The World Bank and the Inter-American
Development Bank (IDB) extol the importance
of involving civil society in the projects that they
fund. From the Amazon rainforest to southern
megacities like So Paulo, local communities and
non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in Brazil
understand how things really work: despite the
rhetoric, the Brazilian government and the multi-
lateral lending institutions lack the political will to
create institutional mechanisms to facilitate a
democratic dialogue with the populations affected
by the projects.
To give one example, the World Bank invested
more than US$500 million over the course of the
1980s to support the Brazilian government’s
Polonoroeste project in Rond6nia, which has been
called the greatest ecological disaster ever funded
by the Bank. This megaproject was supposed to
rationalize the colonization process, provide local
infrastructure, and protect indigenous areas in the
Amazon. Hundreds of indigenous peoples, rural
workers and rubber-tappers were expelled from
their lands after a road to the interior was paved,
yet they had no say in the project’s design at all.
Acknowledging its part in that debacle, the Bank
is now investing US$167 million in a new project
called Planafloro, which is supposed to reflect
a more sustainable approach to development in
the area affected by the previous project.
Although good in intention, Planafloro was not
designed with the involvement of local communi-
ties either. The Bank only initiated a process of con-
sultation after being pressured by Northern envi-
ronmental groups. Local organizations are now
petitioning the World Bank’s Inspection Panel to
investigate Planafloro. Neither the Brazilian gov-
ernment nor the Bank seems to be interested in
pursuing this investigation even though local orga-
nizations have presented compelling evidence of
Fatira Vianna Mello is a member of the Federation of
Educational and Social Assistance Organizations (FASE), one of
the founding organizations of the Brazil Network on
Multilateral Financial Institutions.
significant problems with the way the project is
being implemented.’
Brazil is among the five biggest World Bank bor-
rowers, along with China, Mexico, Indonesia and
Russia. In 1994, Brazil had the most projects funded
by the World Bank, and was third in total amount of
loans. 2 Brazilian activists have become fed up with
the lack of transparency and accountability that has
resulted in socially and environmentally unsustain-
able projects like the Polonoroeste and Planafloro.
For many years, Brazilian organizations turned to
their international allies-mainly U.S. NGOs-to stop
or give a more sustainable direction to develop-
ment-bank projects. Brazilian groups found it diffi-
cult to coordinate their local organizing efforts and
municipal and federal governments were not open
to a dialogue, leading to a reliance on Northern
allies. These international alliances are still crucial.
Besides putting Brazilian struggles in international
context, their Northern allies feed Brazilian activists
information and advocate on their behalf in
Washington, D.C.
Brazilian NGOs, however, felt that Brazil lacked a
domestic forum that could highlight and link up the
many localized struggles taking place across the
country. Various Brazilian organizations were
already monitoring the development banks, and
working with local populations affected by their
projects. But to be effective in an immense and com-
plex country like Brazil, activists began to realize the
importance of fortifying their struggles at the
national level. With a national organization, the
Brazilian government and the multilateral lending
institutions would be pressured on two fronts: from
domestic forces in Brazil as well as from their inter-
national allies.
In March, 1995, 35 groups came together to form
the Brazil Network on Multilateral Financial Insti-
tutions. So far, the Network includes development,
environmental, labor, research, educational, urban,
religious, cultural, and rural workers’ organizations.
Its main goal is to increase civil society’s participation
in the design, planning and implementation of
development-bank projects. The organization also
hopes to influence public policy by promoting a dia-
logue between civil society and the Brazilian gov-
ernment. To that end, the Network is lobbying the
federal government and the National Congress to
create a permanent institution that would give civil
society more input into the allocation of develop-
ment-bank funds.
Another central goal of the Network is to publi-
cize and support local organizing experiences. The
national media rarely cover grassroots social move-
ments, even when they successfully derail environ-
mentally and socially destructive projects and pro-
pose innovative alternatives. The Network intends
to publish information about these local struggles
and to widen public awareness more generally
about the presence of multilateral lending institu-
tions in the country. The Network also maintains an
electronic conference where it posts information
about its activities as well as urgent-action appeals.
At the international level, the Network has built
excellent working links with the Latin American and
Caribbean Network on Multilateral Banks, with focal
points in Montevideo (at the Third World Network)
and in Washington, D.C. (at the Bank Information
Center). The Network also supports initiatives such
as the 50 Years is Enough campaign in the United
States, and disseminates information about these
campaigns in Brazil.
The creation of the Brazil Network will hopefully
contribute to the struggle to democratize multilat-
eral lending institutions. In concert with other such
movements across the globe, the Network is pushing
institutions like the World Bank and the IDB to pro-
mote development strategies that work for people,
not against them.u
1. Stephan Schwartzman, “A Sociedade Civil e os Bancos
Multilaterais no Brasil Diagndstico e Propostas Para DiscUssao,”
Environmental Defense Fund and Instituto Socioambiental,
August, 1995.
2 Henrique Barros and Michael Bailey, ‘Para Comprender e
Dialogar corn Organismos Multilaterais. Umn Guia Sobre o Banco
Mundial no Brasil e no Mundo,” OXFAM Brazil/INESC,
September, 1995.
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