O Movimento Nacional Por Uma Educação do Campo, das Águas e das Florestas Enquanto Intelectual Coletivo de Classe

Abstract

This doctoral thesis focuses on the National Movement for the Education of Countryside, Water, and Forest Peoples (MOVECAF). It delves into MOVECAF's role as an intellectual collective class. The theoretical foundation draws from Antonio Gramsci’s work on intellectuals and culture structure. According to Gramsci, the intellectual collective class is not embodied in an individual, but rather in a collective and leading organization. This intellectual collective class works alongside the masses, assuming an organizing and guiding function toward a new culture, which would be realized collectively, both from the perspective of class consciousness and from the perspective of consciousness of self. Based on bibliographical and documentary research, the study focuses on the historical trajectory of MOVECAF. It is from this historical trajectory that we seek to elucidate the thesis: that a new intellectual collective class emerged from the processes engendered by the struggle of this organization, which is involved in the education of countryside, water, and forest peoples (EdoCAF) across different regions and supports various causes. In addition, to contributing to the broader political struggle for workers' rights, MOVECAF challenges societal projects, providing valuable practical and theoretical insights over its 26-year existence. The main goal of this study was to analyze MOVECAF's role as an intellectual collective class based on its historical trajectory. The specific objectives included I) to contextualize the emergence of MOVECAF at the national level, highlighting key milestones, perspectives, and challenges; II) to analyze the conceptual frameworks of EdoCAF, based on the legal frameworks achieved and the collective bibliographic and documentary production of MOVECAF; and III) to understand the construction of the intellectual collective class in the pursuit of EdoCAF, based on the MOVECAF’s initiatives. Socioeconomic inequality is a landmark in the history of Brazilian society. Segregation, exclusion and racism are hallmarks of a society that has historically denied the most basic rights to significant segments of the population. The product of these inequalities is the various social movements in our history. A novelty in the Brazilian educational scene can be registered from 1998 onwards with the emergence of what was later categorized as the National Movement for Countryside Education. The struggle within the framework of this movement has outlined important achievements in Brazilian educational policy: in 1998 the achievement of the National Education Program in Agrarian Reform and in 2002 the Operational Guidelines for Basic Education in Countryside Schools. As a result of this struggle, EdoCAF is currently recognized as a teaching modality and established as national policy. These achievements would not have occurred without organization and struggle, which marked a new vision for the education of countryside, water, and forest peoples.