“I don’t have to say thank you for what is my right”1576026/... · 2021. 6. 30. · Creo en lo imposible Que de nuestras espaldas Brotaran las alas Que nos harán volar invencible

Linköping university - Department of Culture and Society (IKOS)

Master´s Thesis, 30 Credits – MA in Ethnic and Migration Studies (EMS)

ISRN: LiU-IKOS/EMS-A--21/08--SE

“I don’t have to say thank you for what is my right” – Social movement networks and public policies for

migrant women in Florianópolis, Brazil

Gabriela Martini dos Santos

Supervisor: Stefan Jonsson

Creo en lo imposible

Que la locura más cuerda

Es buscar como ser libre


Que de nuestras espaldas

Brotaran las alas

Que nos harán volar invencible


Que el ¿sin voz? Silenciara

El efecto de sus misiles


Creo que es posible

Hacer de este mundo

Un mundo sensible

Creo en nuestros sueños

Como punta de lanza

El arma perfecta para nivelar la balanza,

Creo en las acciones, las acciones cotidianas

Que te llenan de vida, te llenan de esperanza

Ana Tijoux y Juan Ayala – “Creo en ti”

2

ABSTRACT

Brazil, like other Latin American countries, has witnessed an increase in south-south migration rates

in the last decade. This scenario led to important changes in migration policies at the Federal level –

the update of the conservative Foreigner Statute from 1980 to a rights-based Migration law in 2017

is the prime example of how migration flows can contribute to the promotion of rights and strengthen

democracy in host societies. Nonetheless, migrants still face numerous difficulties in the Brazilian

territory: public servants’ unpreparedness to deal with migratory procedures and the underspending

in welfare institutions are some of the major issues hampering the migrant community in accessing

their rights. For that reason, host society organizations have been leading the process of providing

essential services such as legal counseling and labor integration, on one hand, and forming networks

to advocate for government accountability on the other. This study aims, therefore, to contribute to

the debate on the role of social movement networks in formulating and implementing public policies

for migrants by exploring the trajectory of social movement networks in the city of Florianópolis,

Brazil. Despite being one of the main destinations for newly arrived immigrants, the city has not

implemented any specific policy to support them, which has led local organizations to join together

in networks to demand answers. Stemming from Scherer-Warren’s social movement networks theory

and Braun & Clarke’s thematic analysis method, this research aims to explore the role of social

movement networks based in Florianópolis in implementing public policies for migrants, with special

attention to migrant women, who have been most affected by the absence of a proper reception policy.

In order to delve into civil society’s role and limitations in shaping reception policies for migrants,

this study will rely on secondary sources such as papers on public policies, migration, and gender, as

well as primary sources such as laws and semi-structured interviews with the main Florianopolitan

actors in the migration field. The findings indicate that, despite approving important local policies

recently, civil society organizations based in Florianópolis remain the main reference for both the

migrant community and public servants when it comes to migratory issues. The weakening of political

debate spaces poses a threat to the implementation of such policies, and the strengthening of migrants’

participation in these instances might be the turning point for it to be perceived as a priority by the

Executive branch.

Keywords: Immigration; Public Policies; Migrant women; Social movement networks; Florianópolis;

Santa Catarina; Brazil.

3

RESUMO

O Brasil, tal como outros países da América Latina, testemunhou um aumento dos fluxos migratórios

intrarregionais na última década. Este cenário influenciou importantes mudanças nas políticas

migratórias a nível federal – a atualização do Estatuto dos Estrangeiro de 1980 para uma lei de

migração baseada nos direitos humanos em 2017 é o principal exemplo de como os fluxos migratórios

podem contribuir na promoção de direitos e fortalecimento da democracia nas sociedades de acolhida.

No entanto, os migrantes seguem enfrentando numerosas dificuldades no território brasileiro: o

despreparo dos funcionários públicos para lidar com os procedimentos migratórios e o

subinvestimento em instituições de assistência social são algumas das principais questões que

dificultam o acesso da comunidade migrante aos seus direitos. Por essa razão, as organizações da

sociedade de acolhimento têm liderado o processo de prestação de serviços essenciais, tais como

aconselhamento jurídico e integração laboral, ao mesmo tempo em que formam redes para incidir

sobre políticas públicas em esferas de governo. Este estudo visa, portanto, contribuir para o debate

sobre o papel das redes de movimentos sociais na formulação e implementação de políticas públicas

para migrantes, explorando a trajetória das redes de movimentos sociais na cidade de Florianópolis.

Apesar de ser um dos principais destinos dos imigrantes recém-chegados, a cidade não implementou

nenhuma política específica para atender as demandas específicas dessa população, o que levou as

organizações locais a juntarem-se em redes para exigirem respostas das autoridades públicas. Partindo

da teoria das redes de movimento sociais de Scherer-Warren e do método de análise temática de

Braun & Clarke, esta investigação visa explorar qual é o papel das redes de movimento sociais

sediadas em Florianópolis no processo de elaboração e implementação de políticas públicas para a

população migrante, com especial atenção para as mulheres migrantes, que têm sido as mais afetadas

pela ausência de uma política de acolhimento adequada. A fim de aprofundar a análise sobre o papel

e as limitações da sociedade civil na formulação de políticas de acolhimento para migrantes, este

estudo basear-se-á em fontes secundárias, tais como estudos sobre políticas públicas, migração e

gênero, bem como fontes primárias, tais como leis e entrevistas semi-estruturadas com os principais

atores florianopolitanos no campo das migrações. As conclusões indicam que, apesar da aprovação

recente de importantes políticas locais, as organizações da sociedade civil instaladas em Florianópolis

continuam a ser a principal referência tanto para a comunidade migrante como para os funcionários

públicos quando se trata de procedimentos migratórios. O enfraquecimento dos espaços de debate

político representa uma ameaça à implementação de tais políticas, e reforçar a participação dos e das

migrantes nestas instâncias pode ser o ponto de inflexão para que estas sejam percebidas como

prioridade pelo Poder Executivo.

Palavras-chave: Imigração; Políticas Públicas; Mulheres migrantes; Redes de movimentos sociais;

Florianópolis; Santa Catarina; Brasil.

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Table of contents

ABSTRACT .................................................................................................................................... 2

Table of contents ............................................................................................................................ 4

List of abbreviations ....................................................................................................................... 5

Acknowledgements ......................................................................................................................... 6

Preface ........................................................................................................................................... 7

Introduction ................................................................................................................................... 9

Chapter One – Social Movements and Public Policies in Latin America ..................................... 14

1.1 Literature review: Social movements, civil society organizations, networks: what are we

talking about? .......................................................................................................................................14

1.2 Theory framework – Social movement networks and public policies in Brazil: a perverse

confluence? ...........................................................................................................................................18

Chapter Two – Social Movement Networks and migration in Florianópolis, Brazil .................... 27

2.1 Brazilian migratory policy over the centuries ................................................................................27

2.2 Social movement networks and public policies for migrants in Florianópolis, Brazil ............ 32

2.3 Migrant women accessing CRAI Santa Catarina ................................................................... 38

Chapter Three – Methodological framework for the analysis ...................................................... 40

Chapter Four – “Birds of passage are also women”: migrant women and advocacy for public

policies ......................................................................................................................................... 44 4.1.1 Civil society providing services to address the implementation gap............................................................44 4.1.2 Civil society’s authority in demanding policy implementation versus the weakening of participatory

democratic spaces .............................................................................................................................................49 4.1.3 The underrepresentation of migrant women in advocacy settings ..........................................................52

4.2 Findings ...........................................................................................................................................56

Concluding words ........................................................................................................................ 59

List of References ......................................................................................................................... 63

Annex 1 – Interview guide for civil society organization representatives ..................................... 69

Annex 2 – Interview guide for political advisors and public servants .......................................... 71

Annex 3 - Interview guide for activists and scholars .................................................................... 72

5

List of abbreviations

CNIg – Conselho Nacional de Imigração / National Migration Council

COMIGRAR – Conferência Nacional sobre Migrações e Refúgio / National Conference on

Migration and Refuge

CRAI – Centro de Referência de Atendimento ao Imigrante / Reference Center for Immigrants

CSOs – Civil Society Organizations

CSVM – Cátedra Sérgio Vieira de Mello / Sérgio Vieira de Mello Chair

FEPAS – Fórum Estadual Permanente de Assistência Social / Permanent State Forum of Social

Assistance of Santa Catarina state

GAIRF – Grupo de Apoio a Imigrantes e Refugiados em Florianópolis e região / Florianópolis'

Support Group for Immigrants and Refugees

GTI – Grupo de Trabalho e Apoio aos Imigrantes e Refugiados em Santa Catarina / Immigration

Working Group

IMF – International Monetary Fund

IOM – International Organization for Migration

NGOs – Non governmental organizations

PT – Partido dos Trabalhadores / Worker’s Party

SAE – Secretaria de Assuntos Estratégicos / Secretariat for Strategic Affairs

SNJ – Secretaria Nacional de Justiça / National Secretariat of Justice

UFSC – Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina / Federal University of Santa Catarina

UNHCR – United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees

USAID – United States Agency for International Development

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Acknowledgements

To be the first family member to conquer a master’s degree is indeed quite an achievement. It

wouldn’t be possible, though, if it wasn’t for the sacrifice of many women that came before me: they

were immigrants, teachers, small farmers, folk healers… no matter the instruction level, I carry their

wisdom with me and I hope this research may honor their legacy somehow. To all the ones that came

before me, muito obrigada.

I should also thank all people that were directly involved in this research. André, Bruna,

Emanuely, Isadora, Jeruse, Karine, Marcel, Merlina, and Regina, thank you for sharing your

knowledge and reflections with me. Having the participation of committed professionals and activists

like you is a privilege and I hope this thesis can be worth your effort. Thank you to Stefan, my

supervisor that guided me during these last months with so much patience, for the inspiration and

confidence provided. I also want to say thank you to my friend Allyne, who first guided me

throughout my confusing ideas when trying to frame this research last November; as well as my

friends Kelly and Henrique, for their constant disposal in hearing my insecurities while writing this;

and my friend Gabriel, my main academic reference, for the numerous theoretical recommendations

and insights. Thank you all, for making this a truly participative research.

Obrigada, tack sa mycket and grazzie mille to Lali, Julia, and Gloria, the colleagues that

became the friends this master gave me for a lifetime. The adventure of studying abroad in the cold

and dark of Sweden would not be the same without you. Gracias to Lucia, for all the (loud) laughs

and good time spend at Gripen’s balconies in sunny days and the patacones eaten in cold nights. To

Andriele, Núbia, Leonardo, Gustavo, and Thais, my deep thank you for the long Zoom calls in this

last couple of years and for being always there in the most difficult times. Thank you to my sister

Mariana, for being my fortress in these last two years. Thanks to Camilo, Sandra, Lali, and Myung

for the beautiful memories we created missing Brazil together. Muchas gracias to mis compañeros

from “Chile Despertó Nörrkoping”, which remembered me the force of Latin American solidarity in

Scandinavian lands for several times. I would also like to say thank you to Tina, my boss at Kvinna

till Kvinna, for all the interesting lessons I learned about women’s rights defense during this semester

that will follow me through my professional path and life.

Lastly, I would like to thank my friends Bruna and Will for guiding me in the process of

applying for a scholarship to study in Sweden. Without your trust and support, I would most probably

not be finishing or even have stated this research.

Thank you to the Swedish Institute, for granting the scholarship that gave me the opportunity

to study the Ethnic and Migration studies master at Linköping University, an experience for a lifetime.

7

Preface

The seeds of this research were sown years ago - in May 2015, to be more precise. During

May and June 2015, the Brazilian state of Acre, in the Northern portion of the country, transported

hundreds of Senegalese and Haitian migrants1 in buses to other Brazilian states, with no previous

coordination between authorities of the sending and receiving states and cities. Florianópolis, the

capital of the state of Santa Catarina in Southern Brazil, was one of the destinations. An emergency

humanitarian operation was set up by the Municipality's Secretariat of Social Assistance, and the

newly arrived migrants were sheltered in the Saul Oliveira Gymnasium, known as Capoeirão, a

structure that belongs to Figueirense, one of the city's soccer teams.

The precariousness was not limited to the lack of physical infrastructure, but also in human

resources. The demands were countless: first, to understand French Creole and translate it to the social

workers. Second, to give legal advice on how to get a resident permit or demand asylum, a

precondition to have a work permit, rent a house, start a new life. The Municipality’s unpreparedness

to handle this situation required additional forces: International Relations students from the Federal

University of Santa Catarina were called to collaborate as volunteers in primary needs such as

translation, and civil society organizations such as the Migrants’ Pastoral (a church-based

organization) provided other essential services like legal counseling. Thereafter, a cooperation term

between the University and the Pastoral Care was signed and International Relations and Law

students started to collaborate in protection and integration services at the Migrants’ Pastoral on a

daily basis.

I was one of these students. Being an intern in the Migrants’ Pastoral made me realize that

even though Brazilian foreign policy was based on humanitarian assistance and solidarity, migrants’

fundamental rights were violated every day: getting a document could take days or even weeks, and

this made it more difficult to find a job and livelihood. No financial assistance came from the Federal

Government or Santa Catarina state, and the small office located at Treze de Maio street unfolded

itself to provide legal counseling, Portuguese classes, referrals to the job market, and food baskets to

migrants it assisted. As time passed by, demands increased and resources were scarce. This led other

organizations to join forces with the Migrants’ Pastoral and discuss migrants’ needs in civil society

forums such as GAIRF (Portuguese acronym for Florianópolis’ Immigrants and Refugees Support

Group, free translation) and demand accountability from the State in collegiate bodies in the

1 The term "migrant" will be applied referring to people born outside Brazil and who are currently residing within the

country, regardless of their migratory status. In this category will be included, therefore, immigrants, refugees, asylum

seekers, and stateless persons. These terms will be used when the author believes it is relevant to do so to understand the

context.

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Legislative Assembly such as GTI (Portuguese acronym for Immigration Working Group, free

translation).

This network, composed of civil society organizations, universities, migrant collectives, and

social movements, has been the protagonist not only in providing emergency support, but also

advocating for rights and shaping public policies for migrants in Florianópolis and the state of Santa

Catarina. Some of the most important activities were launching the Santa Catarina State Reference

Center for Immigrants (from now on cited as CRAI) in February 2018 and the enactment of two laws

proposing local public policies for the migrant population in the city of Florianópolis and the state of

Santa Catarina in 2020. However, the approval of laws does not guarantee that services will be

provided, and social movement networks are more important than ever. This nonlinear and turbulent

relationship between state power and social movement networks will be the focus of analysis in the

following pages.

My intention here is to highlight to the reader that even though this research started to be

produced in the cold of Norrköping in February 2021, the history it narrates started in the small room

owned by the Migrants’ Pastoral in Treze de Maio street in 2015, going through CRAI’s crowded

reception and the rooms and auditoriums of Santa Catarina Legislative Assembly – places I occupied

as intern, employee, and activist in the network I intend to honor in this master thesis. My motivation

and inspiration come from Brazilian solidarity networks that are resisting the dismantling of public

policies on a daily basis and despite all adversities, still believe in a fairer future. I hope therefore the

knowledge produced in the following pages may contribute to this long, tortuous, yet inspiring and

still ongoing effort.

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Introduction

Latin America and the Caribbean region have witnessed numerous economic, environmental,

and political crises in its recent history, resulting in the increase of intra-regional migration.

According to the Global Migration Data Portal (2021), disparities between economic and labor

opportunities are one of the main factors encouraging migration within the region, and the Southern

Cone countries – Argentina, Chile and Brazil – are the chief destinations (Migration Data Portal,

2021). According to the Migration Observatory, Brazil has officially registered more than 700.000

international migrants between 2010 and 2018. Haitians, Venezuelans, and Colombians represent the

main foreign nationalities, corroborating the intra-regional migratory trends in the continent

(OBMigra, 2019). Haitian immigration became substantial from 2010 on, due to the Brazilian

presence in the United Nations Peace Mission in the country and the terrible earthquake that ravaged

the Caribbean island in that year. The scenario started to change in 2016, when Venezuelan migration

increased exponentially throughout South America, a result of the largest humanitarian crisis in its

history (R4V Platform, 2020).

The increasing prominence of Brazil as a destination country for migrants from the Southern

hemisphere can be explained by the strengthening of the country’s economic and political influence

in recent decades, besides its role as a regional reference in Latin America (Maria Bógus & Lucia

Alves Fabiano, n.d.). The rise in immigration rates influenced Brazilian migratory policy. Some of

the innovations in this field are: the granting of permanent visas to Haitian nationals through the

Resolution n. 97/2012 in January 2012, justified by humanitarian reasons (Fernandes & De Faria,

2017); the edition of the Normative Resolution n. 17 in September 2013, which conceded

humanitarian visas to Syrian nationals and facilitated its issuance through Brazilian consular

representations in Syria’s neighboring countries (Nascimento & Roberto, 2016); and finally, the new

Migration Law n. 13.445/2017, which sets rights and duties of immigrants and visitors in Brazil,

replacing the old and conservative Foreigner Statute. The new legal framework incorporates three

general principles of human rights (interdependence, universality and indivisibility) and is considered

an example to be emulated internationally (Fernandes & De Faria, 2017).

Despite the importance of a legislation that safeguards migrants’ rights, such a legal

framework is not enough to guarantee fundamental rights such as housing and food security. For

those purposes, the coordination of different institutions and support networks at the city level shows

itself extremely valuable. The report “Practice to Policy” released by the Mayfair Foundation (2012),

highlights that “whatever part of the world immigrants move to, they overwhelmingly settle in cities”

(Mayfair Foundation 2012, p.15). Even though municipalities have small power when it comes to

10

immigration policy related to the admission, status, and citizenship of migrants, they are the

destination point of their journeys. Therefore, local governments are entitled to take the necessary

steps to promote migrants’ reception and integration. According to the study, most of those measures

serve the entire population, including the improvement of essential services such as schools, hospitals,

and welfare in general.

Even though migrants who arrived in Brazil in the last decade are crucial to the country, few

Brazilian states and municipalities have established adequate reception policies for its new

inhabitants. According to Silva et al (2020), this can be explained by analyzing Brazilian colonial

past: throughout the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the country has been receptive to

white European immigrants, having received them with concrete policies such as land and livelihoods

provision. The reality currently faced by racialized migrants from the Southern hemisphere is very

different, wherein the State apparatus acts to exclude and hinder their access to public institutions and

services. The authors conceptualize it as “selective xenophobia” (Ibid).

The city of Florianópolis, the capital of Santa Catarina state in Southern Brazil, is a fine

example of this dynamic. According to data released by the Migration Observatory (2019), the city

figures as one of the main destinations for migrants, occupying the 10th position among Brazilian

municipalities that most employ asylum seekers, refugees, and immigrant workers in the formal labor

market (Obmigra, 2019). Despite the importance of migrant labor force in the state, no action plan or

specific public policy2 was taken to promote a dignified reception, leaving them in a state of extreme

vulnerability. A commonly cited example of vulnerabilization of migrants is the long and time-

consuming procedure for obtaining documentation due to the understaffing and unpreparedness of

immigration officials. The result is long waiting periods to obtain work permits and employment and

the shortage of migrants’ emergency resources in the meantime. Situations in which the lack of

financial assets forced migrant families to seek shelter in totally inadequate spaces like the city’s Bus

Terminal are not rare.

Given this panorama of marginalization endorsed by the State, multiple civil society

organizations (CSOs), social movements, universities, and church-based organizations situated in

Florianópolis have been working in networks to promote a dignified reception and to require liability

from the government. This network achieved unprecedented, albeit temporary, successes, such as the

opening of Santa Catarina State Reference Center for Immigrants (henceforth referred to as CRAI),

the second Reference Center for Immigrants in the country. CRAI was an institution with appropriate

structure and personnel to assist immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers, as well as a focal point to

2 According to Farah (2004), a public policy can be understood as a course of action led by the State, oriented towards

certain objectives, which reflects or translates a set of interests.

11

articulate different organizations responsible for attending migrants’ pressing needs such as migratory

regularization and labor integration. It operated from February 2018 to September 2019, when it had

to close because of political decisions by the current government coalition.

After the closure, migrants’ primary needs were again relegated to civil society organizations,

which concentrate efforts to meet urgent needs such as the lack of housing and legal counselling.

From 2020 on, the scenario appears even more challenging, as relief demands increased with the

continuous migration of Venezuelans escaping the humanitarian crisis and the devastating

consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic. Some of them are a rise of 33.1 percent in the

unemployment rate between May and September 2020, representing 14 percent of the population in

Brazil, of which women and youth are the most impacted (Agência Brasil, 2020). As for immigrants,

a study led by the Federal University of Minas Gerais shows an increase of almost 30 percent in the

unemployment rate of this population since the start of the pandemic (UFMG, 2020).

When considering women migrants, we note that vulnerabilities are exacerbated. According

to a report by Circles of Hospitality, a CSO based in Florianópolis and one of the main service

providers for migrants in the city, gender-based aggressions have increased because of social isolation

and lack of protection shelters for migrant women in Florianópolis. Another challenge is the access

to public services, social benefits, and formal employment, especially for women who are children

sponsors and do not have support networks to take care of their kids, a need aggravated by the closure

of daycare centers during the pandemic (Circles of Hospitality working report, 2021).

The need for sensitive public policies addressing the multiple adversities faced by migrants

has never been more urgent. Under these circumstances, two decrees were approved after a long

process of consultations and meetings between host society organizations networks, migrant

collectives, and political leaders: the Law nº 10.735, which establishes the municipal policy for the

migrant population in Florianópolis, sanctioned on July 2020; and the Law nº 18.018, which institutes

the Policy for the Migrant Population in Santa Catarina state, approved on October 2020. Although

the ratification of both legal mechanisms are important steps for the development of local policies,

its practical implementation is yet to be seen. The support network continues to be indeed a crucial

player during this process, either by providing updated information on the main demands and

challenges faced by the migrant population or by advocating for the execution of policies as it has

historically done.

Considering the above background, this research aims to contribute to the study of host society

networks in their advocacy for public policies. More specifically, the research will address the

question: What is the role of social movement networks in the formulation and implementation of

12

public policies for migrant women in the city of Florianópolis, Brazil? This question will be broken

down in three more delimited research questions that will inform the chapters of this study:

(1) What are the roots of Latin American and Brazilian social movement networks and how

did they impact public policies since the mid 1980s-1990s?

(2) In what context did the Florianópolis’ social movement networks in the migration field

rise and what role did it play to influence public policies for migrants?

(3) What are the main lessons and contributions that the Florianópolis’ social movement

network can give in fostering public policies to migrant women?

The motivation of this research comes from my fieldwork experience as an employee of the

Migrants’ Pastoral and CRAI between 2016 and 2019, and my active participation in advocacy

instances since then. Throughout all these places, the pressing need to develop responsive public

policies able to address the dire condition of being migrant and women in Brazil was constantly

vocalized. Scholars attribute the absence of public facilities to assist migrant women to the fact that

migration trends are historically perceived as headed by men. When ignoring gender perspectives in

the migration process, policymakers contribute to the non-recognition of migrant women as social

actors and subjects of rights. Therefore, the study of gender aspects in migratory flows and how they

are perceived and dealt with in host society is a pressing need (Rosaboni et al., 2018).

The research will be divided as follows. The first chapter provides a literature review on the

historical role of social movements in shaping public policies since the Brazilian democratization

process in the 1980s. The first section of this chapter provides an introductory discussion on how civil

society organizations and social movement networks relate to the political spheres during the

processes of advocating for, discussing, and implementing public policies in Brazil. The second

section will theoretically assess the role of social movement networks in policymaking, having

Brazilian scholars such as Scherer-Warren (2012); Abers et al (2018); and Tatagiba et al. (2018)

grounding such analytical effort. As a whole, Chapter One will thus answer the question: What are

the roots of Latin American and Brazilian social movement networks and how did they impact public

policies since the mid 1980s-1990s?

Chapter Two investigates the context within which the social movement networks dealing

with migration were formed in Florianópolis, as well as their trajectory in advocating for public

policies. Because this research aims to be an interdisciplinary study, theories and research on social

movements, public policies, migration and gender studies, will be utilized to support the findings in

this chapter. These will be combined with analysis of primary sources, such as municipal and state

laws, official records on migration at federal (Brazil), state (Santa Catarina) and municipal

(Florianópolis) levels, in addition to statements given in online lectures on the matter. By the end of

13

this chapter I expect to be able to answer the second research question: in what context did the

Florianópolis’ social movement networks in the migration field rise and what role did it play to

influence public policies for migrants?

While Chapter One and Two offer background and context, my main analysis, building on

these two, targets the concrete work for migrants’ rights made by the social movement networks in

Florianópolis. Chapter Three will first present the methodological choices that inform this analysis. I

here first introduce Creswell’s (2012) arguments for the case study, which has inspired my own

approach. I then go on to present my methodological tools, with especial focus on the semi-structured

interview, which is the foundation of this research. For now, it should be emphasized that my choice

of interviewees was based on their active participation in the network I studied. They are humanitarian

workers from civil society organizations, political advisors who worked on legal drafts, and scholars

and activists constantly engaged in advocacy settings. The relationship of trust between the

participants and the researcher, which was established during fieldwork, was also taken into account

to guarantee that ethical standards are met.

Chapter Four consists of the main analysis of these interviews, and it also expands the

discussion by crossing the interviewees’ testimonies with theoretical material introduced in Chapters

One and Two so as to provide an analysis of the research questions. At the end of this chapter, I am

in a position to answer the final one of my research question: What are the main lessons and

contributions that the Florianópolis’ social movement network can give in fostering public policies

to migrant women? The conclusion will comment on the findings and provide final reflections.

14

Chapter One – Social Movements and Public Policies in Latin America

This chapter aims to present a theoretical review and a conceptualization of social movements

networks, civil society organizations, and public policies within the Latin American context. To

comprehend the particularities of these terms in Latin America and Brazil, a historical and theoretical

review will be taken, divided in two subsections. The first one will explore the origins and

characteristics of Brazilian social movements, their influence in the drafting of the 1988 Constitution

and the mechanisms created to enable their participation in policymaking. The second subsection

will comprise a theoretical review on social movements networks’ influence on the formulation and

implementation of public policies. In doing so, it is expected to answer the general aim of this

research: “What are the roots of Latin American and Brazilian social movement networks and how

did they impact public policies since the mid 1980s-1990s?”.

1.1 Literature review: Social movements, civil society organizations, networks: what are we talking

about?

When studying the complexities of social movements in Latin America – particularly in Brazil

– it is important to recall the colonial past rooted in the servitude of indigenous and enslaved people

that most countries went through. In Brazil, this period of history was characterized by a national

state controlled by conservative political oligarchies that left no room for representation of the lower

strata of society. Most of the former Latin American colonies – including Brazil – have gone through

a process where they first became monarchies and then republics under the influence of the North

American model. Nonetheless, this transition was not smooth, and it was marked by authoritarian

periods in which social movements and civil society struggled to not only reappropriate the State but

also to regulate rules that guarantee citizenship for all. Until the 1930s, the political regimes were

regulated through alliances between different rural oligarchies supported by the traditional catholic

clergy. The result was the development of a political clientelism in which local politics was sustained

by elite’s exchange of favors and protection (Gohn, 2014).

Along these lines, Eckstein (2001) points out that the dependence on foreign trade,

technology and capital, and the bureaucratic centralist tradition of Latin American countries have

deeply impacted the modus operandi of social movements. Economically, the region has produced a

proletariat as a result of its late industrialization in the 1930s. Politically, its democracy can be

considered young and unstable, given the constant shifts between authoritarian and democratic rules

observed in the region (Eckstein, 2001). In that regard, Scherer-Warren (2008) argues that Latin

American emancipatory struggles cannot be disassociated from the highly exclusionary social

15

systems imposed by colonial rule, whose traces are perceptible to the present days. Those resulted in

deep social inequalities and discriminatory practices in relation to a considerable portion of its

inhabitants, as well as historically oligarchic and authoritarian states (Scherer-Warren, 2008). Alvarez

et al (1998) add that one of the outcomes of colonialism in Latin America is an oligarchic conception

of politics known as “latifundio”, in which personal, social, and political power overlays.

Consequently, the least favored layers of society see politics as a “private business of the elite''. The

after-effect is a political culture that ensures both political and social exclusion for most of the

population, hampering collective mobilization (Alvarez et al, 1998).

Latin American social movements emerged in the direction of confronting the authoritarian

culture through the resignification of concepts such as rights, public and private spaces, and equality.

The multiple forms of resignifying those notions contributed to redefine what counts as political and

therefore finding new strategies for change. Brazilian scholars (Gohn 2014; Fernandes 1999) point

out that this process was grounded in the 1960s and 1970s, in which most countries in South America

had gone through coup d’états3 while countries in Central America were violently divided by Cold

War confrontations. During this historical period, all mechanisms of communication between civil

spheres and political representatives were obstructed: political parties were extinct, and independent

media and unions criminalized. Given the impossibility to organize at a national level, the focus was

channelled towards the local level, the “base” of the social pyramid (Fernandes, 1999).

The Catholic Church played a major role in this regard. Once seen as a fortress of

conservatism against popular activism, this perception started to change after the Second Vatican

Council (1962-65) and its 1968 meeting in Medellín, Colombia. From then on, innovations were

stirred in the Church’s structure to emphasize lay participation towards justice promotion and the

denunciation of injustice, as well as closer evangelization among popular classes under the umbrella

of Liberation Theology4. In order to make this connection with communities possible, groups in

which poor people play a major role in the decision-making process were established. These are called

base communities or CEBs5. As dictatorships criminalized most standard political channels, CEBs

were one of the very few vehicles for popular organization, giving rise to a new pattern of grassroots

organization in the region (Levine; Mainwaring, 1989).

3 Those were Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Peru, and Bolivia. 4 Liberation Theology is a catholic philosophy that links evangelization to social practice. Born in Latin America in the

1960s, it argues that the people must build their own history, and not wait for divine intervention. Strongly grounded in

Marxist theory, Liberation Theology gained room in a period when most Latin American countries had high levels of

industrial growth but no income distribution policies, generating a large proletariat in the big cities. The “new social

movements” that came after democracy, such as the Landless Movement, the new parties, such as the Workers' Party, and

the new unionism, with the Central Única dos Trabalhadores (CUT), had, in their genesis, a strong presence of liberation

Christianity (Menezes Neto, 2007). 5 Abbreviation from the Portuguese words comunidades eclesiais de base.

16

Fernandes (1999, p. 43) points out that it was such actions on the local level – given the

impossibility of accessing mechanisms of vertical integration such as big unions and political parties

– that influenced the emergence of a new phenomenon in the region throughout the 1970s, coined as

“social movements”. In Latin America, the word “movement” referred to its unstable and mutating

nature, differing from the long-term centered structures represented by unions, for example. The

concept “social” aimed to mark its distance from the dictatorial State apparatuses. The agenda of

Latin American social movements back then included a range of issues, such as findings solutions

for problems that appeared in the neighborhood, such as lack of water, sewage system, energy,

territory occupations, and multiple others. Rather than having a centralist decision-making

mechanism, local autonomy was the standard. The author attributes the success of these initiatives

precisely to the fact that they were small and local, so they were not seen as a threat to the regime in

place (Fernandes, 1999).

This multiplicity of actors and viewpoints from political actors at the local level played an

essential role on the Brazilian democratization process in the 1980s. When the dictatorship ended and

constituent assemblies were convened, they were presented as interest groups in the construction of

new mechanisms for popular participation. Here, we need to emphasize the massive participation of

women in the agenda setting, given their substantial presence in the urban social movements that

struggled for democratization and for women’s access in public services. Farah (2004, p. 50) cites

Souza-Lobo by stating that “frequently, analysis ignores that the main actors in popular movements

were indeed actresses” (Souza-Lobo, 1991, p.247). These women were key-players in the struggle

for recognition of rights such as daycare, women’s health and sexuality and fighting against gender-

based violence in the new Constitution norms as well as mechanisms to ensure popular participation

in public policies (Farah, 2004), as the Councils of Right6 and the Participative Budgets7. According

to Fragoso & Enríquez (2016), Participative Budgets were crucial to setting gender-sensitive budgets

in the cities’ planning8.

In the early 1990s, efforts to conceptualize the city as a whole through citizens’ participation

was reinforced by the strengthening of sectorial councils in areas such as education, health, and

housing. The idea was to decentralize the administration of specific public policies through the

6 These are permanent instances composed by State representatives, service providers, and community leaders that act in

the elaboration of strategies as well as in the monitoring of public policies implementation in different levels of

government (Avritzer, 2012). 7 Participatory budgets were mechanisms created to consolidate popular demands into the city planning through debates

and the monitoring of public expenditure. To learn more about its structure and history, see Baierle (2003). 8 An interesting example to cite is the city of Recife, which has established participatory budgeting with a gender

perspective since 2001. In 2010, it created a Women’s Secretariat and in the following year, its budget was substantially

expanded to address women’s demands (Fragoso & Enríquez, 2016).

17

election of council members in the local level. The shift in political participation is therefore

noticeable: while in the beginning of the 1980s civil society was worried with the democratization of

politics, in the 1990s the focus was directed to establish a wider engagement of the population in

different sectorial policies. This process resulted in the raising of two clusters of civil society

organizations: a group of specialized associations strongly linked to the State in the implementation

of public policies, a tradition heightened amongst leftist parties from the democratization period; and

a remaining portion of movements linked to CEBs whose focus is still connected to self-help groups

and the organization of poor people from the periphery to demand public goods. While the first one

relies on the election of progressist leftist parties to gain scope of action, the latter is more stable and

relies on volunteer work from people involved in the grassroot movements (Avritzer, 2012).

Within this line of though, Burity (2008) highlights that from the 1990s on, the approach of

civil society organizations towards the state has been one of collaboration rather than combat

(although combative social movements have never stopped being active). The proximity of

governments and civil society became stronger with the establishment of public-private partnerships

settled through networks, councils and forums, which are important instances of articulation fortified

by democratic institutions. The author calls attention to the fact that this rapprochement advanced

new social themes and agendas to public policies, including those tied to culture and identity. The

democratic rule opened a window to think about cultural politics towards the plurality of people living

within the country, reshaping old concepts of citizenship.

Burity (2008) points out that it was through civil society organization forums that the so called

“new social movements” – women, black, indigenous, environmentalist movements – were shaped

or amplified in visibility in the public discourse. To the extent that these organizations intensified

their relations with governments, it did not take long until their agenda began to resonate in social

policies in health, educational, and social assistance sectors. From the 2000s on, such organizations

were no longer “at the service of the popular movement” but had their own agenda settings. It is

important to remember, however, that many of them maintained ties with local communities, in an

idea of social representativity that gave them authority before public actors. This was only possible

due to the work of grassroot movements that expanded the concept of society to other places than

those of economics and politics. New spaces emerged from their representations of realities, forms

of knowledge, and social practices that were not regulated by the State: “the invention or the discovery

of everyday life; the idea of a civil society beyond the State; the idea of the personal as political”

(Burity 2008, p. 121, my emphasis). As Scherer-Warren (2012) states, this historical period witnessed

a transition in the political discourse of grassroots organizations in order to valorize the crucial

political role of “social movement networks”, a term that found increasing use in a wide variety of

18

contexts. The next section will provide therefore a theory review on some interpretations of social

movement networks and their relationship with public policies.

1.2 Theory framework – Social movement networks and public policies in Brazil: a perverse

confluence?

The Brazilian political scientist Euzeneia Carlos (2011) points out that the social movements

network approach offers a substantial contribution to social movements theory, once it takes into

account the multiple layers that cut across collective action. According to the author, we can divide

those theories into three main streams: resource mobilization theory, political process theory, and

new social movements theory. Each of them developed its own structure of analysis – while the first

ones rely on the actors’ rationality in terms of the costs and benefits of collective action (North

America school), the third one focuses its analytical efforts on how cultural and symbolic ties among

individuals in a network create bonds of solidarity in order to build new identities and habits

(European school). Although each school has its own analytical relevance, they lack a more

comprehensive view that takes into consideration both the internal nexuses of collective action and

the participation of social movement activists in the political-institutional arena (Ibid).

It therefore makes sense to speak of a fourth theory stream that will ground this research,

named social movement networks theory9. This choice was based on the possibility that networks

theory provides in analyzing the various layers of movement action, which comprise distinct levels

of formalization and interaction models in a dynamic structure (Carlos, 2011). Ilse Scherer-Warren

(2012) argues that social movement networks are powerful tools in the construction of emancipatory

utopias in culture and politics. The author draws on Ernesto Laclau’s (2011) thoughts on the

constitutive mechanisms of emancipatory social processes to interpret the emergence of social

movement networks in Brazil. Laclau (2011) argues that when distinct groups construct a common

discourse contesting or confronting the prevailing dominant system, they establish a relationship of

equivalence, which allows the union of different struggles around a common systemic opponent. The

author stresses that when a set of unmet or unanswered demands in the institutional system are

connected to each other through a joint speech, they may come to establish a chain of equivalences,

which, in turn, may "unify the popular field" (Laclau 2011, p. 92 APUD Scherer-Warren 2012, p.

219). This affinity will contribute to articulate collectives around some broader emancipatory

proposal, which the author conceptually calls populist reason (Laclau 2011, APUD Scherer-Warren

2012, my emphasis). Scherer-Warren (2012) adds:

9 Emirbayer (1997, p. 298) was the first one to conceptualize it by arguing that social-network analysis emerges as “a

paradigm for the study of how resources, goods, and even positions flow through particular figurations of social ties”.

19

In turn, collective groups of activists who experience various types of exclusion and/or subalternity (of

gender, ethnic, economic or other stances), by building an emancipatory discourse articulated around a

common challenge to a social regime considered oppressive and/or exclusionary to the whole of their identities, may come to form a network of social movements (Scherer-Warren 2012, p. 204, free

translation).

In this way, when a collective is formed and links itself with other movements and institutional

actors, the groups’ political demands expand to far beyond their respective local communities

(Alvarez et al, 1998). Alvarez et al (1998) sheds light on the fact that social movement networks have

the potential to expand their claims through political-communicative webs reaching into parliaments,

the academy, the Church, the media, and so on. Hence, these organizations are not only responsible

for grassroots organizations foundation but also engage in the production of knowledge and know-

how that can be eventually incorporated by the State (Alvarez et al, 1998).

According to Scherer-Warren (2012), an emblematic example of this process is the Brazilian

grassroots movement (movimento popular) whose equivalence chain is constituted around the idea

of constructing a new national project that includes changes in the political economy and promotes

inclusive public policies, recognizing rights alongside the ethnic, cultural, and gender diversities

within the country. She grounds this example in her empirical research involving 13 civil-society

forums and networks in the country (Scherer-Warren, 2012), in which she investigated the impact of

these networks' discursive formations on public policy. The research shows that once social

movement networks find a collective chain that is tight through the common exclusions its members

face, these movements work together aiming to develop dialogues around the multiple forms of

contestations regarding their own particularities and singularities. By doing this, they actively reread

the broader historical-structural exclusionary processes that lead to the current scenario of injustices.

The final objective of social movements networks collective discourse is therefore a rights-based

advocacy on public policies that can contribute to the reshaping of the nation (Scherer-Warren, 2012)

This change can only occur when individuals exercise their full citizenship potential. For this

reason, civil society forums and interorganizational networks have been working so that institutional

participation can contribute to the construction of subjects of right, enabling people to be players in

public policies elaboration and implementation, owning their own lives. What is demanded is capacity

building through the partnership between civil society and the State, through the development of new

forms of institutionality that encourage the empowerment of historically excluded subjects,

guaranteeing full rights. It does not mean, however, that civil society will be coopted by the State, as

the author states:

The growing use of networking among civil society actors and some of the partnerships with State

entities has served not only as institutional support for democratizing practices attuned to a pluralist perspective, but also as instrument for a certain exercise of social control over State action that

20

sometimes manages to reorient it or demand accountability (Scherer-Warren 2012 p. 231, free

translation).

In sum, we can draw two conclusions at this stage. On the one hand, networks demand more

participation and institutionalization of channels that enable social movements and civil society to

participate in the formulation and monitoring of public policies. On the other hand, collectives work

on the political education of the so called excluded individuals in order to make them “empowered”

to claim their rights on political platforms through base communities and grassroots organizations

(Scherer-Warren, 2012). Della Porta and Diani (2006) jibe with Scherer-Warren (2012) by stating

that social movements are hardly the sole actors to promote social change. Therefore, the success of

social movement outcomes or the failure to obtain them are closely connected to the political

opportunities and the availability of actors they can bond with to change unfair policies (Della Porta;

Diani, 2006).

At this point, it is important to emphasize that social movements do not relate with an “abstract

and external” political context, but they comprise interdependent relationships involving various

actors and institutions with which they routinely interact. Abers, Silva, and Tatagiba (2018) point out

that social movements and public policies are constituted mutually, in a sense that “social movements

matter to public policy and that public policy, in turn, impacts the emergence, development, and

success of movements” (Abers et al. 2018, p.16). Therefore, the opportunities and constraints

encountered by social movements working towards public policies are framed by simultaneous and

reciprocal agencying of diverse actors, networks, and institutions, including movements themselves.

The authors explain that in the Brazilian case, there are two settings that condition the ways social

movements access and develop public policies: regimes and subsystems (Abers et al., 2018).

Abers et al. (2018) define regimes as the product of relationships established between

politically relevant actors in society and the state, which in turn shape institutional arrangements,

rules, and ideas according to their political project. The position that each actor occupies in the regime

sets the opportunities or obstructions to the acknowledgement, access, and influence of players

involved in the public policy making process, including social movements. The chances those have

in advancing their agenda rely therefore on the regime set in place and the relationship movement

actors have with ruling coalitions who lead the regime. Subsystems, in turn, are defined as more or

less cohesive groups composed of a limited number of actors and institutions that specialize and direct

their efforts in specific sectors of a policy. Subsystem members’ can be representatives of enterprises,

interest groups, executive bodies and legislative committees, grassroot movement leaders, experts,

and scholars that aim to shape a given policy. The dynamic of subsystems is partially independent

21

from the ruling regime, once the political communities that interact in it debate propositions and

pursue agendas despite whatever interest the government coalition express (Abers et al., 2018).

While the ability to act and allocate public resources over a certain policy tends to be the

competency of regime actors, defining the technical competencies over the policy, and which actors

portray that competence, are the subsystem actors’ role. Therefore, it can be argued that social

movement networks do not interact with regimes and with subsystems, but within the regime and

within the subsystem in different ways. The authors conclude that it is crucial to identify the relational

structures of both regimes and subsystems to be able to analyze to which extent social movements

networks and other actors will be able to regulate the formulation and implementation of specific

public policies (Abers et al., 2018). What distinguishes social movements from the other actors is the

fact that they give ordinary people the opportunity to have their voices heard in decision-making

circuits, as it was explored in the previous subsection. By bringing to the agenda perspectives never

before considered by decision makers, social movements trigger confrontations within the

bureaucracy of political arenas (Tatagiba et al., 2018).

Confrontations in institutional arenas are frequent once social movements generally propose

alternative models of public policies, competing with other models. Here, the word “alternative”

relates to the fact that public policies designed by social movements take into consideration the needs

and perspectives of historically excluded portions of society, thus deviating from mainstream

approaches to policy making. The authors argue that one strategy adopted by social movements to

put forward their agenda entails the creation of defense coalitions and formulation of innovative

structures within the political bureaucracy. Therefore, movements’ actions are not limited to the use

of opportunities institutionally provided by subsystems, but they also propose institutional

innovations that favour their interests, thereby contributing to the reformation of State structures. The

existence of a Ministry of Environment and a National Secretariat of Solidarity Economy in Brazil

are some illustrations of this. Those could only be possible due to the complex relationship between

actors traditionally enrolled in institutional politics (parties, elected politicians, civil servants that

were previously members of social movements) and actors from multiple social movements that

struggled together to build institutional spaces that are appropriate to their causes. (Tatagiba et al.,

2018).

Even though these coalitions traditionally rely on the election of progressive parties to be able

to put their agenda forward, when the relationship between social movements and public bureaucracy

is strong, the actors committed to the causes may continue to dispute spaces within the government,

avoiding setbacks. Participatory instances, such as working groups between social movements and

technicians from the bureaucracy, play a major role in this process (Tatagiba et al., 2018). In this

22

regard, Schumaker (1975) summarizes five levels of receptiveness to collective demands that can be

identified within the political bureaucracy:

The notion of “access responsiveness” indicates the extent to which authorities are willing to hear the concerns of such a group . . . If the demand . . . is made into an issue and placed on the agenda of the

political system, there has occurred a second type of responsiveness which can here be labeled “agenda

responsiveness”... As the proposal . . . is passed into law, a third type of responsiveness is attained; the notion of “policy responsiveness” indicates the degree to which those in the political system adopt

legislation or policy congruent with the manifest demands of protest groups . . . If measures are taken to

ensure that the legislation is fully enforced, then a fourth type of responsiveness is attained: “output

responsiveness” ... Only if the underlying grievance is alleviated would a fifth type of responsiveness be attained: “impact responsiveness (Schumaker, 1975 p. 494–5).

At this point it is important to highlight that although change in legislation is an important

step, it cannot be detached from the analysis of the actual political agenda, its outputs, policy impact,

and structural change. Thus, once a public policy is approved, movements find that they need to

sustain support for the policy among those who are responsible for its implementation, and they also

need to devise strategies to gain public opinion alliances and change the values of political elites

(Della Porta; Diani, 2006). Following this rationale, Tatagiba et al (2018) point out that the

formulation and implementation phases of policymaking are strongly connected, particularly in the

case of alternative public policies. This is so because the design of such policies is generally

influenced by civil society organizations’ previous experiences. As stated above, these organizations

have a track record in leading policies at the local level. When accessing institutional arenas of

policymaking, they bring their expertise to public policies’ formulation. Teixeira et al (2016),

conceptualizes such policies as “associative programs”, that can be defined as:

a) The formal recognition of civil society organizations as agents of policy implementation with a function of mediating the population’s access to certain citizenship rights; b) the valorization of the

policy implementation process as a time that manages public goods and the collectivities associated with

it; c) and the incorporation of a "way of doing" of social organizations that challenges the interests and

knowledge established and crystallized in the traditional paths of policy production (Teixeira et al 2016, p. 3, free translation).

The discussion on associative programs became relevant in the early 2000s, with the rise of

the Workers' Party (free translation from Partido dos Trabalhadores – PT) in 2003, once the party

was able to relay the experience of activists from its base to the state bureaucracy. The recognition of

civil society and social movement actors as policy implementers brought new directions to public

policies: bottom-up processes were spread, giving space to the action of individuals "down there",

impacting the very conception of policies. Associative programs thus rely on the intense

experimentations and practical solutions that social movements created after perceiving problems at

the local level. Civil society organizations became essential partners not only in the formulations but

also in the implementation cycle of public policies. By mediating the delivery of state programs to

23

the community, these organizations fortify collective actions and collectivities at the local level,

building engaged citizens. Because they perceive its beneficiaries as subjects of rights, alternative

policies seek not only to hand over goods and services but to build a new notion of citizenship.

Therefore, the “success” of such programs is not limited to the supply of services but to the conception

of policies that overcome the previous condescending attitude of the state toward its citizens,

especially the poorer ones (Teixeira et al, 2016).

The Cisterns Program (free translation from Programa Cisternas) illustrates this dynamic.

Created in 2003 to enable low-income rural populations from water-scarce regions to access water,

the Federal government created a specific budget action for the construction of masonry reservoirs

for rain catchment and storage. These resources were then decentralized to the local level through

agreements between municipalities and civil society associations from the neighborhoods. The

selected institutions are contracted and receive the resources to start the effective implementation of

the technologies. The innovation of this program relies in the fact that the selected associations

mobilize the beneficiary communities during the whole implementation process: the families that will

receive the masonry reservoirs are hired to build it; they learn how to handle the technology in the

long run and are encouraged to participate in the meetings of the local associations that discuss the

water supply management in the municipality, in order to keep monitoring the execution of the

program. The result is not only the provision of technologies, but the communities’ engagement,

building a new perspective of collective citizenship (Santana; Arsky, 2016).

Therefore, associative programs enabled civil society organizations to not only point out

problems, but also present solutions. By framing the problem as "living with the semi-arid" and not

"fighting the drought", civil society was able to present the construction of cisterns for rainwater

storage as one of the promising ways of living with drought. Such proposals were possible due to the

fact that the movements took advantage of the rise of the Workers' Party to propose new ways of

doing politics. All these proposals were in line with the debates that PT had already been developing

in its government programs together with the popular sectors mobilized around the party. Stimulated

by successful experimentation at the local level, those actors sought institutional formats to access

public resources enabling the execution of alternative policies. The bet was that this interactive

dynamic in implementation could gain scale, be replicated, and be preserved over time (Teixeira et

al, 2016).

The legitimacy of civil society in the management of public policies has raised several

concerns and discussions, ranging from bureaucratic issues to the switch of roles with the state. The

Brazilian scholar Evelina Dagnino (2004) has argued that the democratization process that provided

the institutional channels for civil society participation in public policies coincided with the rise of

24

neoliberal economic arrangements in Latin America, and there has at times been a perverse

confluence between these two projects. While the former aims to explore State bureaucracy and

resources to boost civil society participation in public policies, the later advocates a minimalist

conception of the state that progressively exempts governments from their role as a guarantor of

rights, transferring its responsibilities to civil society (Dagnino, 2004, my emphasis). Designed as

reforms programs imposed on Latin countries by the Washington Consensus10 model in the 1980s,

the neoliberal project has gained strength since the impeachment of President Roussef in 2016 and

the election of Jair Bolsonaro in 2018 (Sefair; Cutrim, 2019).

Dagnino (2004) states that the perversity relies in the fact that both projects require a

proactive civil society. The relationship between specialized civil society or non-governmental

organizations (NGOs) and the State apparatus constitute a fruitful field for the perverse confluence

of the opposing projects:

Endowed with technical competence and social insertion, "reliable" interlocutors among the various

possible interlocutors in civil society, they [NGOs] are often seen as the ideal partners by sectors of the State committed to transferring their responsibilities to civil society. An eventual refusal of this role

(Galgani and Said, 2002) is dramatized when it is confronted with the concrete possibility of producing

positive results - fragmented, punctual, provisional, temporary, limited, but positive results - regarding

the reduction of inequality and the improvement of the living conditions of the affected social sectors (Dagnino 2004, p. 101, free translation).

In this context, the concept of “efficiency” towards results works in permanent tension with

the democratization of decision processes and access to services (Farah, 2004). Dagnino (2004) points

out that the shifting of State responsibilities to civil society organizations goes hand in hand with the

process of giving new meanings to the participation concept, with the rise of the so called “solidary

participation” emphasizing volunteer work and “social responsibility”. While alternative policies

have the collective participation of community individuals as their founding principle, the neoliberal

project adopts the notion of a private and individualistic approach that strips away the political and

collective meaning of social participation, limiting it to the moral principle of the "good citizen." In

a context where the State is progressively exempting itself from its role as a guarantor of rights,

private initiatives based on solidarity are offered as a substitute instance for citizenship:

The main resource of this form of management, the appeal to solidarity is restricted to the moral

responsibility of society, blocking its political dimension and dismantling the references to public

responsibility and the public good, precariously and painfully constructed since the 1980s […] As in the sectors of the State occupied by neoliberal forces, this discourse of citizenship is marked by the total

10 The Washington Consensus was a series of fiscal reforms adopted by Latin American countries to overcome the

economic crisis of the 1980s. These were drawn up by the U.S. government, international financial bodies and Latin

American governments. The technical measures taken aimed to ensure fiscal discipline and promote broad trade and

financial liberalization through the privatization of public companies, reduction of state spending, flexibilization of labor

legislation, and trade liberalization (Castro, 2011).

25

absence of any reference to universal rights or to the political debate about the root causes of poverty

and inequality. (Dagnino 2004, p. 106-107, free translation).

This discourse is most clearly evident in sectors that formulate social policies regarding

poverty and inequality. With the expansion of neoliberalism and the reduction of the State's role,

social policies become increasingly restricted to emergency efforts directed at certain social sectors

whose survival is jeopardized. The beneficiaries of such policies are not seen as citizens of right, but

as “deprived human beings” needing charity, whether public or private. When confronted with this

approach, reinforced by the scarcity of public resources for these policies and the gravity and urgency

of the situation of their target groups, civil society organizations frequently surrender to this

proposition. Thus, the shrinking of the State's social responsibilities finds its counterpart in the

shrinking space for politics and democracy. Both must be limited to the bare minimum in order to

exclude the subjects, themes and processes that can threaten the advance of the neoliberal project

(Dagnino, 2004). Miraftab (2004) resonates with Dagnino (2004) by stating that neoliberal policies

promoted by big funding agencies depoliticize grassroots participatory discourses, eroding

impoverished populations to access the most essential services – especially women. (Miraftab, 2004).

This can furthermore relate to what feminist economists such as Grown & Seguino (2006)

have argued, namely that women are eminently affected by structural adjustments programs promoted

by neoliberal agencies such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), major

players in Latin America during the 1980s.This happens because the pressure on ‘developing’

economies to eliminate budget deficits directly impacts the state’s capacity to provide social services.

Cuts in the education, health, and housing sectors make women, especially solo mothers and

breadwinners, act as the economic ‘shock absorbers’: besides being in charge of the family’s

livelihoods, they also perform duties such as full-time care of children, once governments do not

provide services such as daycare anymore (Grown & Seguino, 2006)

By way of conclusion, it can be stated that social movement networks have played a major

role in the reshaping of public policies in Brazil since the democratization process. By bringing local

perspectives to political forums discussing public policies, movements have contributed to a

particular way of doing policies that, going far beyond the delivery of services, has also provided new

(and collective) meanings to citizenship. Nevertheless, one cannot ignore that in times of rising

neoliberalism, partnerships with civil society organizations in the implementation of public policies

can contribute to the resignation of the state’s role as provider of rights. Social movement networks

might have to step back and advocate for accountability in order to safeguard basic rights, especially

if their target audience are minority groups such as migrants. One example of this dynamic will be

26

better explored in the following chapters, portraying the case of social movement networks’

advocating for public policies for the migrant population in the city of Florianópolis, Brazil.

27

Chapter Two – Social Movement Networks and migration in Florianópolis, Brazil

This chapter aims to present the circumstances that led to the rise of the social movement

network to support the migrant cause in the city of Florianópolis, addressing question number one of

this research: “In what context did the Florianópolis’ social movement network rise and what role did

it play to influence public policies for migrants?”. To do so, the chapter will be divided into three

subsections: the first will provide a resumed presentation of Brazilian migratory policy over the

centuries to depict how such policies are designed to attract a specific immigrant profile while

rejecting its opposite. Despite being brief, this analysis is relevant to understand the factors

influencing the formulation of public policies in the migration field and the importance of social

movements to forward it. The second subsection will display the public policies implemented in Santa

Catarina and the role of social movement networks as well as the context set in place at the time of

its implementation. Finally, the third subsection will present the main challenges faced by the

network when it comes to fulfilling migrant women's rights.

2.1 Brazilian migratory policy over the centuries

The use of migration policies bound to the attraction of a specific profile is a strategy

employed since the colonial rule. According to Carneiro (2018), the official programs aiming to

attract European workforce to occupy unpopulated territories in the states of Santa Catarina, Rio de

Janeiro, Espírito Santo, and São Paulo started in the 18th century, part of a migration policy of colonial

settlement. The first decree related to the topic was the Provisão de 9 de Agosto de 1747, which

“disposed about the conduction and settlement of Azorean couples to those determined regions.”

(Carneiro 2018, p. 65, free translation) The period coincided with the establishment of the captaincy

of Santa Catarina in 1738 to where most part of the families was settled. In August 1746, D. João V

(the head of state at the time) approved a budget to sponsor the transportation of six thousand people

from the islands of Açores and Madeira to Santa Catarina’s coast (Carneiro, 2018).

This strategy was maintained during the First Republic (1889-1930), in which migration

policies based on eugenic principles11 were supported by the white and European elites ruling the

country. In this regard, Seyferth (2011) affirms:

11 Besides restricting the entering of racialized immigrants, the policy prevented the entry of people with physical and

mental illnesses, the physically handicapped, people over 60, and any immigrant who might “indulge in prostitution”.

The policy’s sexist nature can be perceived through measures such as a presidential decree enacted in 1892, authorizing

the repatriation of widows and orphans of male immigrants who died in Brazil. According to Carneiro (2018),

unaccompanied women and children were rejected by government programs from the beginning of the settlement policies.

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The enactment of the Land Law (Law nº 601, of 1850), (promulgated in the same year in which the

African traffic ended), consolidated the colonization system based on small property, changing the

concession of lots that became by contract [...] a form of employing European workers in the coffee farms, white ones, considered more efficient and racially superior to blacks and mestizos (Seyferth 2011,

p. 200-2001, free translation).

Silva (2020) explains that such policies not only maintained the idea of racial supremacy but

also granted numerous privileges to white immigrants. Those included the payment of transportation

expenses for the entire family, the construction of temporary housing to accommodate workers until

they permanently settle, and the provision of land for farming. The author adds that nowadays, this

whitening policy is considered a “success story”, as the states in Southern Brazil present higher

development indexes than the national average. The exclusionary model that disregarded the

contribution of former enslaved Africans and indigenous populations already living in the land is

rarely questioned: “As a matter of fact, in Santa Catarina, for example, there is an abundance of proud

propaganda about its ‘European identity’, while the contribution of blacks and indigenous people in

the construction and enrichment of this state remains erased” (Silva 2020, p. 31, free translation).

The granting of benefits to European settlers became questionable when anarchist and

socialist ideas were spread by European immigrants in the in the mid-19th century. From then on,

immigrant-attraction policies were no longer seen as a need for shaping the nation but perceived with

reservations. The eminent threat that certain immigrant profiles would pose to emerging state

institutions resulted in restrictive migration rules in Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Peru, and

Ecuador (Carneiro, 2018). In Brazil, those were intensified during the dictatorship ruled by Getúlio

Vargas (1937-1946). In this period, not only were migration policies stricter, but the assimilation of

immigrant communities was an imperative. In the Cold War context, the profile of immigrants

admitted to the country was carefully examined in order to avoid “the one at odds with the project of

a nation oriented to progress” especially the non-whites, non-Christians and the leftists (Ricci et al.,

2018).

Even though migration rates to Brazil decreased considerably from the 1930s as a result of

Vargas’ measures, migration policies were reformed when the military junta took power few decades

later in 1964. The main result was the formulation of the law nº 6.815 in 1980, popularly known as

Foreigner's Statute12. The Foreigner’s Statute remained as the main policy regulating migration flows

in Brazil up to 2017. Grounded in the national security bias, the jurisdiction stated that “[…] in the

application of this law, national security, institutional organization, and the political, socio-economic

An example of the oppressive consequences that resulted from their undesirability was the refusal of pensions to

immigrant windows and their children, leading families to misery 12 Free translation from Estatuto do Estrangeiro.

29

and cultural interests of Brazil, as well as the defense of the national worker, shall be given priority"

(Foreigner Statute 1980 (Br).). The regulations were not limited to the admission of people into the

country but were extended to their surveillance. Therefore, rights such as acquiring property, political

manifestations, and political rights, such as voting and being voted, were expressly prohibited (Ricci

et al., 2018).

It was during this period that the role of pro-refugee civil society institutions linked to the

Catholic Church was strengthened. In 1977, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees

(UNHCR) set up its office in Rio de Janeiro (which was officially recognized by the Brazilian

government only in 1982), resettling 20,000 South Americans asylum seekers to countries in the

Global North. The Archdiocesan Cáritas of Rio de Janeiro assisted those people, supporting them

until UNHCR was able to find a resettlement country. The work of Cáritas was crucial not only in

the struggle for the respect of human rights in opposition to the military regime, but also for the

operationalization of UNHCR itself. Later on, these organizations played an essential role acting as

pressure groups for the approval of Bill n º 1.936/96, which regulated the status of refugees in Brazil

(Moreira, 2014).

With the advent of the democratic state of law and the increasing prominence of Brazil as a

destination country for asylum seekers, labor and humanitarian immigrants, the abusive and

authoritarian norms of the Foreigner’s Statute became controversial. Lima Alves (2020) points out

that “It is fundamental to elucidate, however, that the 1988 Constitution, which should be a symbol

of social and democratic reform in the country, confronted its constitutional principles with the

authoritarian legacy that the Foreigner’s Statute had established.” (Lima Alves 2020, p. 121, free

translation). This happened because it took 37 years to reform the aforementioned legislation, which

carried out the paradigm of national security in the Brazilian legal system until 2017 (Lima Alves,

2020).

Nonetheless, as time went by the need to change the migration act was recognized by several

fronts, including the Executive Branch. Several bodies such as the Secretariat for Strategic Affairs

(SAE), the National Secretariat of Justice (SNJ), and the National Migration Council (CNIg) were

actively involved in the debates around the issue, which gained strength from 2010 on due to the

Haitian migration to Brazil (Rosaboni, 2019). Brazil was leading the United Nations Stabilization

Mission in Haiti in that time, becoming a reference destination to Haitian emigrants. In a short space

of time, the number of Haitians entering the country jumped from two hundred in 2010, to 39,000 in

2014 (Arosa & Otero, 2017).

The growing number of residence requests made by Haitian immigrants in a short period of

time shed light on the fact that Brazil had an obsolete migration policy, with unsuitable structures to

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deal with the increasing migration flow and, more importantly, lacked public policies for the migrant

population (Rosaboni, 2019). Consequently, several debates and partnerships between governments

and civil society organizations were promoted to discuss policies for migrants in the local and national

levels. In 2014, the 1st National Conference on Migration and Refuge13 (COMIGRAR) was set.

Coordinated by the Ministry of Justice in partnership with the Ministry of Labor and the Ministry of

Foreign Affairs, the event comprehended partial conferences in several Brazilian cities, involving the

participation of more than five thousand people. As a result, 2618 proposals were made aiming to

cross the migration theme in Brazilian public policies (Reporter Brasil, 2014). During the same year,

the Ministry of Justice signed agreements with local governments from the cities of São Paulo, Porto

Alegre and Florianópolis, and negotiations were initiated with Curitiba, Rio de Janeiro, Belo

Horizonte and Guarulhos targeting the implementation of Immigrant Reference Centers (CRAIs).

The Ministry included this program in its project for institutional strengthening, calling it “the

Network of Reference Centers and Reception of Migrants and Refugees”, considered as the axis of

durable solutions in local integration of migrant populations (Arosa & Otero, 2017).

The impeachment of President Rousseff in 2016 affected the implementation of the strategies

set by COMIGRAR. Nonetheless, it did not stop the approval of the new Migration Law n. 13.445,

which was enacted in May 2017, repealing the Foreigner’s Statute. The law is considered a great

democratic achievement not only for the rights it ensures to migrants in Brazil and Brazilians living

abroad, but also because it involved the participation of several institutions in the debates that

preceded it, such as government agencies, civil society organizations, the academia, and migrant

collectives. Grounded in the principles of non-discrimination and human rights defense, the new

legislation contributed to the de-bureaucratization of the migratory regulation process, the

institutionalization of the humanitarian visa policy, and the non-criminalization of individuals for

migratory reasons (Lima Alves, 2020). However, such progress must be cautiously celebrated, given

the undergoing turbulent political scenario experienced in the country.

According to Mendes & Menezes (2019), Bolsonaro’s administration (2019-present)

represents the return of the national security paradigm in migration policy. Bolsonaro's first act

regarding the topic occurred on the day of his inauguration as President of the Republic on January

first, 2019, withdrawing Brazil from the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration.

The president himself justified the action stating that “just like no one enters our house [with no

invitation] no one will enter Brazil because of a pact signed by third parties” (Mendes & Menezes

13 Free translation from Conferência Nacional sobre Migrações e Refúgio – Comigrar.

31

2019, p. 308, free translation), a completely misunderstood conception, because the pact is actually

of non-binding nature and the president’s statement also goes against numerous human rights treaties

that Brazil is signatory to14.

Furthermore, the regularization of the Migration Law nº 13.445 has been threatened. Mendes

& Menezes (2019) point to the use of legal tools such as the Ordinance n º 666 of July 26, 2019 for

state control and surveillance of migrants. The ordinance provides for summary deportation of

migrants based on suspicion of involvement in terrorism, criminal organization, drug trafficking, fans

with a history of violence in stadiums, and child pornography, among other crimes. “Suspicion is

sufficient for framing the migrant as a dangerous person” (BRAZIL, 2019-a, my emphasis). The

Ordinance also suggests editions in the Article 45 of the Migration Law n º 13.445, which deals with

preventing the entry of migrants to the national territory, and article 50, which mentions the

deportation of migrants in irregular situation (Mendes & Menezes, 2019).

The hardening of migration policies has not stopped people from entering the country,

especially on the northern border, which is the gateway for Venezuelan migrants15. The concentration

of Venezuelans in the northern state of Roraima16 raises numerous demands, which forced Bolsonaro

to take an immediate approach right after being elected. Faced with an emergency situation, he

decided to keep Operação Acolhida, a humanitarian operation set up by the previous federal

administration jointly carried out by several Ministries, United Nations agencies, and civil society

organizations. Its main lines of action include: a) border planning for the transit of people; b)

assistance and shelter for migrants and refugees, especially the most vulnerable ones; c) voluntary

transportation to other regions of the country, aiming at socioeconomic integration to reduce pressure

on Roraima’s public services (Mendes & Menezes, 2019). From April 2018 to March 2021, 50.475

people benefited from the so-called interiorization program, of whom 5.789 migrated to Santa

Catarina, the fourth main destination (R4V Platform, 2021). The interiorization process comprises

numerous steps involving several Ministries, civil society and international organizations, and local

governments. While the Ministries carry out travel arrangements, the sheltering and provision of

subsidies until the families find jobs is the responsibility of local governments and/or civil society

14 Brazil was the first South American country to ratify, in 1960, the 1951 International Convention relating to the Status

of Refugees. The 1967 Protocol on the Status of Refugees, which removes geographical limitations, was signed in 1972.

Later, the country signed the Cartagena Declaration of 1984, an important regional treaty that links the issue of generalized

violation of human rights to the refugee issue in Latin America (Lima Alves, 2020). 15 Up to October 2020, Brazil had registered 145,462 Venezuelan citizens in its territory (Migration Data Portal, 2020). 16 According to the Ministry of Justice and Public Safety, the state of Roraima was the northern state that concentrated

the highest volume of requests for recognition of refugee status in 2019, accounting for 56.72% of requests, followed by

Amazonas, with 23.38%. Venezuelan people who applied for the refugee status in these two federative units (26,541)

represented 79.33% of the total number of requests analyzed by the National Council for the Recognition of Refugee

Status (Conare) in 2019.

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organizations, often financially supported by international organizations (Organização Internacional

para as Migrações, 2021).

On the way to conclusion, one can argue that in spite of the advances conquered in recent

history regarding the defense of migrants’ rights – such as the enactment of the Migration Law nº

13.445 – the paradigm of national security still surrounds Brazilian migration policy, given the

undemocratic measures taken since Bolsonaro’s election. The current conjuncture reveals that a

specific migrant profile (white, European) is still preferred over its opposite (person from the global

south, asylum seekers), since the border with Venezuela has been closed due to COVID-19, while the

air routes receiving tourists have been unblocked (Martuscelli, 2021). Moreover, it is worth

mentioning that despite being an advance, the Migration Law nº 13.445 does not indicate a specific

budget for its implementation. The absence of a specific budget allocation for migration policies

exempts the federal entities from the responsibility of creating and executing public policies in this

area. The lack of resources for compliance with these regulations may pose another challenge to the

implementation of the legislation’s guidelines, leaving the migrant population at the mercy of

emergency and temporary initiatives such as Operação Acolhida, and of the solidarity-based

initiatives promoted by civil society organizations (Ricci et al., 2018).

2.2 Social movement networks and public policies for migrants in Florianópolis, Brazil

Historically recognized as a destination for immigrants, the state of Santa Catarina is among

the major receptors of “newly arrived” migrants, particularly Haitians, after the terrible earthquake

that devastated the Caribbean island in 2010 and Venezuelans, a result of the humanitarian crisis that

has hit the country since 2015. The “Asylum in Numbers 2019” report (Ministry of Justice), points

out that Santa Catarina ranks 4th in the country in relation to the number of asylum requests

(accounting for 1,894 requests), along with the states of Paraná (1,408) and Rio Grande do Sul

(1,223). With regard to the insertion of the migrant population in the labor market, the Observatory

of Migration in Brazil found in its 2019 Annual Report that Santa Catarina issued 3,703 work permits

to this public between 2011 and 2018. The importance of migrant labor force in the state can be

perceived by the fact that Santa Catarina has been the federation unit with the highest balance of

migrant workers in the period (1,812 in total) (Cavalcanti et al, 2019).

The island of Florianópolis is the capital of Santa Catarina state. The city, famous for its

beautiful beaches, attracts both internal and international migrants due to its intensive touristic

activities, especially in the summertime when there is a boost in job offers. Up to 2013, the main

nationalities settling in the capital were citizens from neighboring countries: Argentinians,

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Uruguayans, and Paraguayans. Even though Santa Catarina has historically benefited from

immigration programs, the state did not count with any specific apparatus to support migrants living

on its territory. In face of the state’s inoperability, some civil society organizations have been taking

the lead when it comes to promote the reception of these populations. The main one is the Migrants’

Pastoral, which has been monitoring the situation of different migratory trends in Florianópolis since

its establishment in 1996. For more than 20 years, the entity has functioned as a reference point for

immigrants by promoting, on an ongoing basis, assistance for regularization of migratory status,

socioeconomic support, and referrals to specific public agencies (Silva; Rocha; D'Avila, 2020).

Up to 2015, the Pastoral’s staff was limited to two people: Priest Joaquim Filippin, who

coordinated the institution’s activities; and Tamajara Silva, responsible for daily attendances. From

2015 on, the small room based at Treze de Maio Street close to the city center reached the number of

100 attendances per day, as a result of the unprecedented number of people migrating from Haiti. At

this moment, an agreement was signed with the Federal University of Santa Catarina (UFSC), whose

interns have been supporting the Pastoral Care on daily services since then, through the Extension

Project "Sérgio Vieira de Melo Chair: Center for Immigrants’ and Refugees’ Support" (CSVM-

Eirenè)17. The relevance of the partnership between the institutions can be observed through the

empirical results presented by Silva, Rocha, and D'Avila (2020) named “Invisibilized in Ilha do

Desterro: The new flows of immigrants and refugees in Florianópolis”. Between 2015 and 2017, the

Pastoral Care/CSVM-Eirenè promoted assistance18 to 178319 migrants and refugees of 48

nationalities from 4 continents, accounting for more than 5,000 annual consultations. These

individuals were mainly from Haiti, Argentina, Uruguay, Ecuador, and Senegal, certifying the

relevance of south-south migration in the city (Silva; Rocha; D'Avila, 2020).

The authors call attention to the fact that the above mentioned research is the first academic

study that raises concrete data about the overall presence of the so called “new immigrants” in

Florianópolis’ metropolitan region, leading to the conclusion that there is a prolongation of the

invisibility of non-white communities in the state’s historiography. Such institutional erasure directly

affects (the lack of) public policies for this population: without concrete research on nearly arrived

migrants’ profiles and demands, it is not possible to formulate efficient hosting policies (Silva; Rocha;

17 The Sérgio Vieira de Mello Chair extension project is an action of "Eirenè: Center for Decolonial and Post-Colonial

Research and Practices applied to International Relations and International Law", institutionally supported by the United

Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). 18 These ranged from preparation and printing of résumés to orientation about regularization of the migratory situation in

Brazil (which includes registration with the Federal Police, renewal of the Protocol and request for refugee and consular

certificate, consultation of processes, orientation for residence request, etc), assistance with the procedure to renew the

passport for Haitians, and orientation about family reunion (Silva; Rocha; D’Avila, 2020). 19 It is important to highlight that the real number of people attended is higher, but due to failures in the internal system,

only 1783 individuals were registered (Silva; Rocha; D’Avila, 2020).

34

D'Avila, 2020). Given the state’s absence in providing services to deal with the growing number of

immigrants and refugees who have arrived in Florianópolis since 2015, local entities working in the

field organized themselves in collectives to demand concrete actions from the federal and state

governments.

One of the main instances formed to discuss gaps in migrants’ reception is the Florianopolis’

Support Group for Immigrants and Refugees (GAIRF). Created by the Migrants’ Pastoral in

partnership with the Archdiocese of Florianópolis, at the beginning this group was formed basically

by Catholic Church entities that provided services to migrants. Gradually, other entities20 and people

started to participate in the monthly meetings that took place at the Florianópolis’ Metropolitan Curia.

Many public agencies (municipal, state and federal) also participated, and their participation was

either organic or through invitations aimed to deal with some specific issue, according to the need of

the moment (Batista, 2020).

Another important instance created to debate migrants’ needs and formulate institutional

demands to public authorities is the Immigration Working Group (GTI) of Santa Catarina State

Legislative Assembly, bound to its Human Rights Commission. Founded in 2015, it is a collegiate

where the Legislative, in partnership with civil society and various entities, acts together with several

public and private institutions, namely the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the State Prosecution Office,

the State Secretariat of Education, the Pastoral Care, GAIRF, UFSC, civil society organizations such

as the Hospitality Circles, immigrants' associations, among others. In other words, it is an

institutionalized space where it is possible to formalize demands raised at GAIRF, require responses

from the Executive and the Judiciary, and, when possible, coordinate with the Legislative to take

stances and make decisions (Silva & Castelan, 2019).

It is interesting to observe that the initiative to create the GTI came from civil society

organizations and migrant collectives’ appeals. According to Marcel Salomon, one of my

interviewees who works as a political advisor and manages the group since its establishment, the need

for an institutional channel inside the Legislative Assembly to debate migration issues was a demand

from migrant leaders and civil society representatives articulated around GAIRF. Salomon assigns

two main reasons moving such request: the rising migration flow of Haitian migrants to the state

observed in 2014-2015 by one hand, and the misinformation of public authorities on the topic

20 According to Silva and Gestal (2018) the main entities that work directly with immigration demands in Santa Catarina

are: The Federal Police, the Ministry of Labor and Employment, the Public Defender's Office, the Migrants’ Pastoral, the

Federal University of Santa Catarina, through the Extension Project 'Núcleo de Apoio a Imigrantes e Refugiados'

(NAIR/Eirenè), the Nucleus of Studies on Psychology, Migrations and Cultures (NEMPsiC), and the Florianopolis’

Support Group for Immigrants and Refugees (GAIRF) (Silva; Gestal, 2018).

35

influencing leaders to demand accountability, by the other. The situation reached its peak in May-

June 2015, when hundreds of migrants were transported from the northern region to Florianópolis

without any apparatus to welcome them. The first move was the setting of a public hearing that

counted with over 700 people. One of the outcomes of such reunion was that a working group on

migration should be created inside the Human Rights Commission to promote a constant and

continuous debate on the issue, setting the starting point of migration public policies discussion within

the state apparatus.

This information jibes with Tatagiba et al’s (2018) proposition that social movement networks

often struggle to redefine the organizational structures within subsystems (in this case, the Legislative

Assembly) aiming to create institutional spaces to put their agenda forward. The authors claim that

what distinguishes social movement networks performance in policymaking processes is their role to

give ordinary people the possibility to organize collectively and make their voices be heard within

subsystems. After gaining access to institutional spaces, social movements bring their practical

experiences into the decision-making arena and set conceptions on how society should be organized

according their political projects. By doing this, networks trigger a set of confrontational interactions

in order to foster “alternative policies”, often ignored by political elites (Tatagiba et al, 2018).

We can see that in the case of Florianópolis, the institutional channel created to foster the

debate on migration issues was extremely important to set an agenda for alternative policies

previously ignored by the political elite. This happened because GTI’s space opened state’s

bureaucracy to a public that has been historically invisibilized in Santa Catarina, which are racialized

migrants. After having access to the Legislative Assembly, migrant collectives and grassroots

organizations had the opportunity to vocalize the need for a specific service that would enable the

migrant population to access their rights, claiming the state’s recognition of their existence in the

territory. Salomon explains this:

[...] from the various meetings that were happening every month, we discussed education, health, the

issue of documents… we realized that something was missing. [...] Although we had a debate, and forwarded the results of this debate, the group understood that it should be created a proposal of a

Reference Center that would assist the migrant when he/she arrived here in Santa Catarina, so that it

could be, let's say, a 'Safe Harbor' for the migrant that came to Brazil, that suddenly had no contact with the Portuguese language and needed to find support somewhere. So, in this sense, we started working

on the idea that we needed to create CRAI, which was the Reference Center for Immigrant Support.

From then on, CRAI’s creation became the predominant item on GTI’s agenda. It is important

to emphasize that such an idea was directly bound to the national debates on migration issues within

COMIGRAR’s scope, that were happening concurrently throughout the country. According to

Salomon, the creation of CRAI was indeed an opportunity that was possible by the Ministry of

Justice’s tendering in 2016, one of the outcomes of COMIGRAR’s discussions. Once again, it meets

36

Tatagiba et al’s (2018) premises, since the authors claim that alternative policies are double-

conditioned by the structure of subsystems and the configuration of the regime. In Santa Catarina’s

case, we can argue that the regime set in place at that time played an important role in decentralizing

the debates about migrants’ rights and investing resources for its operationalization. Nonetheless, as

highlighted by Tatagiba et al (2018), networks should not be seen as passive actors that merely react

to political opportunities. They act towards the regime and subsystems set in place to dispute a space

to set their agendas forward. Therefore, in addition to seizing the opportunities posed by the regime’s

political conjuncture, the network of actors around GAIRF took advantage of allies within the public

policy subsystems (Legislative Assembly) to create institutional channels (GTI) that would facilitate

their access to decision-making processes, setting the agenda for CRAI’s opening. Such importance

can be reinforced if we note that the impeachment of President Rousseff in 2016, which ended up

hindering the transfer of resources from the federal government, did not prevent the opening of the

CRAI, which was funded with resources from the Secretariat of Social Assistance itself. According

to Salomon, this decision came out of discussions carried with the Social Assistant Secretary at the

time, a former congressman who had been sensitized by the migration debates taking place in the

chamber, provided by the GTI.

The result was that for the first time since the so called “humanitarian emergency” happened,

the government provided finances in migrants’ reception services. The Reference Center for

Immigrants was launched in February 2018, in a ceremony that counted with massive presence of

state representatives, civil society members, politicians, authorities from the Catholic Church, the

migrant community, and the media (as it can be seen in Image 1 and Image 2). CRAI operated until

September 2019, and it was the leading institution providing guidance to migrants’ in the city, as well

as to articulate solutions together with social movement networks, which will be explored in the next

subsection.

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Figure 1

CRAI’s opening in February 2018, counting with network’s representatives, authorities, and media.

Source: Florianópolis’ Archdiocese (2018).

Figure 2

Some of the authorities in attendance

Source: Santa Catarina Secretariat of Social Assistance (2018).

Note: Those were the State Secretary of Social Assistance, Valmir Comin; the Director of Human

Rights from Santa Catarina, Maria Elisa de Caro; Bishop Wilson Tadeu Jonck; State Representative

Dirceu Dresch, GTI's Coordinator at the time.

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2.3 Migrant women accessing CRAI Santa Catarina

The Santa Catarina Reference Center for Immigrants was in operation from February 2018 to

September 2019. The service can be considered a milestone in the history of migration policies in the

state of Santa Catarina and the social movements themselves, being the main actor in bringing the

voices of collectivities to institutional spaces to demand accountability. For the first time since the

colonization settling policies, the state invested resources to assist the immigrant population, a task

historically relegated to civil society institutions. Its services included referrals of migratory

regularization nature such as counseling on asylum requests, family reunification, and naturalization;

linguistic and labor accessibility, such as preparing resumes, contact with employers, and referral to

Portuguese classes; and psycho-social support to help people in accessing Brazilian social programs

and benefits and the provision of psychological support with an intercultural approach (Silva et al,

2020).

The importance of the service can be noticed by the substantial number of people who have

accessed it. According to official data, 5,924 people whose origins range from 59 nationalities sought

the institution between April 2018 and September 2019. Haitians, Venezuelans, Cubans, and

Argentinians were the most numerically representative nationalities, validating the current trend of

south-south migration in the region. As for the gender, male individuals were the majority among the

immigrants assisted in the analyzed period, accounting for 60,5 percent of total attendances (Silva et

al, 2020).

Here, a careful look at how migrant women accessed the services, what were their main

demands, and to what extent CRAI was efficient in welcoming them becomes necessary. Researchers

in the migration field (Martin, 2014) have been pointing out that nonprofit organizations increasingly

act as a mediator for migrant women’s social, economic, and political needs. This happens because

the rise of neoliberalism particularly affects this group, once the outsourcing and privatization of

government programs make migrant women doubly charged with the search for a source of income

and the care of the family, particularly the children. The privatization of socialized relms of life leads

to the discourse of “personal responsibility” in which the state exempts itself in providing services

related to social reproduction and nonprofit organizations rise as a backup to fill the gaps created by

this process (Ibid).

When analyzing how Haitian women accessed the services of CRAI, Rissardo & Müller

(2020) point out that the services of the integration sector were the most sought after by these women,

whose unemployment rate was around 78 percent. According to the authors, this can be explained by

the fact that the migration experience of Haitian women in Brazil is embedded in social processes

39

that triply subordinate black women in layers of race, class, and gender. This oppression is clearly

illustrated by the statistics on the Brazilian labor market, in which the unemployment rate of black

women is 130 percent higher than white men (Dias Silva, 2013). In the case of migrant women, the

nationality and language factors accentuate such precariousness, and many rely on domestic economy

as the only opportunity left for them (K.S. Silva, personal communication, March 30, 2021). The

internal reports from the social work sector expands the analysis stating that social roles commonly

attributed to women such as childcare combined with the lack of daycare facilities hampered their

chances to find a formal employment. The result is the maintenance of a vicious cycle in which

Men who come to the service ask about job openings, resumes, besides understanding the Portuguese

language better. On the other hand, most women, mainly of Haitian nationality, cannot understand Portuguese and their role in the family structure is usually marked by their presence at home and taking

care of children. The result is greater difficulty in social interaction and, consequently, labor insertion

(CRAI/SC. May-December 2018 Social Work Report. Florianópolis. Institutional archive, 2018).

By way of conclusion, we can point out that despite being an important conquest in providing

essential services for the migrant population – such as migratory regularization, referring to

Portuguese classes, and insertion to the labor market – CRAI’s scope of action became limited when

it comes to fulfilling migrant women rights. This gap is connected to structural problems related to a

neoliberal conjuncture in which social-reproduction tasks such as taking care of children become

relegated to the private sphere while the state exempts itself from its responsibility. Within this line

of thought, Martin (2014) points out that nonprofit organizations can play a crucial role by providing

services to fill this gap and at the same time “transform alienating individual experiences into

collective understandings of social structures, racial hierarchies, and economic exploitation. These

understandings, if properly mobilized, can lead to alternative imaginaries of political possibilities”

(Martin 2014, p. 19). Political mobilization to address the issues that pervade the experience of being

migrant and women appear to be therefore the axis of action. The next chapters will therefore discuss

if and how such issues are being discussed in the public policies involving the migrant population,

namely in relation to the municipal law nº 10.735, and the state law nº 18.018.

40

Chapter Three – Methodological framework for the analysis

So far, we have discovered that social movement networks based in Florianópolis have been

key actors in demanding public policies for “newly arrived migrants”, which have been historically

invisibilized by political elites. By creating communication channels within state subsystems and

seizing the opportunities set by the regime, migrant collectives and entities organized around GAIRF

managed to launch the second Reference Center for Immigrants in the country, namely CRAI/SC.

However, when pursuing a gendered view of CRAI’s scope of action, one can notice its limitations

in meeting migrant women’s needs. Those were the ones who arrived at the service in the most fragile

situation, struggling for a suitable position in the formal labor market but held back by several layers

of discrimination experienced in Brazilian society, and with limited welfare institutions to help them

bear their productive and reproductive duties. Scholars such as Martin (2014) and Miraftab (2004)

point out that women’s enrollment in the political setting are vital to address those issues, especially

in a neoliberal setting that undermines government services directed to them. The current moment

seems propitious for such debate, since two laws directed to the migrant population were approved

in Santa Catarina last year. In the next chapter I will therefore analyze if and to what extent gender

issues have been addressed in the policymaking of those laws and existing policies, and the perception

of those issues by relevant players – civil society workers, legislative assembly employers, and

migrant leaderships. Before presenting such data, I will present the methodological choices that will

guide my analysis.

The methodology chosen is qualitative. Creswell (2012) points out that qualitative researchers

use assumptions, worldviews, and theoretical lenses combined with research problems to find out the

meanings individuals make of social problems. To study contemporary issues, qualitative researchers

collect data in a sensitive setting to people and places under study, and material analysis include

inductive assumptions that leads to established patterns or themes. The final result is a set of

interpretive, substantial practices that make the world visible and calls for an action (Creswell, 2012).

From there on, the author argues that a framework should be chosen to guide research procedures.

The current research will present a case study, once it allows the researcher “to explore a bounded

system through detailed, in-depth data collection, involving multiple sources of information

(observations, interviews, audiovisual material, and documents), to report a case description”

(Creswell 2012, p. 73).

Along with the above cited secondary and primary sources, semi-structed interviews with

open ended questions will add to the methods employed in this study. The reason behind this choice

is the fact that semi-structed interviews allows a participatory research (Castles, 2017), including the

41

perspectives of different actors and the social meanings they make of processes under analysis. To

get diverse perspectives, actors from various backgrounds were interviewed: three aid workers from

civil society organizations; two political advisors at the municipal level and one at the state level; an

officer from the Secretariat of Social Development of Santa Catarina state; a university scholar; and

a leader from the migrant community. The selection criteria were the length of time the interviewees

have been involved with the network (most since 2015) and their proximity to the researcher, aiming

to ensure an exchange of information based on mutual trust. More details about each interviewee can

be seen in the following table:

Table one. Informants’ profile

Interviewee's

name Institutional Affiliation Position

Bruna Kadletz Hospitality Circles Coordinator

Emanuely

Gestal Pastoral Care for Migrants/SPM

Projects'

Manager

Isadora

Azevedo Cáritas Santa Catarina Coordinator

Merlina

Saudade Venezuelans’ Association in Florianópolis Coordinator

Jeruse Romão Councilman Lino Peres’ Office

Political

Advisor

André Farias Councilman Marquito’s Office

Political

Advisor

Marcel

Salomon Deputy Fabiano da Luz’s Office

Political

Advisor

Regina Suenes

Administration of Policies for Racial Equality

and Immigrants of the Secretariat of Social

Development of Santa Catarina Manager

Karine de

Souza Silva CSVM-Eirenè/UFSC

Coordinator

and scholar

I got to know all the informants through common spaces shared during former fieldwork in

advocacy settings – such as forums and working groups – or recommendations from people who were

present in those places. Chavez (2015) highlights that the position of insider researcher potentially

adds value to the investigation once insiders “can understand the cognitive, emotional, and/or

psychological precepts of participants as well as possess a more profound knowledge of the historical

and practicalities happenings of the field” (Chavez 2015, p. 481). The author claims that the affinity

constructed among the researcher and the community gives her/him a trustworthy and legitimate

access to people participating in the study, bounding both parts ethically. Nonetheless, I am conscious

42

of the critical reflection required in the process of being an insider researcher, which demanded me

double efforts to critically analyze all information provided by informants detached from my own

perceptions of it.

Although I prepared interview guides, those were there only to remind me of the topics I

wanted to examine, but most interviewees shared their reflections as storytelling21, which enriched

the discussion. The interviews were conducted between March 2 and March 30 through the Zoom

application. The interview guides were prepared according to each category: civil society

worker/legislative representative/executive servant/scholar/activist. Following the ethical guidelines

of the Swedish Research Council, all interview guides contained a section on the purposes and aims

of the research to make sure all interviewees grasped the final objective of the study they were

participating. The interviews were conducted in Portuguese, which is the native language of most

participants22, and recorded using Zoom’s tool. I transcribed the interviews without the use of any

computer device, and the translation to English was occasionally supported by a translation

application. Because all interviews were held virtually, the consent to publish their testimonies was

given orally.

All informants were told they could withdraw information provided at any moment, and that

confidential issues would not be transcribed and released. Despite the possibility of using alias was

presented, all of them wished to keep their real names in the research. According to Ellersgaard et al

(2021), anonymizing interviews should not be seen as the only ethically sound solution, especially

when the interviewees are experts who are not in a position of vulnerability. The authors argue that

masking informants’ by giving them numbers may hamper the contextualization of interviews and

soft anonymization (changing names) can be useless when interviewees occupy a position of

authority, which is the case of all the informants of my study. Therefore, interviewees’ real names

were kept because the information presented in this research does not harm them and adds to the

transparency of the study, as argued by Ellersgaard et al (2021). Moreover, I add that keeping the real

names of my informants contributes to record the movement’s history and represents a statement of

the militancy background of the people who were interviewed. Keeping their names is therefore a

matter of being loyal to their struggles.

The analysis method can be described as a thematic analysis. Braun & Clarke (2006, p. 79)

define a thematic analysis as “a method for identifying, analyzing and reporting patterns (themes)

21 Anderson (2010, p. 5-6) defines storytelling as the “culturally important act of presenting an event or series of events,

true or fictional, through some form of communication; oral, written or visual to an audience that is or is not present at

the time of the presentation.” 22 Although the option to conduct the interview in Spanish was presented to the participant whose mother tongue is

Spanish, she preferred to perform the interview in Portuguese.

43

within data” enabling the interpretation of the various aspects of the research topic. The authors advise

six steps to be taken in order to produce a good thematic analysis, which were pursued as follows:

01. Familiarizing yourself with your data;

02. Generating initial codes;

03. Searching for themes;

04. Reviewing themes;

05. Defining and naming themes;

06. Producing the report.

During step one, I listened to all interview records and took notes of all topics reported by

informants. Step two comprised the coding of interesting features of data, collecting and transcribing

relevant information to each code. The third phase transformed codes into initial themes consistent

with research questions and aims. At this step, I noticed that some codes were common in all

interviews, so I organized them in initial themes, which were: i. civil society organizations as the

main reference for migratory issues; ii. civil society participation as crucial in public policies

formulation and advocacy; iii. the challenges to be faced for policies implementation; iv. and the

specificities of migrant women in the processes of policymaking and implementation. In phase four

I gathered and reviewed data into a thematic ‘map’ to be used in the analysis. Finally, step five

comprised the ongoing analysis to refine themes according to the thematic map, resulting in: i. civil

society providing services to address the implementation gap; ii. civil society’s authority in

demanding policy implementation versus the weakening of participatory democratic spaces; iii the

issue of underrepresentation of the migrant community and especially migrant women in advocacy

settings. Phase six was the actual production of the report, in which I extracted samples of interviews

and presented them accordingly to each theme, analyzed in relation to the research question and

backed up by the theoretical framework and existing literature on the theme (Braun & Clarke, 2006).

The thematic analysis was chosen as method because it is a useful approach when taking

research participants’ as collaborators of the study, besides being a useful tool to summarize key

features of a large volume of data. The mechanism also allows for a social interpretation of

participants’ meanings and when correctly backed by previous research and theory, it can be an

insightful style to produce qualitative analyses contributing to policy development (Braun & Clarke,

2006). In doing so, it is expected to pursue an ‘holistic approach’, connecting research on specific

local experiences on migration (e.g. the role of social movement networks in promoting reception

policies in Florianópolis) to broader transformations of contemporary societies (migratory trends) as

well as its connections to global trends (neoliberalism undermining public policies) (Castles, 2017).

44

Chapter Four – “Birds of passage are also women23”: migrant women and advocacy for public

policies

The aim of this chapter is to present the main lessons and contributions of social movement

networks in fostering public policies in the migration field in Florianópolis, with special attention to

migrant women, addressing the specific question number two of this research: “What are the main

lessons and contributions that this network can give in fostering public policies for migrant women

in Florianópolis?”. The chapter will be divided into two subsections. The first one will analyze the

main aspects of the policymaking process according to each theme presented by the interviewees: i.

civil society providing services to address the implementation gap; ii. civil society’s authority in

demanding policy implementation versus the weakening of participatory democratic spaces; iii the

issue of underrepresentation of the migrant community and especially migrant women in advocacy

settings. Finally, the second one will consist of a findings section, crossing the thematic analyses

aiming to make an overview of the work done by the network so far and contribute with reflections

for possible future lines of action.

4.1.1 Civil society providing services to address the implementation gap

Before presenting the discussions around the implementation of the migration laws ratified in

Santa Catarina in 2020, it is necessary to make a brief overview of the current political scenario at

the national and local levels. As previously mentioned, CRAI ended its activities in September 2019,

a political decision taken by the governor Carlos Moisés (Social Liberal Party), inducted in January

2019. Elected by the same party as Jair Bolsonaro at the time, Moisés’ government is embedded in a

political project in which neoliberal premises of efficiency and minimal state are the main foundation.

In terms of migration policy, Moisés government's understanding is that a specific service to attend

the migrant population is not necessary, which means relegating such task to the Social Assistance

Reference Centers, considered as an efficient way to attend to this population while exempting itself

from spending resources (Santo & Andion 2020, my emphasis).

In theory the Social Assistance Reference Centers have the personnel trained to meet the

demands of the general public in terms of accessing social benefits, but such institutions lack

knowledge about the specificities of migrant population demands’ like migratory regularization and

understanding other languages than Portuguese (Santo & Andion, 2020). The immediate result of the

closure of CRAI was the return of the panorama experienced in 2014, in which civil society

23 Reference to Morokvasic’s (1984) paper “Birds of Passage are also Women.”

45

organizations are the reference point not only for migrants, but also for public institutions that are

unaware of migratory procedures. In this section, three representatives of civil society organizations24

were interviewed. They are: Emanuely Gestal, the Migrants’ Pastoral project manager and one of

GAIRF’s coordinators, who works within the migration network in Florianópolis since 2014, when

she was an intern at CSVM/Eirene. Bruna Kadletz, Circles of Hospitality coordinator, who has also

been active in the network since 2014. And Isadora Azevedo, Cáritas Santa Catarina coordinator, and

also a psychologist, working in the field of migration and mental health.

All informants reported that since the closure of CRAI, there has been a greater demand from

public servants for information about migration procedures. Gestal noticed a bigger representation of

public servants seeking information at migration forums such as GAIRF, where she coordinated some

actions aiming to address this gap before the COVID-19 pandemic:

They realized “gee, CRAI is closed”. Because they used to refer [people] to CRAI. So CRAI closed, and they really arrived at the [GAIRF’s] meetings terrified, right. “My God, CRAI closed, now what?”

We explained and so on, we tried to do some actions. […] There was even a technician that tried to do

the scheduling thing at the Federal Police one time. I thought it was very cute [because] we know it's

not their job. […] We were able to bring people from Social Assistance that didn't come before [to GAIRF’s meetings], very often. One representative used to come... but out of nowhere in the face-to-

face meetings, every meeting we held there was someone from a specific [social assistance] center.

Gestal tells that this dynamic changed completely after the COVID-19 outbreak, which forced

GAIRF into an unpredictable hiatus. In her view, the networks' scope of action was doubly affected

by the closing of CRAI and the pandemic, resulting in the sectorization of each organization with

their own projects to meet specific demands. Let me briefly present these three organizations in order

to give the reader an idea of the current scenario.

Circles of Hospitality was founded in 2015, with the objective of promoting social,

educational and cultural activities to facilitate the integration process of migrants in host society.

What started as a personal initiative of its founder Bruna Kadletz with the help of a few volunteers

who promoted Portuguese classes adapted to the (cultural and social) demands of Syrian women,

today is one of the organizations that assists the migrant population in the state of Santa Catarina the

most. Circles of Hospitality receives funds from private foundations and international organizations25

to maintain its activities, which include Portuguese classes, entrepreneurship courses, support for

migratory regularization, and campaigns to raise awareness about the migratory cause in host society.

24 Surely there are more than those three organizations providing support for migrants in Florianópolis. Nonetheless, those

were chosen to be interviewed because of the time they have been working on the field and its relevance in the network.

25 With emphasis on the support of the International Organization for Migration – IOM whose financial source comes

from the United States Agency for International Development – USAID.

46

As Kadletz described to me, all projects aim to prioritize women (especially mothers) and the

LGBTQIA+ community as target. The organization counts over 30 volunteers and 8 employees,

reaching more than 39 municipalities, having attended around 3,000 people in 2020.

Although the Migrants’ Pastoral has been present in Florianópolis since 1996, the organization

went through a structural change in March 2019 aiming to reach the entire state of Santa Catarina.

Most of the main actions continue to be implemented in Florianópolis, but other activities have been

articulated with other Pastoral offices so that the service to the migrant population is strengthened

throughout the state. Currently, the main activity in Florianópolis is the management of a reception

house for Venezuelan migrants brought in by the Operação Acolhida interiorization program, in

operation since October 2019. Besides providing shelter, there is also assistance for migratory

regularization and partnerships for labor integration of families, who are assisted by the service until

they achieve economic independence. There are no specific projects for women, but sometimes there

are income generating workshops directed to them, such as craft sewing, depending on the availability

of personnel to teach. So far, the institution has received four interiorized groups, totaling 54 people.

It has three employees (general coordinator, project coordinator, social educator) and receives funds

from IOM/USAID (having already received funds from the UNHCR and Cáritas Switzerland) to

maintain its activities. The support of Venezuelan families from the interiorization program is the

priority action, but activities such as legal counseling continue to be carried out for the general public

through online tools such as the institutional Whatsapp.

Cáritas Santa Catarina, on its turn, started to work in the area of migration in 2018, providing

shelter and socioeconomic assistance for Venezuelan families from the interiorization program, in a

program founded by the United States State Department. From 2020 on, it has worked more

intensively in the areas of professional qualification, and education for access to rights. The increased

scope of work has also influenced a greater contact with other Cáritas entities throughout Santa

Catarina, leading Cáritas Florianópolis to work more on training for its agents from other regions. So

far, at least 5 trainings on labor rights and 5 trainings on migration regularization have been carried

out. Partnerships were also made with CIEE26 on how to prepare resumes and perform a good job

interview, besides recurring workshops on Solidarity Economy carried out by Cáritas’ staff. Apart

from the projects aimed at professional integration (funded by IOM/USAID), there is also a three-

month income transfer project for families in situations of extreme socioeconomic vulnerability,

whose main profile are solo mothers and pregnant women (funded by Cáritas Switzerland, Germany,

Luxembourg, the European Union, and Cáritas’ regional office). In total, Cáritas staff comprises a

26 The Company-School Integration Center (free translation) is a private association, which, among several programs,

provides young Brazilian students with trainings and internships to enter the labor market.

47

coordinator, a social educator, a social worker, a technician in solidarity economy, an administrative

assistance, a protection agent, and Cáritas’ General Secretariat.

The current scenario meets Martin’s (2014) claim, that “the neoliberal ‘roll back’ of universal

policies led to a concomitant ‘roll out’ of civil society organizations into the emerging void” (Martin

2014, p. 22). The scholar points out that in such environment, nonprofit organizations tend to emerge

as the only actors with credibility and capacity to develop programmatic responses to the unique

situations faced by migrant women in the host community. In a setting in which government funding

is scarce, these actors rely on private funding from foundations and international organizations, as it

can be seen in Florianópolis case. Martin (2014) affirms that such dynamic restricts the organizations’

scope of action to donors’ priorities, commonly set by numbers of people getting a job, percentages

of educational attendances, and other metrics that demonstrate purely tangible results. As a

consequence, it becomes difficult to meet collective demands that go beyond concrete numbers and

require mass mobilization. Particularly in the case of women, the projects are limited to punctual

actions to respond to urgent demands, as is the case of Cáritas' cash transfer project, or to income

generation projects that are outside the formal labor market, as is the case of the Pastoral Care for

Migrants and the Hospitality Circles.

Gestal, Kadletz and Azevedo all point out that despite the efforts made by their respective

organizations to make companies hire women, men are usually employed first. According to them,

the lack of job opportunities is one of the most common complaints brought up by migrant women

assisted by their institutions. All interviewees connected this problem to structural issues linked to

the social gender roles disproportionately attributed to women by one hand, and to the unenviability

of public equipment to answer this demand, by the other. Kadletz tells:

[...] So what we see today, if for single professionals or those without children it is already difficult to

get an insertion in the labor market, for mothers it is even more difficult. Because many companies won't

offer a place for mothers to take their children. The day care centers, when they do get a place, which is

extremely difficult to get a place for the children, are often not full time, they are part time [...] so this is a challenge that ends up limiting opportunities for women many times. [...] And that this situation is

of course not exclusive to migrant women, working class Brazilian women will also go through this

challenge [yet] it is very important that we understand that many of the [migrant] women do not have access to the social networks that they had in their country of origin. That is, they cannot leave their

children with their mother, with their aunt, with their sister, because they are often not here.

Another point reported by the informants was the weakening of the political spaces to demand

state’s accountability in providing services like daycare. As previously stated by Dagnino (2004), in

a context in which the neoliberal project takes over, civil society organizations end up giving up on

collective mobilizations to demand long-term policies when confronted with the possibility of

producing positive results for their beneficiaries, even if those are limited to punctual, provisional,

and temporary solutions. At the same time, the spaces to discuss the root causes of inequality and

48

poverty are discredited. Kadletz says she ends up looking after other solutions because her speed of

action is different from what she calls “the system”:

Because the time to sit, gather, put everyone in a room, hold the first meeting, hold the second meeting, let's delegate, let's make the referrals... the person has already died of hunger, is already under the bridge

with three children, exposed to great risk. So I don't have that patience, I don't have that time because

hunger doesn't wait, eviction doesn't wait. [...] So that's why I end up looking for other sources of resources, and in parallel, of course, we understand that the system works at a totally different speed [...]

in situations where we can intervene in a more specific way, we end up intervening, and I don't know

how much this ends up being detrimental to the whole picture, but if we just wait for good will, it doesn't

come. There has to be pressure.

As mentioned beforehand, the story backs Dagnino's (2004) proposition that the shrinking

role of the state as a service provider goes hand in hand with the shrinking space for politics and

democracy, which now is limited to the bare minimum. The result is a dangerous cycle in which

democratic channels are replaced by short-term solutions that depoliticize the debate, thus reinforcing

the neoliberal project. The disbelief that the situation might change can be perceived in Gestal’s

words:

What happens is this: there is the law, it is guaranteed, but the migrants enter where they are able to. And always working with the leftovers. And this hurts me a lot. Because we are always there struggling,

struggling, struggling, to provide the basics, you know. It's very complicated, man, these issues. [...] We

just keep thinking about solutions, but... they are much bigger issues than we can access, it seems. It is a matter that is structured to be maintained like that. And then, how are we going to change the whole

system?

So far we can imply that the shift in the regime, which started with the impeachment of

President Roussef in 2016 and gained ground with Bolsonaro’s election in 2018, deeply impacted the

network’s scope of action. With the shortage of state resources followed by the outbreak of the

COVID-19 pandemic and the escalation of the humanitarian crisis in Venezuela, the organizations

were forced to concentrate their efforts on emergency responses such as palliate the effects of hunger

and provide shelter. Meanwhile, the advocacy spaces have emptied out. Nonetheless, we should

remember that social movement networks are composed by individuals endowed with their own

agency, capable of making decisions independently of the dominant government coalition, as argued

by Abers et al (2018) and Tatagiba et al (2018). The approval of the two migration laws in the second

half of 2020 can be seen as a sign that despite being not so active, the alliances constructed by the

network since 2014 are still in operation.

Assuming that social movements networks are inserted in relations of interdependence with

the various actors and institutions within the regime and that this relational structure directly

influences the context for political opportunities and future actions, the next sections will analyze the

interaction between the actors involved in the process of legislations formulation, in an attempt to

49

construct a cohesive line of reasoning about the networks’ trajectory so far and draw future lines of

action so that the laws are implemented.

4.1.2 Civil society’s authority in demanding policy implementation versus the weakening of

participatory democratic spaces

The approval of the Law nº 10.735, which sets forth the Municipal Policy for the Migrant

Population of Florianópolis’ and the Law nº 18.018, that institutes the State Policy for the Migrant

Population in Santa Catarina, can be considered an initial step to demand long term policies. Besides

setting important guidelines such as guaranteeing access to social rights and promoting respect for

diversity, both legislations mention budget allocations: the municipal one points out that the execution

of the law will be covered by its own budget allocations. The state law mentions that the migration

policy will be taken into account in the formulation of the Santa Catarina state Target Goals,

Pluriannual Plans, Budget Guidelines Laws, and Annual Budget Laws. The allocations of resources

to implement the policies is a crucial point, and all civil society representatives told me this is a major

challenge.

In order to understand the political processes involved in the policies’ draft and the challenges

for its implementation, three political advisors were interviewed. Marcel Salomon is the political

advisor of Deputy Fabiano da Luz27 (Workers Party) since the latter took office in 2019. Nonetheless,

Salomon’s history with human rights dates way back: he works at Santa Catarina Legislative

Assembly for 15 years and since 2008 he assists congressmen from the human rights bench. In 2015,

as he was assisting congressman Dirceu Dresch (Workers Party), he was sought up by a group of

migrant collectives and civil society organizations to debate migration issues inside the chamber,

culminating in GTI’s creation. He manages the working group since then.

Jeruse Romão was advisor of councilman Lino Peres (Workers Party, the municipal law’s

author), whose mandate finished in 2020. She worked as a political advisor since the beginning of the

2000s, assisting five congressmen and one congresswoman from the Workers Party. With a degree

in pedagogy and a black movement militant for over 30 years, she has worked with migration since

the 1980s, when she assisted a group of African students at Santa Catarina’s University. André Farias,

in his turn, is the advisor of councilman Marquito (Socialism and Liberty Party, partner in the

municipal law’s writing). He advises the councilman since the beginning of his first mandate in 2016.

The first time Farias had contact with the migration cause was through the participation in the Food

27 Luz is vice-president of the Human Rights Commission of the Legislative Assembly of Santa Catarina and the

migration’s law author.

50

Security Council of Florianópolis, of which he has been a counselor for many years, meeting fellow

counselors who were immigrants in such spaces.

When asked about the policymaking process, all the legislative representatives highlighted the

role of civil society as essential in the preparatory debates and in the laws’ drafting itself. Romão

pointed out that making a legislation to attend different nationalities was challenging, and the only

possible way to do an inclusive legislation was consulting all the groups that worked with the theme

in the city: migrant collectives, civil society organizations, GAIRF, and so on. At the state level,

Salomon pointed out that the entities participating in the GTI’s meetings were of extreme importance

to make a project consistent with the local reality:

The final text that was approved, and I want to say here, we must refer that it was the working group,

the GTI, with all the entities, people, researchers dedicated to the theme, that made this difference. […]

We [The Legislative chamber] are not masters in all debates, [...] we are not experts on the subject. So, nothing better than having a working group for us to debate these themes, because they [the entities] are

the people linked to the theme who are working with this on a daily basis, who have the practice, right.

The narrations are consistent with Abers et al (2018) and Tatagiba et al (2018) when the

authors claim that social movements matter to public policies and that public policies in its turn impact

the emergence, development and success of social movements. The relational structure between

subsystems and the regime can be noted through the alliance between social movement networks and

parliamentarians: while the former set the agenda in subsystems structures (such as GTI), the latter

rely on social movements’ expertise for policy’s formulation (Ibid). In this sense, social movement

networks fulfill the assumption made by Scherer-Warren (2012), when she states that by bringing

their daily life experiences to public spheres, movements might build up emancipatory utopias in

culture and politics. The fact that Santa Catarina, a state built by a eugenicist, racist, and sexist

migration law, has passed a bill whose main audience are migrants from the global south, may be the

beginning of a new conception in the state's political-cultural history.

It is necessary to point out, however, that the role of civil society, migrant collectives and

other entities must not be limited to give inputs in the policy formulation processes, but becomes

extremely necessary at the current juncture when human rights issues are not a priority for the

executive branch, either in the state or in the municipality. As Farias explains:

I see that this is the only possibility today for this implementation to move forward. There is no other

way. We can't put it on the agenda. […] Even more now, we are in a moment of very, very bad dialogue

[with the Executive]. […] So, I think that it is a prerogative of civil society at this moment, you know. To really set the agenda, in several ways.

Another challenge raised by all three legislative representatives is the weakening of

communication channels between civil society and the executive branch, such as the Councils of

Right. Farias says that since Bolsonaro's election, there has been a movement to destroy the spaces

51

for democratic construction, either by extinction or making them inoperable due to underfunding.

According to him, this dynamic ends up resonating in the local level. The councils of right in

Florianópolis, for instance, lack minimum operational structures to functioning, such as meeting

rooms and material. Romão adds that the current conjuncture has emptied the councils’ agendas,

limiting the performance of social movements, stigmatized as “leftist stuff.” The result is that social

policies issues, which are under the purview of the Social Assistance Secretariat, end up being

relegated to purely assistencialist activities driven by volunteer actions. Farias says:

Today, all the essential services of social assistance are relegated to volunteer work. […] Our current

conjuncture is the following: In the municipality, the social welfare policy is desperate [emphasis added]. We had a growing understanding that social assistance was a public policy, and from one

moment to another, the municipality's understanding is that social assistance is an assistencialism organ.

Their big flag is the SOMAR network. The SOMAR network is the First Lady's institution. […] It is desperate, man. Because the entire City Hall takes out the budget from social assistance and asks

[people] to make donations to the SOMAR network.

Once again, we return to Dagnino (2004), when the author argues that the appeal to private

solidarity becomes the main resource of managers whose motto is to block the political dimension of

citizenship. At this point, we must make a critical review about the role and the pathways to be

followed by the network’s actors, once the current scenario undermines not only public resources for

social policies but also obstructs the democratic channels for citizenship building.

As pointed out by Abers et al (2018), social movements actors should not be seen as a passive

players whose action relies on political opportunities. Although changes in the regime’s governing

coalitions have drastic effects on social movements influence in public policies setting, the authors

point out that the consolidation of the subsystem might be the key for the agendas to be put forward

even in unfavorable conditions like the present one. In this sense, special attention should be given to

the reciprocal agency of actors and institutions acting within the regimes and subsystems: just as the

social movements cannot perform in public policies without forming alliances with the political class,

the latter needs the support of the movements in order to set the agenda. This relationship becomes

clear in Salomon's statement:

And that is why I always demanded this, from all the entities, and I always made this very clear. That

the space of the Legislative Assembly was a fundamental space for articulating the construction of legislations. […] So, I think that one strategy that we should adopt is to build a joint effort to pressure

the state government to put a budget for this public policy. And then talk to the state government to

sincerely embrace this cause. What we have seen since the extinction of CRAI is that the evangelical

churches, the Catholic churches, the social organization groups, the NGOs, the federal universities themselves, they have to lead this role [because] the Assembly makes the law. The Executive

executes. [and society, on its turn] must demand the execution. […] Because if we don't do this, if we,

entities of civil society, and the Legislative Assembly don't debate this, we will not insert the immigrant in society. The immigrant needs to feel the protagonist on this.

52

Salomon complemented it by saying that raising the participation of migrant leaders in

Councils of Right might be the key to make them feel protagonists in the cause, setting the agenda on

many fronts. Regina Suenes, who works at the Management of Racial and Migratory Issues of Santa

Catarina’s Social Assistance Secretariat and who was also interviewed, pointed out that many times

migration is relegated as an exclusive Social Assistance issue, which limits the execution of a

transversal public policy as it should be. She adds by saying that migrant participation in all Councils

of Right is crucial to change this mindset, especially for migrant women, once the challenges faced

by them are not only a Social Assistance issue, but should also be discussed within the scope of

Education, Health, Labor, Housing, and the Council of Women itself. As stated by Scherer-Warren

(2012), the political mobilization to empower individuals to claim their rights in political instances is

fundamental for the elaboration and implementation of public policies. Although all people

interviewed cited the importance of involving the migrant community in the policymaking processes,

most of them recognized that there is a failure to engage this participation in a representative and

substantial way. According to research about migrant communities in the city of São Paulo (Nogueira

2019; Rosaboni 2019; and Kanas 2018), migrant engagement might be a decisive point for the

recognition of the migratory policy as a priority by the Executive branch. Having that said, the next

subsection will analyze the particularities of Florianópolis’ network in addressing the issue of migrant

participation in advocacy instances, in an attempt to contribute for a propositional discussion on the

topic, underresearched so far.

4.1.3 The underrepresentation of migrant women in advocacy settings

Scherer-Warren (2012) points out that public policies aiming to suppress historical injustices

can only occur when the target individuals of such policies exercise their full citizenship potential.

The author claims that this can be achieved when institutional channels of participation commit to

the construction of citizens of right, enabling people to be active players in public policies discussion

and implementation, “owning their own lives” (Ibid). Therefore, while networks demand and help to

build new institutional channels so people can monitor and participate in policymaking by one hand,

they also work on the political education of individuals to prepare them to make claims on political

platforms, on the other. Teixeira (2016) complements this by adding that when social movement

networks that engage with the state in the delivery of public policies are committed to their respective

communities, they fortify collective actions in order to make beneficiaries not mere “service

consumers”, but subjects of right, building engaged citizens along the implementation process (Ibid).

53

Although migrant collectives were present in the spaces of advocacy and formulation of the

legislations approved in Florianópolis, such participation has turned out to be quite unstable and

inconsistent. The interviewees point out several reasons for this: the meetings times, which in their

majority occurred during business hours; migrants’ priority in solving more urgent matters, such as

searching for jobs; and the fear of participating in political spaces, since several communities have

received xenophobic attacks from part of the Florianopolitan political class. This subsection will try

to go further in this discussion, once the participation of the migrant community has shown itself as

the key for settling a policy that aims to be sustainable and long-term oriented.

I start by presenting the reflections of two interviewees not previously introduced: Merlina

Saudade and Karine de Souza Silva. Saudade migrated from Venezuela to Brazil across the land

border in the state of Roraima in 2016. She lived in the capital city of Boa Vista for two years, where

she was active in welcoming Venezuelan migrants alongside civil society organizations and

international organizations. Educated in psychology, she worked with the United Nations Population

Fund in the campaign "Elas Somos Nós" (They Are Us), directed to combat xenophobia against

Venezuelans, besides being actively engaged in advocacy spaces claiming migrants’ rights. She

migrated to Florianópolis in 2018 and since then has been involved in advocacy spaces in the city

together with other Venezuelan nationals, besides being the director of the NGO Africa of the Heart,

which holds a seat in the National Council of Human Rights. Her scope of action has been to denounce

the various human rights violations suffered by Venezuelans in Brazil, besides accompanying the

meetings of the Permanent State Forum of Social Assistance of Santa Catarina state (FEPAS).

Silva, in turn, is a teacher at the Federal University of Santa Catarina (UFSC). She coordinates

the Sérgio Vieira de Mello Chair (CSVM) at UFSC since its establishment in 2014 through the

extension nucleus of Eirene Center for Postcolonial and Decolonial Research and Practices applied

to International Relations and International Law. As previously presented in chapter two,

CSVM/Eirene28 fieldwork has been crucial not only to provide essential services to the migrant

population in Florianópolis/Santa Catarina, but also to produce research on the reality of those people

and use this material in advocacy settings demanding accountability. She participated in the

construction of important advocacy instances such as GAIRF and GTI, and also trained students

interested in the cause who are current players in the network. Silva stresses that CSVM/Eirene’s

work is grounded by a Freirean perspective on education, aiming to construct knowledge in a non-

hierarchical dialogue with the migrant community.

28 For more on the work of CSVM/Eirene in promoting the rights of immigrants in Santa Catarina, see:

“Internationalization aimed at global social justice: Brazilian university initiatives to integrate refugees and displaced

populations” by De Wit, Leal, and Unangst (2021).

54

When making a historical review of the networks’ track record over the years, Silva

commented that it has always acted in a very organic way, without thinking about long term planning.

She divides this trajectory in two moments: pre-CRAI and post-CRAI. In the pre-CRAI moment, we

lived a very different historical moment, she says. There was a left-wing government in power and

there was the Haitian migration, which she considers a turning point for migration policies. While

Brazil had strategic interests in Haiti, leading the Peace Mission in the country, the migration of

Haitian people stirred up a lot of attention in the media and in Brazilian society in overall. Therefore,

both national and international contexts culminated in a favorable environment to promote reception

policies with government support. The post-CRAI juncture, on the other hand, is marked by the

withdrawal of the state as a provider of rights and a protagonism of civil society organizations and

international organizations as service suppliers, which Silva considers a hinderance to long-term

policies. In her perspective, the reassertion of alliances with the legislative chamber is indispensable

to change this scenario, and the migrant community should be leading this process. She adds:

Now we have a huge job to do. Because in any case it is necessary to rearticulate contacts, including

with immigrants. I think that it is necessary to bring these people to the table, to talk. But, before anything

else, it is necessary to promote alliances with the Legislative branch. Because we cannot implement norms if we cannot have a communication channel with the Legislative and with the Executive. [...]

But it is necessary to find formulas, and we are already doing that. [...] But I think that this is the idea,

to strengthen the network. Strengthen. To find solidarity strategies. But, again, I think that the fact that we don't have a Center that is a little bit protagonist in this cause is a little bit bad. Because, again, we

manage to do things according to what is possible, and according to what is happening. We are reacting.

But it would be necessary to find propositional strategies. To think long term and promote alliances.

Without alliances we can't do anything.

It is noteworthy that both Silva points out that in addition to the difficulty of seeing immigrants

in debate spaces, representativeness is even less common when it comes to migrant women. Such

reality corroborates what many researches in the field of gender and migration (Stefoni et al., 2018;

Lutz 2010; Morokvasic 1984) point out. According to them, the male bias in migration research has

portrayed women who migrate as merely companions of their partners, “passive victims of their

destiny” (Lutz, 2010), labeling their reasons as “personal, minor, emotional, familial or individual,

drawing on the stereotyped view assigned to women” (Morokvasic 1984, p. 898). Although there is

a growing academic production that recognizes this gap, little has changed in terms of impact on

policy making (Ibid, 1984). The failure to address gender-specific migration experiences and the

assumptions that their place of action is merely the household sphere has overlooked important factors

that hinder migrant women's access to rights in host societies. Boyd & Grieco (2003) point out that

“because migrant women are often viewed by the state as ‘dependents’, their rights may become

dependent – sometimes precariously so – on the migration and residency status of other family

members” (Boyd & Grieco, 2003, p. 04). This dynamic affects women’s ability to access language

55

and job training classes, which in turn jeopardizes the chances of economic independence and

freedom to make their own choices, leaving them much more susceptible to abusive relationships and

aggressions. In this sense, Saudade points out:

And the tendency that I have noticed, which is a very frightening question that I am feeling now, that I

hadn't felt before, I think that because of the pandemic, is a new variable, which is psychological violence. [...] And I am in great demand, because I am Venezuelan, and I speak Spanish, and some

women recognize me as a leader, I am receiving many women who say "He doesn’t hit me.

But he does things that hurts me even more". [...] And so, until the woman is not dead, nobody helps her. And there is subjective death, you know? There are emotional deaths that we can't really take in.

And this is still a question that scares me. Because the indices of physical violence are increasing.

Undeniable. [...] And I don't think we have… [...] civil society doesn't have the structure for this […] Civil society has to function as a support. Not as a problem-solving protagonist. Because it does not

have this condition of continuity.

Field research such as that of Nunes (2020) points out that investing in female leaders is

crucial to build public policies that take into account women’s civil, political, and social rights and

go beyond the standardized forms that treat the beneficiaries as passive receivers and not actors

capable of exercising their full citizen potential. Therefore, strengthening the dialogue with the

migrant community within the democratic debate spaces becomes one of the key points for the

migratory public policy to go beyond reactive and contingent responses. Saudade's participation in

forums like FEPAS demonstrates this feature:

I think that the important point too, that I mentioned at the beginning, is not to take social assistance

support as if it were a favor. I think that the understanding of what social assistance means in Brazil is

that it is a favor. And it is not a favor. Social assistance is to balance the forces between social classes. […] And not charity. I think that when we start there, we'll have better results from social assistance.

[…] So we are not thinking of entering into welfare policies of handing out food baskets and such. We

want the personal development of immigrants in society.

Saudade also states that she is now enrolled in mobilizing a Venezuelan association to request

funds from the Municipality to build a space for children, since the lack of daycare is one of the main

issues brought by women who are in vulnerable situations. She is also preparing herself to run for a

seat in the Social Assistance Council in two years, in order to bring these issues to public policies’

agenda. Saudade's words jibes with Miraftab’s (2004) who points out that grassroot movements often

mobilize in a wide range of citizenship spaces, being it informal (migrant associations) or formal ones

(councils and forums set up by the government). Miraftab (2004) also highlights that although

informal practices follow no master plan, they are always situated in specific contexts. While the

focus might be survival strategies at a specific time, at others they move to strategies of resistance,

challenging the structural hardships imposed by the status quo. When women take the lead, there is a

challenge in the binary constructions of public-private spheres, framing new formulations for

citizenship. This happens because by bringing issues that happen at the neighborhood level to

institutional spaces, they politicize issues traditionally seen as “private and personal”, such as

56

childcare. Saudade's engagement in Santa Catarina’s Permanent Forum of Social Assistance pervades

her experience as immigrant, mother, woman, psychologist, and Venezuelan leader living in Brazil.

By questioning the conception of social assistant as charity, she challenges a status quo that has been

the neoliberal operational motto in the country. Strengthening migrant women participation in

policymaking instances might be a pathway to move forward in the unfavorable political scenario.

For this to be possible, the support of civil society and social movement networks is critical. Saudade

tells us that:

The [migration] law is great, very inclusive and so on, but it lacks the strength of immigrants'

participation in this process. [...] [In Roraima] I was able to mark some agendas that are still raised by my friends who stayed there. We had this support, from IOM and civil society. And I don't feel that

here. I feel that here the immigrant don't have a leading role. And one thing I felt, in Roraima, was that

I had the freedom to say, “Oh, it's happening this, this and this. This way”. And even the Sister who supported me, she would say: “oh, you think so? let's articulate it well”. She wasn't afraid to say things.

And this contributed a lot to us getting the attention of the Public Ministry, the Public Defender's Office,

the Ministry of Labor... you know? the bishop of Boa Vista itself. They weren't easy issues to talk about. But when you have this support, you manage. [...] And [here] there is a selective protagonism. Like, “If

I like what you say, I will support you”. [...] And I have a defect, which I sometimes see as a defect.

That... when it is a right that I have, I don't have to be grateful. You know? I don't have to be grateful

for a right. A right is a right. I don’t have to say thank you for what is my right.

4.2 Findings

It is possible to dwell on several points of analysis when doing a thematic-theoretical

investigation of the narratives presented by the interviewees crossed with Scherer-Warren's (2012)

theories of social movement networks and Abers’s and Tatagiba’s (2018) rationale on social

movement networks’ relational structures within regimes and subsystems.

First of all, we must pay attention to the fact that the current migration flows in Brazil and in

the state of Santa Catarina are embedded in south-south migration waves, be they from neighboring

countries such as Venezuela, Argentina, and Paraguay; people from the Afro-diaspora such as the

Senegalese, or Haitians. When migrating to Brazil, these people feel the oppressions of race, class,

and gender even more accentuated by the fact that they do not speak Portuguese and find additional

(bureaucratic, social) barriers when trying to access rights and public services. In this sense, these

groups share the oppressions lived by other (Brazilian) groups, such as the indigenous and the black

populations, as a result of a colonial setting that erases their identities and existences.

It is no wonder that the state of Santa Catarina (which, it is worth remembering, was shaped

out of an eugenicist, sexist, and racist migration policy) continues to make these people invisible by

not providing services that enable the full exercise of their rights in the Brazilian territory, despite its

legal warranty. Nor is it a coincidence that such demands find support in advocacy instances such as

GTI, where the participation of militants and parties linked to racial movements is extremely

57

powerful. In this sense, the testimonies presented by the legislative representatives corroborate

Scherer Warren’s (2012) thoughts when she claims that groups that share the same types of exclusion

and subalternity might form an emancipatory discourse, establishing chains of equivalence in order

to articulate demands that are not met by institutional politics (Laclau, 2011). The creation of GTI

itself and the migration laws enacted in Santa Catarina are products of emancipatory discourses whose

core action is to attack a social regime that oppresses and excludes racialized migrants’ existence and

identities. It seeks, therefore, to contribute to a new project of a nation that recognizes the existence

of pluralities within the country – which is the social movement networks’ basis of action (Burity

2008; Scherer-Warren, 2012).

With the creation of GTI, a demand that came from the migrant collectives and grassroots

movements themselves, it was possible to institutionalize a channel to debate and frame concrete

policies for the migrant population. The most concrete result of this work was the creation of CRAI,

a public policy resulting from the intense advocacy work of the several entities and collectives

working on the migration cause in Santa Catarina. When analyzing such dynamic within the

theoretical lenses developed by Abers and Tatagiba et al (2018), it is possible to affirm that the entities

active in GAIRF and GTI took advantage of a political opportunity – in this case, the Ministry of

Justice call in 2016 – when the regime in power was attentive to migration issues, to mobilize actors

towards a common outcome. Although the ruling government coalition was of extreme importance

in terms of resource allocation, it is at the subsystem’s level that the role of the network becomes

even more noticeable. The GTI, a group institutionalized within the Human Rights Commission of

the Legislative Assembly of Santa Catarina, can be defined as an example of subsystem where

popular movements meet to monitor and demand specific (migration) policies from the state. Thus,

GTI not only took advantage of the regime in vogue in 2015/2016 with the Ministry of Justice's call

for CRAI’s opening but was also essential to raise awareness of migratory issues among the political

class. This work was of extreme importance for CRAI’s launching with Santa Catarina Social

Assistance own resources, at the time headed by a former deputy who had already been sensitized by

GTI debates.

However, contrary to the hypotheses formulated by Abers at al (2018), the GTI (subsystem)

was substantially affected by the regime change that occurred in the 2018 elections, as the neoliberal

agenda took over the country, weakening and depoliticizing debate spaces such as working groups

and Councils of Right at all levels. Since then, the network has responded to migration issues in a

reactive manner, being forced to focus efforts on providing short-term provisions such as hunger

relief and shelter, especially after the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak. The fact that civil society

organizations rely on funds coming from international organizations bound to agencies whose line of

58

action is oriented to a neoliberal scope ends up depoliticizing their performance, a perfect illustration

of what Dagnino (2004) conceptualizes as “perverse confluence”.

Nonetheless, the approval of the migration laws at the state and municipal level in 2020

demonstrates that the alliances between social movement networks and political allies done at the

subsystem level are still active, despite the unfavorable regime. The debates around its

implementation may lead to a reorientation of the networks’ action towards concrete policies again.

However, at this point it becomes necessary to emphasize what has perhaps been the biggest failure:

such advocacy spaces for debate lack substantial participation of the migrant community, especially

migrant women, who are the ones who most bear the consequences of the neoliberal regime, as

pointed out by feminist economists (Prügl 2017; Seguino & Grown 2006), migration researchers

(Boyd & Grieco 2003; Morokvasic 1984), and social workers (Nunes, 2020).

As long as reactive responses continue to be the rule, migrant women's rights will keep to be

curtailed, since the lack of essential services such as daycare, presented by the interviewees as one of

the main factors obstructing them in accessing the labor market and becoming self-sufficient, cannot

be answered by civil society projects, and require long-term advocacy work. Saudade’s accounts

demonstrate that when women who are leaders at the grassroot level engage in institutional politics,

new perspectives might be brought up to policymaking, collapsing the public-private bias by

politicizing the issues happening in the neighborhood as highlighted by Miraftab (2004). In this sense,

turning the movement's foundations towards the empowerment of grassroots leaders to participate in

political platforms might be a guiding course of action for the network’s next steps in the

implementation process.

59

Concluding words

My aim in this research was to analyze the contribution of host society organizations to the

formulation and implementation of local public policies for migrant women living in Florianópolis.

In order to answer such questioning, I made use of academic works on the theme, empirical data

analysis, and interviews with key players in the network. This led me to outline four distinct chapters,

comprising: a theoretical and bibliography review on social movements in Latin America and Brazil;

a revision of Brazilian migration policies and how they shaped social movement networks dealing

with migration in Florianópolis/Santa Catarina; and finally, a chapter presenting experts’ perspectives

on the current political scenario and possible pathways to be taken to implement long-term policies

in the migration field, besides the methodology chapter.

Throughout Chapter One, I analyzed the roots of Latin American and Brazilian social

movement networks and to which extent they impacted public policy formulation from the mid-

1980s-1990s, exploring the general aim of this study. The bibliographical review shows us that

grassroots mobilization, fortified in the 1970s in response to the obstruction of democratic channels

by the dictatorship rule, was crucial to solidifying citizens’ participation in policymaking during the

democratization process. As highlighted by Fernandes (1999) this happened because people who were

engaged in grassroots movements presented themselves as interest groups during the Constitution’s

draft in 1988, constructing mechanisms that enabled society’s direct participation in the formulation

and monitoring of public policies – the Councils of Right and Participatory Budgets are some

prominent examples of this. Burity (2008) expands the discussion by stating that from the 1990s on,

the interaction of different movements in councils and forums contributed to bringing new themes

and agendas to policymaking. From then on, the discussion on social movement networks starts to

emerge. Scherer-Warren (2006; 2012), one of the main Brazilian authorities on the theme, has

produced several studies on the importance of social movement networks’ discourses to shape public

policies that address the multiple subordinations faced by ethnic, racial, and gender minorities in the

country, which were essential to understanding the trajectory of the social movement networks in the

migration field based in Florianópolis, which I present in Chapter Two.

In Chapter Two, I discussed the context set in place when the Florianópolis’ social movement

network on migration rose and what role it played to foster public policies in this field, addressing

specific question number one of this research. In order to explore this, I revised Brazilian migration

policies throughout the centuries. The literature explored (Carneiro 2018; Seyferth 2011) showed us

that Santa Catarina state was built out of a eugenic, racist, and sexist migration policy that contributed

to erasing ethnic minorities’ identities from the state’s historiography. Silva & Castelan (2019) and

60

Silva et al (2020) extend the analysis by arguing that such institutional racism resonates in the

invisibilization of migrants from the global south, who share many layers of subalternity with other

groups whose rights have been suppressed by the colonial rule. It was in this scenario that the social

movement network in migration emerged in Florianópolis, one of the main destination cities of

Haitian immigrants in 2014/2015. The expressive number of people arriving in a city with no structure

to meet their demands led several host society institutions in charge of migrants’ reception to organize

in forums such as GAIRF to demand governments’ accountability, culminating in the creation of GTI,

a watershed to migration policymaking in the city.

In exploring the relational structures that condition social movement networks’ ability to

influence policymaking, Abers et al (2018) and Tatagiba et al (2018) tell us that social movements

and public policies are mutually influenced in a sense that public policies (or the lack of it) influence

the emergence and social movements’ scope of action, which in turn impact public policies

formulation and implementation through agenda setting, advocacy work, and so on. According to the

authors, there are two instances that guide social movements’ performance in setting public policies:

regimes and subsystems. The authors define regimes as a structure of relations among politically

relevant actors with institutional arrangements, rules, and ideas who are led by government coalitions

that might ease or obstruct social movements’ participation in policymaking. Subsystems, on the other

hand, are specialized arrangements that gather in more or less cohesive groups and direct their efforts

to some specific aspects concerning a policy. When applying such concepts in empirical cases during

and after the Workers’ Party's rule in the federal government, the authors concluded that when social

movements occupy important positions within the regime, the possibilities of accessing and

constructing policies increase. Although regime change can lead to drastic changes, the strength of

the subsystems can be the key to avoid setbacks.

Revisiting the theoretical model proposed by the aforementioned authors is important to

understand the trajectory of the social movement network I am analyzing in chapters two and four.

In Chapter Two, we learned that the regime set in place by the time of the Haitian migration in

Florianópolis was crucial to enable the network entities to demand concrete policies for migrants’

reception. By opening communication channels with civil society entities through national

conferences on migration such as COMIGRAR, Rousseff’s government realized the importance of

setting a budget for migration reception policies. This led to the launching of a public notice to open

Reference Centers across the country. The entities around GTI, which can be considered a public

policy subsystem, directed their efforts to CRAI’s opening accordingly, demonstrating the relational

structures of regimes and subsystems in policymaking. The impact of the regime shift can be

perceived right after the coup that resulted in the impeachment of President Rousseff, obstructing the

61

transfer of resources to operationalize the service. As pointed out by Abers and Tatagiba (2018), the

work done at the subsystem’s level was essential to open the service with Santa Catarina state’s

budget, once the public manager responsible for the folder was a former deputy that had been

sensitized by GTI’s debates and decided to open the service with its resources.

Nonetheless, we have seen in Chapter Four that the election of Bolsonaro in 2018 marked an

unprecedented setback when it comes to the allocation of resources to social policies and the

operationalization of participative instances to monitor them. The impact on migration policies

happened accordingly: CRAI was shut down in September 2019. The COVID-19 pandemic and the

deterioration of the situation in Venezuela led most civil society organizations to focus their activities

on relief programs to cover essential services not provided by the state, in a dynamic that Dagnino

(2004) calls a “perverse confluence”. Despite performing an outstanding job, those organizations are

found in an unstable situation, once their main funding source are agencies whose support might shift

from year to year. Moreover, the focus on delivering tangible results in the short-term time-lapse end

up hampering collective actions demanded by groups who are most affected by the neoliberal agenda,

such as migrant women.

However, the enactment of migration laws at the city and state level amid the pandemic might

be a sign that despite that advocacy instances have been hampered by the upsurging of the neoliberal

regime and social distance needs, the alliances built with the Legislative at the subsystem’s level are

still functioning. As informants’ have highlighted throughout Chapter Four, it is a premise of the

entities organized around the network to set the agenda to implement such policies. Notwithstanding,

we should remember that such implementation must enroll the active participation of leaders from

the various migrant communities living in Florianópolis to go beyond reactive and emergency actions.

As explored by feminist scholars such as Miraftab (2004) and Nunes (2020), when female leaders

whose militancy is grounded in the neighborhood level access institutional political platforms, they

disrupt binary assumptions of what is private and what is public, pushing for demands that meet

women’s collective (social, political, and economic) needs. Saudade’s testimony on her perceptions

about the Florianópolis network demonstrate that there is a failure in supporting migrants to exercise

their citizenship potential in the city. When we add the gender aspect, this representation is even

smaller.

So, when we reflect on the main lessons and contributions that the Florianópolis’ network can

give in fostering public policies for migrant women living in in the city, we can dwell on many

aspects. First of all, I should state that these organizations are not mere aid providers: they perform

as a reference point, often the only one, to people and women who do not find a response to their

claims in public facilities. Besides offering essential services for migrants, CSOs act as a bridge in

62

the access to public devices, being the only ones capable to provide accurate information about

migratory issues to public servants themselves. All these aspects make this network a powerful

resource in fostering public policies that go beyond relief actions. Nonetheless, these have been

roughly impacted by the regimes’ shift and are frequently forced to be short-term oriented, given the

funders’ requests and the emergencies they need to respond. So, to ensure that migrant women will

have their rights fulfilled in host society, the network might find ways to work within the subsystems

constructed along the years to build platforms where migrants can exercise their full citizenship

potential. In doing so, they may dismantle the view that social policies’ beneficiaries are passive

receivers that should be grateful for the bare minimum. After all, one should not have to say thank

you for a right.

63

List of References

Primary sources

Interviews

A. Farias, personal communication, March 09, 2021.

B. Kadletz, personal communication, March 02, 2021.

E. Gestal, personal communication, March 04, 2021.

I. Azevedo, personal communication, March 08, 2021.

J. Romão, personal communication, March 11, 2021.

K.S. Silva, personal communication, March 30, 2021.

M. Salomon, personal communication, March 12, 2021.

M. Saudade, personal communication, March 05, 2021.

R. Suenes, personal communication, March 10, 2021.

Reports

Circles of Hospitality. Project Description and Budget. Florianópolis. Institutional archive (2021).

CRAI/SC. May-December 2018 Social Work Report. Florianópolis. Institutional archive (2018).

Legislations

Política Municipal para a População Migrante (2020). Law nº 10.735 (Brazil).

Política Estadual para a População Migrante (2020). Law nº 18.018 (Brazil).

Secondary sources

Abers, R. N., Silva, M. K., & Tatagiba, L. (2018). Movimentos Sociais E Políticas Públicas:

Repensando Atores E Oportunidades Políticas. In Lua Nova: Revista de Cultura e Política (Issue

105). https://doi.org/10.1590/0102-015046/105

Agência Brasil. (2020, October 23). IBGE: número de desempregados chega a 13,5 milhões em

setembro. https://agenciabrasil.ebc.com.br/economia/noticia/2020-10/ibge-numero-de-

desempregados-chega-135-milhoes-em-setembro

Alvarez , S. , Dagnino , E. , and Escobar , A.( 1998 ) ‘Introduction: the cultural and the political in

Latin American social movements’ , in S. Alvarez ,E. Dagnino , and A. Escobar(eds.) Culture of

politics, politics of culture: re-visioning Latin American social movements, Boulder, CO :

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Annex 1 – Interview guide for civil society organization representatives

Introduction [same for all guides]

The purpose of this interview is to contribute to the master's research entitled "Social movement

networks and public policy making for migrant women: the case of Florianópolis, Brazil". The

interview will be recorded, transcribed and translated into English. In case the interviewee does not

want any specific speech to be transcribed, s/he should inform the interviewer by late April.

The objective of the research is to analyze the contribution of host society organizations to the

formulation and implementation of public policies for migrant women living in Florianópolis and its

metropolitan region. Besides analyzing the laws that have been enacted, the research will rely on

semi-structured interviews with key players in the network: representatives of civil society

organizations, leaders of the migrant community, political advisors and people holding public

positions in the Secretariat of Social Assistance.

Let me know if you want to stop me to ask any clarification at any time.

Questions

What is your name, position, and organization? Can you tell a little about the history of the

organization? (Please list staff and how it is financially supported).

Is your organization part of any networking initiatives? Please give an overview of the history of

networking.

What are the main projects that your organization currently manages? Do any of them have a gender

focus? Which of them are related to the federal government's internalization program?

If yes, why is it important to have projects that focus on migrant women?

What are the main constraints that the organization is currently facing?

What relationship does your organization have with public agencies to resolve the main obstacles? Is

70

there any kind of support from public authorities for this?

In your view, what are the main challenges that migrant women face in Brazil / in Florianópolis,

considering their various intersections?

What should a public policy for migrants be like? Do you consider the gender variable important in

this public policy?

What mechanisms should this policy devise to: 1. be gender sensitive and 2. guarantee migrants'

access to public policies?

Did your organization contribute to the formulation of the laws? if yes, how? Has the organization

maintained contact with public actors since their approval?

Who benefits from a policy for the migrant population? Do you think that a welcoming policy for the

migrant population can also benefit the local population?

71

Annex 2 – Interview guide for political advisors and public servants

Questions

Ask the interviewee to introduce himself/herself and talk a bit about the history of the mandate and

his/her involvement in the creation of this law

What are the next steps to be taken towards the implementation of the law? What is the role of civil

society and the migrant population itself in this process? (Councils?)

What are the main challenges and obstacles to be faced to make the policy effective? (budget?)

What should a State/Municipal policy for the Migrant Population look like?

What mechanisms should this policy devise to: 1. be gender sensitive and 2. ensure migrants' access

to public policies?

How can State devices be equipped to ensure that the rights of migrants are respected?

How can the state law and the municipal law complement each other to ensure that a policy for the

migrant population is effective?

During the pandemic, was there any conversation between the two instances to think of emergency

and long-term public policies for immigrants?

Who benefits from a policy for the migrant population? Do you believe that a welcoming policy for

the migrant population can also benefit the local population?

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Annex 3 - Interview guide for activists and scholars

Questions

What is your name and involvement with the cause?

Is your collective part of any networking work? Give an overview of the history of networking.

Are you part of any advocacy instance?

What relationship does your collective have with public authorities? Is there any kind of support from

public authorities to respond to the advocacy work?

In your view, what are the main challenges that migrant women face in Brazil / in Florianópolis,

considering their various intersections?

What should a public policy for migrants look like? Do you consider the gender variable important

in this public policy?

What mechanisms should this policy devise to: 1. be gender sensitive and 2. guarantee migrants'

access to public policies?

Has your collective contributed to the formulation of the laws? if yes, how? Has the collective

maintained contact with public actors since its approval?

Who benefits from a policy for the migrant population? Do you think that a welcoming policy for the

migrant population can also benefit the local population?

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