There is an undeniable distress both within and outside of the Brazilian government in regards to the macroeconomic policies enacted by President Lula. There is a clash of two perspectives, each one with its own logic and corresponding discourse.

The first perspective is fixated on the economy, and it is based on the idea that after applying very stringent fiscal policies, there is undeniable economic growth, inflation and the dollar value are under control, there is a better balance between GNP and the foreign debt, which is being repaid, and employment is growing.

The other perspective regards society as a whole, and it looks at truly frightening data such as the 2002 Report on Human Rights in Brazil. Almost all negative indicators have either stayed the same or have gotten worse: salaries have gone down, violence in the city and elsewhere has gone up, slave labor remains, no progress in the negotiations with indigenous peoples, a stalled agrarian reform, and political movements that have stopped or where people feel completely disenfranchised. Critical analysis shows that the social crisis is, in part, the price paid for economic development.

But then, the question arises: what good is economic growth without social development? What little we gain in terms of economic growth does not result in any kind of social benefits for the great, impoverished and excluded majorities. Those that earned well before, now earn much more. Those that didn’t, still don’t.

There is no evidence of the promised changes. We expected so much from Lula, the son of social chaos, survivor of the historical tribulation of the humiliated! We thought he would finally put in place a path to freedom…He was elected under that banner, and when he gained power, he changed his program. The national and international elites succeded in dragging him towards their logic, towards the prevailing neoliberal model. But he who goes through that door is lost. That door could well be emblazoned with Dante’s phrase: “ Those who enter, leave behind all hope”. Behind it only the interests of capital count. And to think that he used to represent workers…

But, to be sincere, what did we expect? We wished that Lula, with his lively history and with the novelty of the PT election, would be able to begin to overcome neoliberalism through a renegotiation with the IMF about how the debt should be repaid. We expected him to subjugate the dominant, ultra-rich elites to the logic of social policy and its realities, so that they would finally begin to pay the social debt accumulated through the years with the people. This has not come to be. He has been the victim of the rancid policies of the elites, which the historian Jose Honorio Rodrigues described very well: “Elites always try to reconcile among themselves, before conceding anything to the people.”

We are sad for ourselves. Either we were naïve, or we did not have enough strength to impose a new path for the country. Perhaps we have not yet succeded in creating a leader with enough courage for true, innovative change.

I still trust Lula, the person. He is honest, and would not betray his dreams. He is charismatic, and I believe capable of changing, though first he needs to understand what he has always preached: capitalism is only good for capitalists, never for workers. Workers need a different type of economy, where they are not only the beneficiaries, but the main actors.

(translated by Daniel Morduchowicz)

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