.9
_textiles
... _---
53.6

metallurgy 9.5 15.6

-----
cherRies 6.8 11.1

other 18.2 20.3

TOTAL ,
t
I
100.0 100.0

Source: lEGE Census, 1940 and 1950

5. BRAZIL~ ~~igrant ~rrivals 1888-1945
..
Years Total
1888 - 1890 304,054
1891 - 1900 1,129,315
-
1901 - 1910 671,351
1911 0

- ••
1920 797,744
1921 ... 1930 840,215
1931 - 194-0 288,607
191.tl - 194-5 18,432 -I
Source:IBGE Census

6. BRAZIL: Immigrant' distribution by production sectors, 1920.

agriculture 44,9
industry 24,2
tertiary 30,9

Source: lBGE Census

7.iRAZIL: Net internal migration for the principle states,1940-1950

Minas Gerais -624,578

Bahia -106,354-
Alagoas - 91,774
. , - 77,470
l'ara~ba

sergipe - 33.326
Cidade de Rio, +362,014
federal capital
,
Parana +333,53 1
Estado de Sao - +300,866
Paulo
.'
GOl-as + 88,59 8

Rio Grande do
Sul + 10,779
..... .. ... ---
d s· io Buarque de Hollanda
S ouree, Douglas Grah aJ!1 an 1 e~gurhan Gr(w.,-th and [1eVe 1:-
Filho. 1r1irrration, H~don2:.- an--. '.- .,Lau-1oT.• IpH' lO'?l.p.lOJ
-;-- -:-1 1 ~ )2 2 - 1 () '70 • s a 0 1:
rt' J-J • ,/
onment J.n BI'~Jl , .:- .;u.:;:.
~.
BRAZIL: POPULATION OF THE 7 ~~JOR CITIES IN 1940 - 1950
~.~----------T-----------------------r- __________.____ ~
cities population population growth

- Rio de Janei~o ~,764,141 2,377,4-51

(1940 - 1950)
613,)10
, Sao Paulo 1,326,261 2,198,096 871,835
Recife 384,42 /+ .524,692 176,258
Salvador 29 0 ,443 417,235 126,792
porto Alegre 272,232 394,151 121,9 19
Belo Horizonte 211,377 352.724 141,)47
.....
, Sources s Jose Francisco de Camargo, Exo.9-o_ R\!ral no ]rasil. Rio, 1960
Census I 1940 and 1950

9. BRAZIL: Papulation growth of cities due to migration and natural

population increase, 1940-1950

Capital population increase (10)

ci tie s
.
.;,
natural- internal migration total

Rio de Janeiro 9.97 24.80 34,77

,. ,
Sa a Paulo 18.06 47.68 65.74
Reci fe 12.21 38.3 50.5
Salvador 12.7 30.8 43.6
Porto Alegre 12.5 32.2 44.7
19.8 47.0 66.8
Bela Horizonte
~o. !ercentage of factory workers who earned up to 2 minimum wages
in 4 capital cities (sic Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Porto Alegre.
 H. Monthl~ expendi ture f
_- _._-- on ood, as defined
__o_d__i_t~e~m~S~~i~n~t~k~~~~.~.~--~~~~~~~b:y~_~th~~eii~d~ea~lll~e3g~Oll~~~~
O_f_n II mlnlmu~ wage law 1 _ amounts
40 and 1949 In Cr ~
(l)ontht~
-"1 - SaOPaulo
Items Qmoun
-
Monthly expendi ture (Cr11')
-meat
6 kg 1940 -
1949
18,00
milk 7,5 I i 39,00
9 0 0(J
beans 4.5 kg 21,00
.
rl.ce
5,25
3 kg 20,25
4,40
flour 1,5 kg 15,30
1,80
potato 6 kg 39,00
7,36
vegetable 9 kg 29,00
1,80
bread 6 kg 23,90
6,00
coffee 600 9 37,20
2,40
banana 7.5 dz 75,60
3,00
sugar 3 kg 20,25
3,90
lard 750 9 9,90
2,90
butter 15,30
750 9 2,17
26,25
TOTAL
103,00
371,90
(minim. wa ge:frt220,00)
(minilTLwage:Cr~3 60,00)

SourceS:Minimum_wage law, 1938

Araujo, Oscar Egydio, "Uma pesquisa de padr~o de vida".
Revista do Arguiva Municipal, Sao Paulo, 1941
Amaral, f. Pompeo, "A Alimenta9;o da popula~~o paulistana"
Revista do Arquivo Municipal, Sao Paulo,vol.XC, 1943
Rudol fe r, B. and Araujo, 0. E., 'IE statisticas dos generos de
primeira necessidade". Revista do Arg~ivo Municipal,
vol. LXII. dez. 1940
MTle - SEPT, Inguerito do Salario Minima - IV Relatorio, 1949

12. ~ocia1 inequality: some indexes (1940-1950)

Brazil 'Sao Paulo IRio de Janeiro

Life expectancy 42. 7 years 43.5 years 45.3 years

- Child mortality 158.27/1,000 154.68/1,000 146.22/1000

Adult male
mOJ:taI~ty i20 - 29 y~) 5.62/1,000 10.10/1,000
Aa it f 30-39
mo~ al~~yat2o_29 y)
y) 7.83/1,000 '
5.29/1,000 :
13.39/1,OCO
9.62/1,000
( 30- 39 y) 5,97/1,000 9.61/1,000
JB mortality 245.6/1,000
I 11 i. t era c y 5 6 • 4 ,~ ." 20.8~
"