"Here in the South, we do not like Carnival": Subnational Identity as a Political Stategy in Southern Brazil

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“Here in the South, we do not like Carnival”

Subnational Identity as a Political Strategy in Southern Brazil

Author: Alexine van Olst Student ID: 10000552

Supervisor: Prof. Dr. C.G. Koonings Second Reader: Dr. B. Hogenboom Master’s Thesis in Latin American Studies CEDLA Master’s Programme

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Acknowledgements

First and foremost, I sincerely would like to thank Professor C.G. Koonings for sharing his knowledge, for his enthusiasm and his insightful comments that lifted my thought process to a higher level throughout every stage of this thesis. Thank you to all leaders, members and supporters of O Sul É O Meu País who have been willing to explain me their outlook on life. In particular I would like to thank Wanderlei Salvador, who has been so kind to show me around the beautiful state of Santa Catarina. Furthermore, I would like to express my gratitude to Professor R.G. Oliven for sharing his knowledge with me. To everyone I discussed my thesis with over time: I am so glad all of you took the time to share your knowledge, opinions and doubts about this research with me. Last but certainly not least, a special thanks to my family, friends, and fellow CMP-students who have always encouraged me to work hard, to stay focused and to not forget to have fun every once in a while.

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Abstract

This thesis explores the role of subnational cultural identity in separatist movements. To do so, it focuses on a case study of the movement O Sul É O Meu País. This movement aims to establish an independent nation state for the three most southern states of the Brazilian federation, Paraná, Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Sul. The findings in this thesis are based on a survey among members of the movement as well as interviews with leaders and supporters of the organisation. Through a combination of qualitative and quantitative research methods, the differences between the official narratives on cultural subnational identity, reasons for supporting the movement and possible outcomes are compared to the interpretations of these factors by members of the movement. Moreover, the differences in interpretations in Paraná, Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Sul are explored, as to highlight the distinct reasons for support for independence in these three states. Regarding the importance of subnational cultural identity in this separatist movement, it is argued that although the cultural otherness is not considered the most important reason to support secessionist ideas, it forms the ‘cherry on top’ that lifts O Sul É O Meu País’s narratives from rational fiscal and political reasons to a narrative of a Sulista Self seeking independence from the Brazilian Other.

Esta tese explora o papel da identidade cultural subnacional nos movimentos separatistas. Para isso, concentra-se em um estudo de caso do movimento O Sul É O Meu País. Este movimento visa estabelecer um Estado-nação independente para os três estados da região Sul da federação brasileira, Paraná, Santa Catarina e Rio Grande do Sul. As evidências nesta tese são principalmente baseadas em uma pesquisa entre os membros do movimento, bem como entrevistas com líderes e apoiadores da organização. Através de uma combinação de métodos de pesquisa qualitativa e quantitativa, são comparadas as diferenças entre as narrativas oficiais sobre a identidade subnacional cultural, as razões para apoiar o movimento e seus possíveis resultados e as interpretações desses fatores pelos membros do movimento. Além disso, são exploradas as diferenças de interpretação no Paraná, Santa Catarina e Rio Grande do Sul, para destacar os motivos distintos de apoio à independência nestes três estados. Em relação à importância da identidade cultural subnacional neste movimento separatista, argumenta-se que, embora a alteridade cultural não seja considerada a razão mais importante para apoiar ideias separatistas, ela forma a ‘cereja no bolo’ que levanta as narrativas de O Sul É O Meu País de razões fiscais e políticas a uma narrativa do Próprio Sulista buscando independência do Outro Brasileiro.

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Chapter 1. Brazil: Everyone’s Country? Subnationalism and Separatism in

Southern Brazil

“I do not identify with the Brazilian stereotype”, “Because I do not consider myself Brazilian”, “Because the South is my country and I rarely identify with the rest of Brazil.” These are just three of the responses to the question as to why people support separation of the three southern states from the rest of Brazil.1_{In turn, these responses question whether it}

possible and desirable to have a single, national identity in a nation state of over 200 million people.2_{It is easy to imagine the existence of a variety of local interpretations of what it means to}

be Brazilian. Moreover, it is also easy to imagine the existence of distinct subnational identities in particular regions of this sizable federation. In Brazil, one of these subnational identities is found in the three southern states of Brazil: Rio Grande do Sul, Santa Catarina and Paraná (Região Sul).

The otherness of this region is discussed in academic literature by for example Oliven and Kraus Luvizotto.3_{Said otherness is often connected to the culture of European migrants that came to}

the region in the nineteenth century and the subnational cultural identity of the southernmost state, Rio Grande do Sul: the Gaúcho-identity. Based on this combination of cultural othernesses, I

decided to study the southern cultural identity beyond the Gaúcho-identity and shift towards a

broader subnational Sulista-identity which includes all three states of Região Sul. In this way, an

interesting development can be studied: the organisation of civil society in a socio-political movement that uses the Sulista-identity and its otherness contrasting the national Brazilian identity (Brasilidade) as part of a means to a political end.

The Brazilian federation is divided in twenty-six states and these states are in turn geographically combined into the five regions.4_{The statistics from 2016 collected by the}_Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística demonstrate that 29,439,773 people live in Região Sul. Zooming

in per state, the statistics show that Rio Grande do Sul has the most inhabitants (11,286,500), closely followed by Paraná (11,242,720) and lastly the smaller state of Santa Catarina with 6,910,553 inhabitants.5_{To research the subnational identity of Região Sul and in particular its use}

in a political context, I conducted three months of fieldwork in the region, visiting all three states

1_{Data based on author’s survey distributed between May and August 2017.}

2_{Population figure available via:}

https://www.ibge.gov.br/estatisticas-novoportal/sociais/populacao/9103-estimativas-de-populacao.html. Consulted on 25 September 2017.

3_{See for Oliven’s work on the subject: Ruben Oliven,}_{A Parte e O Todo: A Diversidade Cultural de Brasil-Nação,}

(Petrópolis: Editora Vozes), 2006. See for Kraus Luvizotto’s work on the subject: Caroline Kraus Luvizotto, Cultura Gaúcha e Separatismo no Rio Grande do Sul, (São Paulo: SciELO - Ed. UNESP. 2009).

4_{Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia Estatística, “}_{Estimativas de População”. Accessed digitally via:}

ftp://ftp.ibge.gov.br/Estimativas_de_Populacao/Estimativas_2016/estimativa_TCU_2016_20170614.pdf. Consulted on 25 September 2017.

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in the period May 2017 to August 2017. I decided to make Porto Alegre, the capital of Rio Grande do Sul, my base and from there travel to both Santa Catarina and Paraná. The main reason for spending most time in Rio Grande do Sul is based on the idea that, through the lively memory of its history as the forever frontier state and the Gaúcho-identity, this would be the state where the otherness of the region is expressed the strongest. In order to study the mobilisation of this cultural subnational identity for political objectives, I decided to approach a social movement that does exactly that. I contacted the largest movement that aims at separating Região Sul from the Brazilian federation and they were more than willing to show me various aspects of their organisation. Although their otherness in a cultural sense is not their only argument for their political objectives, it is part of their narratives. This movement is called O Sul É O Meu País (OSEOMP) and has been active in its current form since 1992.

Case Study: O Sul É O Meu País

Separatist movements are active in many shapes and forms in various parts of the world. The Kurdish independence referendum on 25 September 2017 and the Catalan independence referendum on 1 October 2017 are only two of the most recent and famous examples of acclaimed nations that aim to separate themselves from an existing nation state to which they claim not to belong. As a less known example, the case study of the secessionist movement in this thesis serves as an instrument to explore similar sentiments in the southern region of Brazil. From an academic point of view, this research aims to contribute to the debate on the relationship between national identities, subnational identities and separatism. Moreover, it aims to explore how cultural subnational identities can be mobilised as a political strategy. The particular subnational identity that will be studied in this research appears to be a niche in international studies on subnational identity in Latin America and Brazil in particular. From a social perspective, this research aims to shed light on a group of Brazilian citizens who are interested in breaking their relationship with the Brazilian nation state. In the unstable socio-political and economic context of present-day Brazil, this research aims to contribute to the debate on the current structure of the Brazilian federal nation state by mapping the use of cultural identity narratives as a political strategy in the south of Brazil.

In order to find out how this particular subnational identity is formulated and activated in a political context, I studied the movement O Sul É O Meu País (OSEOMP) as briefly mentioned above. Besides emphasising and cherishing the cultural differences of southern Brazil compared to the single national identity constructed on a federal level, this movement also frames their otherness in a political manner for they use it to advocate a separation of the three southern states from the rest of Brazil. One day before the most recent municipal elections in

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October 2016, the movement organised its first consultative plebiscite (‘Plebisul’) on the

separation of the region from the Brazilian federation. Since the movement claims to value direct

democracy, organising a consultative plebiscite appears to be a logical step. The question on the ballot for the plebiscite was formulated as follows: “Do you want Paraná, Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Sul to form an independent country?”6_{* The voter could only respond affirmative or}

negative without elaborating on the answer. The movement published the following figures on the results of this plebiscite. A total of 616,917 people in Região Sul voted in the Plebisul of 2016. Of this total, 95.74% voted in favour of an independent country for the three states in the region and 4.26% voted against this proposal. The figures per state show that Paraná had relatively the most people voting who opposed the idea, with 88.82% in favour and 11.18% opposing the idea as formulated on the ballot. In Santa Catarina 94.63% voted in favour and in Rio Grande do Sul 97.21%.7_{The movement organised another Plebisul with the same question}

on the ballot on 7 October 2017, demonstrating similar outcomes albeit based on a smaller group of voters.8

The consultative plebiscites described above are the most recent campaigns organised by the movement. Founded in Santa Catarina on 17 May 1992, some of the predecessors of the movement that merged into the current organisation O Sul É O Meu País were associated with radical, political Right independence movements in the region such as Pampa Livre and Separatista Sulino.9_{In recent years, the movement’s focus shifted towards building a narrative of a}

democratic and pacifistic movement that aims at providing a platform for the people in Região Sul to be heard and potentially to establish an independent nation state for the region. The movement’s current leadership, referred to as Diretoria or Comissão Nacional, installed for the

period 2014-2017, has its seat in Passo Fundo, Rio Grande do Sul.10_{The decision to focus on this}

movement is based on their recent activities, with as a main component the annual consultative

plebiscites in October as well as their active use of social media and frequent appearances in other media to discuss their objectives. Moreover, as their political goal is to create an independent ‘Sulista nation state’, this movement provided a suitable case study to research the

6_{O Sul É O Meu País, “}_{Plebisul”. Accessed digitally via: http://www.sullivre.org/. Consulted on 25 September 2017.}

*All quotations in the text are translated by the author, unless indicated otherwise. A list of quotations in the original language of the interviews (Portuguese) can be found in Appendix 6.

7_{O Sul É O Meu País, “}_{Resultado Oficial do Plebisul 2016”. Accessed digitally via:}

http://www.sullivre.org/cco-divulga-resultado-oficial-do-plebisul-2016/. Consulted on 25 September 2017.

8_{The two editions of the Plebisul will be discussed extensively in Chapter 3.}

9_{Caroline Kraus Luvizotto:}_{Cultura gaúcha e separatismo no Rio Grande do Sul. (São Paulo: SciELO - Ed. UNESP, 2009),}

p. 42.

10_{O Sul É O Meu País, “}_{Sobre o Movimento”. Accessed digitally via: http://www.sullivre.org/sobre-o-movimento/.}

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relationship between subnational identity and mobilisation of popular support for further decentralisation or secession in federal states, such as Brazil.

Key Concepts and Research Question

In order to construct an analytical framework for this thesis, I will use a set of concepts that are important in the understanding of the case study. These concepts include the nation, the nation state and subnationalism. Throughout this thesis, the definition of the nation as formulated by Guibernau will be used for it attributes a set of dimensions to the nation that is also used in the narratives of O Sul É O Meu País. Guibernau defines the nation as: “a human group conscious of forming a community, sharing a common culture, attached to a clearly demarcated territory, having a common past and a common project for the future, and claiming the right to decide upon its political destiny. This definition attributes five dimensions to the nation: psychological, cultural, territorial, political, and historical.”11_{Additionally, the definition of}

a nation as an imagined community as elaborated upon by Anderson will be of importance in this thesis. Chapter two provides a more in-depth discussion of theoretical concepts and debates related to subnationalism in the Brazilian nation state. To operationalise the idea of the nation state and (sub)nationalism, I use the definition by Gellner, who frames nationalism as a political idea that emphasises the unity of the political and the cultural entities.12_{It is important to note}

that local cultural identities in this thesis will be referred to as subnational identities rather than as regional identities. This decision is based on the idea that subnationalism provides a clearer formulation for the subject, because it highlights one subgroup in one nation state that formulates their local identity as fundamentally different from the single, national identity promoted by the nation state.

The main research question for this thesis is: how does the movement O Sul É O Meu País use the cultural otherness of the southern region of Brazil to mobilise support for political

goals? To answer this research question, various subquestions (SQs) and sub-subquestions (SSQs) focus on different aspects of this main research question. The SQs address themes such as the organisational structure of the movement, their objectives and strategies, the role of cultural subnational identity in the movement and the preferred outcome of the movement’s actions. The SSQs focus on the differences per state in Região Sul.13

11_{Montserrat Guibernau, “Nationalism without States” in}_{The Oxford Handbook of the History of Nationalism, chapter}

30, ed. J. Breuilly (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), p.2.

12_{Ernest Gellner,}_{Nations and Nationalism, Introduction by John Breuilly (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2008).} 13_{An overview of all subquestions (SQs) and sub-subquestions (SSQs) can be found in Appendix 1.}

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9 Methodology

In order to answer the main research question, the SQs and the SSQs, I decided to use both quantitative as well as qualitative methods. The quantitative method is a survey that has been distributed among the members of the movement via the register of email addresses the movement’s leadership keeps. The main qualitative methods are open interviews with the movement’s leadership and informed outsiders and semi-structured interviews with members of the movement from all three states of Região Sul.14_{As complementary methods I used}

participant observations when visiting events organised by the movement as well as document analysis for the articles and official documentation published by the movement itself and for news articles written about the movement in the media. My justification for the use of both quantitative as well as qualitative methods is threefold. Firstly, the combination of a survey complemented by interviews, allowed me to map the motivation of citizens in the three states to support this movement compared to the official narratives formulated by the movement’s leadership. Secondly, the survey allowed for the collection of large amounts of data from a specific population that shares similar interests, in this case the support of the movement, but who might have different reasons to support the cause, based on how they interpret the conceptualisation of the subnational identity. Thirdly, by complementing the main methods with participant observation at events and document analysis, I analysed the movement and its members both from an inside perspective as well as from a more distant view.

The quantitative part of the methodology was a survey distributed via email to all registered members of the movement. It is assumed here that the total population of the movement is about 25,000 registered members.15_{The survey was spread through an email with}

the URL to the survey in it distributed by the movement’s leadership via their official email address. The use of the official email address of the movement increased the likeliness that members would open the email and participate in the research rather than upon receiving an email from an unknown address like mine. Since all members have an email address registered with the movement, it is assumed here that the distribution of the survey via email could theoretically have reached all 25,000 members of the movement equally. Furthermore, as this survey is distributed to registered followers of the movement, I expected that the respondents answered in line with the official narratives of the movement’s leadership. This bias in the responses is not considered problematic for the survey aims to compare the members’ narratives and the movement’s official narratives in an explorative manner. The survey was designed using

14_{A complete list of questions of the survey in both Portuguese and English can be found in Appendix 2.}

15_{This number of registered members is the number that I have been told by various members of the movement’s}

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Qualtrics with the clear intention to be completed online. Moreover, a digital survey also allowed for an easier way to reach respondents, for the population that I aimed to reach is spread over three states, which is a rather large geographical spread to cover in the time available for this research.

The survey contained closed questions to answer in the style of a Likert-scale when appropriate, as well as questions that required answers in a form of ranking and three open questions. Furthermore, not all questions were set as obligatory to answer in order to proceed to the next question. Since the open questions were placed in various positions in the survey, making these questions obligatory could lead to respondents cancelling their participation since open questions clearly require more effort than closed ones.

Of the total assumed population of 25,000 registered members, a total of 702 at least partially completed the survey. This total dataset has been adjusted to a final set of 429 respondents who completed at least the closed questions and one out of three open questions which will be used for the data in the empirical chapters of this thesis. The analysis of the survey data consists of cross tabulations to identify relations between multiple variables. As the method of analysis already indicates, the data collected through the survey is decidedly of explorative nature.

The main qualitative methods used in this research are interviews and observations. The interviews with members of the movement from all three states of Região Sul aimed at creating depth and nuances in the narratives that a survey is unable to gather. Moreover, the interviews mostly took place before members had taken the survey which lead to the inclusion of topics in the conversation, such as the importance of education, that I had not thought to be important when designing the survey. Since most interviewees were active members of the movement, the emphasis lay more on finding nuances and personal interpretations of the narratives used by the movement rather than finding radically different reasons for supporting the movement. For a different point of view, I interviewed two informed outsiders and had various informal conversations about the topic with people not associated with the movement. The interviews with informed outsiders were conducted at the end of my fieldwork period. Their opinions and interpretations of the movement allowed me to widen my view on the movement and created interesting contrasts since I had before these interviews spent most of my time in the field talking to members of the movement. In total, I conducted five interviews that have been officially recorded. All these interviewees were men and active members of OSEOMP. As the survey data show, more than 90% of the respondents are male, so this trend in the qualitative data is not surprising. Additionally I interviewed about twenty other members of the movement in more

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informal settings and at events organised by the movement. These informal conversations are used to illustrate the observations throughout my visits to the three states of Região Sul.

The first of these five recorded interviews took place in Santa Catarina and was an almost three hour long in-depth conversation with the movement’s current Strategic Mobilisation Director and one of the founders of the GESUL, the movement’s research group. As a

representative of the national board, a long term member of the movement and author of a book on the movement, this interviewee was a valuable resource in terms of the movement’s official discourse and narrative and their future plans. The second interview took place in Rio Grande do Sul with a regional leader of the movement from a nearby city. This interview focused on the otherness of Rio Grande do Sul in particular and the more political and economic arguments for his support of the movement. The third interview was conducted in Curitiba, with a regional leader from that city. To cover the interview with a member from Santa Catarina, I turned to the many conversations I had with a long term local member of the movement who invited me to show me around the state and with whom I therefore travelled throughout the state for four consecutive days to visit the movement’s leaders and other places connected to the movement. The two other recorded interviews were conducted with the informed outsiders. The first was a PhD candidate in Philosophy from the Federal University of Santa Catarina, who is originally from Recife, Pernambuco. His interpretations as an academic and as a literal outsider, for he is born and raised in the Northeast of the country, have been extremely valuable in understanding the opposition to this movement. Lastly the fifth interview I recorded was a conversation with professor Oliven, who is professor of Anthropology at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul and who is an expert on Gaúcho-identity and separatism in the region.

Looking back at the fieldwork, the quantitative and qualitative methods have been able to complement each other as was intended in the research design. As a researcher, I wish I had been more proactive in approaching more informants and informed outsiders for (follow-up) interviews. To some extent, my impression of the fieldwork now is that I have only been doing most of the work in the second half of the time spent in the field and by that time, as most informants referred me to other potential informants, I seemed to run out of time to speak to all the people I would have liked to speak to for this research. Furthermore, the vast majority of people I reached out to were open to meet with me and to help me out with any further information or contacts if needed. Since the movement is strongly focused on presenting itself as a democratic, transparent and pacifistic movement, possibly to combat negative associations of the movement in the past, it was easy for me to enter and approach the movement as a

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researcher, to talk to members and leaders of the organisation and to visit public events that they organised.

To guarantee the safety of the collected data, I have stored all my qualitative data in three different formats: written notes during observations, events and conversations in a notebook, digital files of said written notes stored online via Google Drive and all collected data digitally on a flash drive. The results of the quantitative data are stored online in the original format in Qualtrics and copies of it are stored both in Google Drive and on a flash drive. Before each recorded interview, I have sent a letter explaining my status as a Master student at CEDLA to the informant in order for them to verify my story. Moreover, permission was asked for all recordings specifically before every interview and again when I started the recordings. Throughout the thesis I have opted not to refer to informants who are members of the movement by name for it does not add any value to the story, even though most of them confirmed that they did not have a problem with having their name in the research. Therefore, only one informant is mentioned by name for in his case explaining his role in the movement and the use of his name contributed to the lines of argumentation in this thesis.

As a final note, I would like to reflect on my position and role as a researcher. Something I did not specifically pay attention to in the field but what becomes very clear from the survey data as well as my qualitative data is how unequally distributed the ratio men-women is within the movement. The vast majority of the respondents and the all of the recorded interviewees were male.16_{However, in the field this has not been something that I noticed in a negative sense or}

that put me in a notably difficult position as a female researcher. Moreover, when studying a movement with a political objective, the political position and the extent to which this position has been propagated by the researcher, are important. In my situation, I have not explicitly shared my political beliefs with members of the movement during interviews or other conversations unless the informant specifically asked me to. My main reason for this was based on the idea that I wanted to hear the complete stories of the informants, rather than getting involved in a discussion on political ideologies. A question about my own political beliefs was asked only once in a recorded interview with a member of the movement in Paraná, who asked if he was correct in assuming that a researcher interested in the movement, is aligned with the movement’s political views. This informant was surprised to learn that I did not start this research out of support for the political ideology of the movement but rather out of interest in subnationalism and decentralisation, and did not hold my answer against me in any way. In conversations with informed outsiders however, informants were more directly interested in my political position.

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13 Structure of the Thesis

This thesis is divided in six chapters. This first chapter served as an introduction to the research theme, the research site and some key theoretical concepts as used in this study. Moreover, it introduced the main research question and the methodology used to conduct the research. The second chapter builds an analytical framework for the case study by formulating the definitions of the key concepts used for this research. Secondly, it gives an overview of the academic debates on nationalism, national identity construction and the use of subnational identity as a political strategy. This chapter will also outline an overview of the development of a single national identity in Brazil since independence. The third chapter is the first empirical chapter and concentrates on the organisational structure of OSEOMP, their objectives and strategies. The fourth chapter is another empirical chapter which centralises role of the cultural subnational identity within the movement’s official narratives. It compares the interpretations and importance given to said subnational identity from the movement’s leadership to those of the members who responded to the survey questions on this topic. The fifth chapter is the final empirical chapter which aims to explore the reasons for supporting the movement and the desired outcome of the movement’s actions. Again a comparison between the interpretations of the movement’s official discourse and the most desired outcomes from the movement’s members is made. The concluding chapter explores to what extent O Sul É O Meu País should be seen as a movement operating on the fringes of the Brazilian society and what their strategies can tell us about subnational identity and its use as a political strategy in Brazil and in a comparative global perspective. Moreover, it centralises the complexity of rational and emotive reasons as underlying causes for supporting OSEOMP as a movement in particular and separatist movements in general.

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Chapter 2. Key Concepts and Debates on (sub)National Identity and

Separatism

In the field of studies on (sub)nationalism and (sub)national identity, many debates exist on the exact definitions of nations, states and nationalism. In order to apply these rather fluid and abstract concepts to this case study, I explore some main definitions on the concepts below. Guibernau defines a nation as: “a human group conscious of forming a community, sharing a common culture, attached to a clearly demarcated territory, having a common past and a common project for the future, and claiming the right to decide upon its political destiny. This definition attributes five dimensions to the nation: psychological, cultural, territorial, political, and historical.”17_{Whereas Guibernau formulates a broad definition that attributes a list of dimensions}

to the ‘human group’ in the nation, Anderson’s famous concept of the nation as an imagined community emphasises both the abstraction of the concept, as well as its excluding nature. He describes the nation as: “[…] an imagined community, a political community and imagined as both inherently limited and sovereign.”18_{Moreover, Anderson is able to capture the}

psychological or even emotive aspect of this idea in the concept of imagined communities: “It is imagined because the members of even the smallest nation will never know most of their fellow-members, meet them or even hear of them, yet in the minds of each lives the image of their communion.”19

For the concept nationalism, I will use the definition of Gellner, as shortly phrased by Leerssen as: “Nationalism is the attempt to map political frontiers on cultural borders.”20_The

definitions above demonstrate that studies on nationalism and as an analogy studies on subnationalism as is this thesis, study a conflict between cultural boundaries and political frontiers. Another approach to nations and nationalism is explored by Hobsbawm. Continuing on the idea that the political and national unit should coincide, he adds the importance of the top-down construction of the nation, demonstrating his more Marxist interpretation of the concept.21_{Hobsbawm formulates his interpretation of the nation therefore as both a}

continuation of Gellner’s conceptualisation as well as a critique: “If I have a major criticism on Gellner’s work it is that his preferred perspective of modernization from above, makes it difficult

30, ed. J. Breuilly (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2013), p.2.

18_{Benedict Anderson,}_{Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso, 2006), p.}

6.

19_{Benedict Anderson, p. 6.}

20_{Joep Leerssen,}_{National Thought in Europe: A Cultural History (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2006), p.}

175.

21_{Eric Hobsbawm,}_{Nations and Nationalism since 1780: Programme, Myth, Reality (Cambridge: Cambridge University}

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to pay adequate attention to the view from below.”22_{This importance of popular culture and the}

use of mass media in the construction of (sub)national identity will be discussed further in the next section of this chapter.

For the definition of a state, I will follow the definition as formulated by Weber, which is often used in studies on nationalism. This definition defines the modern concept of a state, for it is not the scope of this research to include more historical interpretations of the state. Weber defines a state as: “a human community that (successfully) claims the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory.”23_{By using this definition of a state, it becomes}

apparent that the state that will be referred to and studied here is the modern state in a Eurocentric sense, as emerged on the European continent since the French Revolution.

In general, processes of nationalism and consequently constructing a national identity for a nation can be divided in groups of three different objectives: (1) nationalism as a form of state centralism, (2) nationalism as unification process and (3) nationalism as a means for separatism.24

I focus on the third group, where (sub)nationalism is used as a means to a separatist end.

Another concept requires explanation in this section: subnationalism. As Anderson remarks in his introduction on imagined communities: “[…] subnationalisms are nationalisms which naturally dream of shedding this subness one day.”25_{I opt for the use of subnationalism to}

describe the situation in southern Brazil, rather than another common concept in this field: regionalism. Regionalism in my opinion suggests a multilateral phenomenon, rather than a phenomenon occurring within the political boundaries of one existing nation state. Some scholars use the concept of subnationalism and more specifically non-secessionist subnationalism as a synonym for regionalism or federalism. However, I agree with Guibernau who argues that those concepts do not clearly demonstrate that subnationalism is a struggle for acknowledgement and power from a local subgroup within a nation state.26

National Thought in Europe and Latin America: a Comparative Overview

Generally speaking, the rise of nationalism began in the nineteenth century, with the growing influence of (political) Romanticism on the European continent.27_{Since an in-depth}

22_{Eric Hobsbawm, pp. 10-11.}

23_{Max Weber,}_{From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology, ed. H. Gerth and C. Wright Mills (London: Routledge, 1970), p.}

78.

24_{Joep Leerssen,}_{National Thought in Europe: A Cultural History (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2006), pp.}

137-170.

25_{Benedict Anderson,}_{Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso, 2006), p.}

3.

30, ed. J. Breuilly (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2013), p. 2.

27_{Joep Leerssen,}_{National Thought in Europe: A Cultural History (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2006), p.}

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explanation of the reasons to why this happened is not the scope of this thesis, I will follow Leerssen in his summary on the rise of nationalism in the nineteenth century: “[…] nationalism emerges in the nineteenth century from eighteenth century roots: Herder’s belief in the individuality of nations, Rousseau’s belief in the sovereignty of the nation and a general discourse of national peculiarities and ‘characters’.”28_{The comparison between nationalism and national}

identity processes in Europe and Latin America is interesting for their colonial history makes the processes both closely related as well as fundamentally different at the same time. In the following section, this dichotomy will be explored further, as well as the role of literature, printed press and elites in processes of national identity formation in both Europe and Latin America.

Anderson explains some key differences in processes of nationalism and national identity creation in Latin America compared to these processes in (old) European nations. He argues that: “language was not so much a differentiating factor [in Latin America] and that while in Europe the rise of the middle class was key to nationalism, this group was still insignificant or non-existent in Latin America in those days.”29_{Therefore, the creation of the national identity in Latin}

America became mostly a matter of state elites and intellectuals. Moreover, as nationalism was rising in Europe, Latin America became an Other, a periphery to the Eurocentric Self.30

Since processes of identity formation rely on the framing of the Self in relation to an Other, the role as centre for Europe and that of periphery for Latin America, is a crucial aspect in the development in both European as well as Latin American national identity. However from the point of view of Latin American elites, the experience of the Self was considered inferior to the European Other. This pessimistic interpretation of the Latin American Self, which lasted according to Larraín until the second half of the nineteenth century, was based on the notion that the Self was created by affirmation and opinions of the Other on the Self. Since the Other, Europe, created negative stereotypes about the Latin American Self, these stereotypes became internalised in the formation of the national identity in various Latin American nations as a consequence.31_{Examples of this pessimistic interpretation of national ‘character’ in Latin}

America can be found throughout various documents, most notably in literature produced in this time period, as Larraín explains. Despite the fact that Anderson emphasises nationalism as a political project and Larraín puts his focus on the cultural aspect and the importance of modernity, these two lines of argument come together when it comes to the start of national identity thinking in Latin America: the criollo self-awareness as a consequence of political

28_{Joep Leerssen, p. 125.}

29_{Benedict Anderson,}_{Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso, 2006),}

chapter 4.

30_{Jorge Larraín, “}_{Identity and Modernity in Latin America” (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2000), p. 14.} 31_{Jorge Larraín, p. 107.}

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exclusion. As Larraín argues: “The obstacles against free trade with Europe coupled with the political exclusion of the locally born criollos from administrative and governmental tasks were the

two main motivations behind the independence process.[…] during the eighteenth century the local criollos had increasingly acquired self-consciousness as a group, and their distinct identity

manifested itself in many struggles for recognition.”32

Not only the definitions of nations, states and nation states are of importance for this thesis. The processes leading to a national identity that is recognised by the people of that nation, are also of importance. Literature, poetry and other written media have played an important role in the process of national identity formation as it functioned as an instrument for the creation (national) narratives. Within these narratives, a shared sense of history, customs and culture is referred to. The authenticity of traditions, culture and customs is discussed in debates on national identity by referring to the concept of invented tradition and the related concept of ‘fakelore’. As Hobsbawm and Ranger explain, referring to (memories) of shared culture, tradition or customs is a part of the process of national identity building for it ensures a connection to and continuation of the (constructed) shared past.33_{Therefore, the invention of tradition often occurs in times of}

social change that might be perceived as a threat to a specific imagined community. In present time, not only literature and written media influence the process of nation building, also modern mass media such as television and internet do so. Moreover, as the middle class in Latin America grew, the influence of popular culture, closely related to the rise of the modern media, on processes of national identity formation also grew and continues to grow.34_{The growing}

importance of popular culture and modern media in present-day national identity formation also creates a shift from elite-based national identity constructions to popular imaginations of the nation. According to Radcliffe and Westwood, popular culture serves as an instrument to renegotiate official narratives of national identity, which are often formulated by an elite group of society.35

A final concept that should be addressed here is the distinction between civic and ethnic (sub)nationalism. As described above, processes of national identity construction are based on inclusion and exclusion, on the framing of the Self and the Other. A long established distinction exists in the literature between civic nationalism and ethno-nationalism.36_{Civic nationalism in this}

context refers to an appeal to the willingness of an imagined community to comply with its civic

32_{Jorge Larraín, p.70.}

33_{Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger,}_{The Invention of Tradition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 1983, p.1.} 34_{Sarah Radcliffe and Sallie Westwood,}_{Remaking the Nation: Place, Identity and Politics in Latin America. London:}

Routledge, 1996, chapter 4.

35_{Sarah Radcliffe and Sallie Westwood, chapter 4.}

36_{See for example Brubaker (1999) Habermas (1994), Gellner (1996) and Smith (1991) for an extensive debate on}

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duties as a nation, which formulates a Self that is based on character traits of the imagined community rather than on ethnicity as is the case in ethno-nationalism. As Fozdar and Low argue based on reviewing the academic debate on this distinction: “Civic nationalism is generally perceived as a more appropriate model in a globalised world […].”37_{Notwithstanding this}

‘preference’ of civic nationalism over ethno-nationalism, it is argued in the literature that both forms always are form of exclusion and therefore the nation as a political project is based on the exclusion of the Other from the community that forms the Self, notwithstanding the grounds for this exclusion. Additionally, the concept of ‘civic culture’ as explained by Almond and Verba, which highlights the importance of a belief in citizen participation through civic duties will be explored as part of the cultural narrative in the case study.38

The concepts explained above, form the core of many debates on nationalism, nations and nation states. Since it is impossible to discuss all previous and current debates on the subject in detail, the definitions and explanations provided above function as a instruments for the analysis of the narratives of (sub)national identity throughout this thesis. In the following section, I explore the key concepts and debates in the field of subnationalism and more specifically the use of subnational cultural identities as a strategy for political mobilisation.

Decentralisation, Subnationalism and the Politics of Subnational Identities

Latin America includes four states that are classified as federations: Argentina, Brazil, Mexico and Venezuela. Within a federation the concept and interpretation of decentralisation is key to the relationship between the separate levels of government. In the Brazilian federation, the division of the state in three levels of government has played various roles of importance throughout history. Moreover, since the implementation of the 1988 constitution, the recognition of the three levels of government is institutionalised.39_{It is important to note this three-level}

federal system, for most federations only recognise two official layers, often federal and state level only. The official recognition of the third level, the municipal level, is important for the understanding of the decentralised federation that Brazil is today. With the official recognition of three levels of government comes the implication that the local, municipal level in Brazil is actually a substantial political actor that is granted access to decision making instruments, budgets and administrative bodies that, in two level federations, usually are not directly available for these local level of government. As Falleti shows in her analysis of the decentralisation processes in

37_{Farida Fozdar and Mitchell Low, “They have to abide by our laws … and stuff’: Ethnonationalism masquerading}

as civic nationalism”, Nations and Nationalism, Vol. 21, Issue 3, July 2015, p. 525.

38_{Gabriel A. Almond, Sidney Verba,}_{The Civic Culture : Political Attitudes and Democracy in Five Nations : An Analytic}

Study, (Boston: Little Brown, 1968).

39_{Tracy Beck Fenwick, “The Institutional Feasibility of National-Local Policy Collaboration: Insights from Brazil}

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Brazil, these processes accomplished an increase of (political) power on the municipal level, in terms of access to decision making power for example, which is considered to be the most desirable outcome of decentralisation.40

Based on the existing structure of the Brazilian federation, I would argue that Brazil is a decentralised state. This is important because the case study that will be discussed in the next chapters interprets the structure of the Brazilian federation as limiting to their power of decision on a local level, or more specifically limiting the sense of autonomy the movement in the case study desires. Therefore it seems that a decentral federation, despite a transfer of administrative, fiscal and political power to the different levels of government, could nevertheless still inspire subnational separatist movements to seek secession from the federal nation state, as is the case in this study. As Siroky and Cuffe argue in their extensive comparison between case studies of separatist movements that currently have, never had or have recently had autonomy,41_separatist

movements are most likely to advocate secession when the group has been independent before, especially when this was recently revoked.42_{Since Siroky and Cuffe compare 324 groups in over}

100 countries, it is not their scope to identify the exact conditions under which separatist movements advocate for secession. However, it seems that administrative, fiscal and political power are not sufficient for these groups. What seems to be lacking is territorial power as argued by Siroky and Cuffe, which is also emphasised by Guibernau in her definition of a nation. Besides the lack of territorial power, I argue that another factor for secession for separatist movements in federal states could be the lack of ‘cultural power’. Despite the transfer of tangible forms of power to the local level in this type of government, the national identity constructed on the federal level is still the ‘cultural power’ that is dominant in the federation. This emotive argument relates to the idea that the federal state remains the Other that the subnational Self contrasts itself against, causing the duality of calls for separatism in a decentralised federal state.

As Guibernau demonstrated in her work, there are many cases where subnationalisms are non-secessionist.43_{In the case of subnationalism in a decentralised federation, non-secessionism}

would follow as a logical consequence, for in this particular form of government the federal state is aware of local interest in power, and therefore grants administrative, fiscal or political power to local actors. However, in the case studied here, the subnationalism is formulated in a

40_{Tulia Falleti,}_{Decentralization and Subnational Politics in Latin America (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010),}

p. 3.

41_{In the article by Siroky and Cuffe, autonomy is interpreted as “territorial self-governance” as defined by Wolff}

(2013).

42_{David Siroky and John Cuffe, “Lost Autonomy, Nationalism and Separatism”,}_{Comparative Political Studies, Vol 48,}

Issue 1, 2015, pp. 3-34.

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decentralised federation and still leads to secessionist objectives from an active social movement. In their argumentation, said movement uses their cultural otherness and the unsatisfactory federal construction of present-day Brazil as their main arguments for said secessionist objectives. Therefore, it is interesting to look at the case study in this thesis as contrasting this logical consequence.

Even though not all subnationalisms advocate independence, the use of subnational identities as a political strategy is not uncommon.44_{Eaton argues in his comparative analysis on}

political mobilisation of subnational identity to counter recentralisation processes in Bolivia, Ecuador and Venezuela that subnational political actors could “[…] [encourage] locals to see these [subnational] identities as unique and important, and to perceive that these identities would best be protected by continued - if not deeper - decentralization.”45_{Eaton describes two factors}

that are important in determining the degree of success in mobilisation of subnational identities as a political strategy. The first factor is that the political mobilisation of subnational identities is most likely to succeed when they are framed in “binary oppositions: Black versus White, colonizer versus colonized, us versus them.” Secondly, he argues that to “[…] actually mobilize identities, political entrepreneurs need mobilizing structures.”46_{These mobilising structures are}

usually social movements who are able to mobilise groups of people relatively easily.

Consequently, it would be interesting to see how subnationalism as a political strategy could then be put into practise. In his analysis of subnationalist movements in South Asia, Mitra formulates a ‘pathway’ that subnationalist groups follow on their way to becoming a political actor with secessionist objectives. The pathway consists of three main ‘steps’: (1) setting the agenda, (2) political entrepreneurs join the movement, (3) ‘less-adventurous’ stake-holders align themselves with the movement.47_{The social movement that is studied in this thesis, has yet to}

transition from NGO to political organisation. However, as O Sul É O Meu País is on the verge of doing so, it is interesting to apply the framework that Mitra builds in his article on South Asia, on the case of subnationalism in South Brazil, to find out whether the pathway also fits this particular example. The following section of this chapter will discuss national and subnational identity constructions in Brazil, in order to illustrate the rather abstract concepts discussed in this chapter so far.

44_{See for example Eaton (2014), Guibernau (2013), Mitra (1995) and Olivieri (2015).}

45_{Kent Eaton, “Recentralization and the Left Turn in Latin America: Diverging Outcomes in Bolivia, Ecuador, and}

Venezuela”, Comparative Political Studies, vol. 47(8), 2014, p. 1140. 46_{Kent Eaton, p. 1140.}

47_{Subrata Mitra, “The Rational Politics of Cultural Nationalism: Subnational Movements in South Asia in}

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21 Building Brasilidade: the Process of National Identity Construction in Brazil

National identity formation in Brazil, as in other nation states, is an ongoing and fluid process. To understand the development of national identity in the Brazilian nation state, it is important to understand Brazil’s history and in particular the period from Independence onwards. Since the in-depth discussion of Brazil’s history of independence is not the scope of this thesis, this will not be discussed in detail. As a point of departure I take 1822, when Emperor Dom Pedro I of Brazil was crowned.48_{As the head of state of an newly independent Brazil, Dom}

Pedro I saw himself as a modernising actor. He was in favour of concentrating the Brazilian economy on export and the unification of the state in a central power, which in turn he and other Brazilian elites believed would create a modern nation.49_{Another concern of the elites was}

finding ways to achieve ‘whitening’ of the Brazilian population. Based on mostly Eurocentric and North-American interpretations of nation building, this was believed to contribute to the modernity of a nation state. Therefore, the role of European immigrants in the newly independent state became an important one early on. However, not only the desired European immigrants arrived in Brazil. Present-day Brazil consists of people from all over the world, with significant African, European and Asian ethnic groups who have been calling Brazil ‘home’ for generations. The role of immigrant groups in the process of building Brasilidade has thus been

from the start a very important one. In describing the influence of immigrants on Brazilian national identity, Lesser refers to the following illustrative description for an inhabitant of Brazil’s largest city, São Paulo: “[a paulistano] is a Japanese who speaks Portuguese with an Italian accent

while eating esfiha.”50_{To understand how Brazil became “everyone’s country”,}51_{a historic}

overview of the construction of Brasilidade is needed.

As could be argued for other Latin American states too,52_{the Brazilian elite of the}

nineteenth century framed the national identity of their nation state in comparison to European nation states. In this comparison, elites often stressed the “[…] sense of inferiority based on Brazilian colonialism, backwardness and dependence on foreign culture”53_{as the basis of}

Brazilian national identity. Confronted with ideas about development and national identity building coming mainly from European and North-American schools of thought, the above

48_{Jeffrey Lesser}_{, Immigration, Ethnicity, and National Identity in Brazil, 1808 to the Present.(New York, NY: Cambridge}

University Press, 2013), p. 25.

49_{Jeffrey Lesser}_{, p. 26.} 50_{Jeffrey Lesser}_{, p. 4.}

51_“_{Brasil, um país de todos” was the slogan of the Brazilian federal government under}_{President Luiz Inácio Lula da}

Silva.

52_{Jorge Larraín, “}_{Identity and Modernity in Latin America” (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2000).}

53_{Robert Chilcote,}_{Intellectuals and the Search for National Identity in Twentieth-Century Brazil. (New York, NY: Cambridge}

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described sense of inferiority has played an important role in Brazilian national thinking. As the twentieth century arrived, the emphasis in national thinking in Brazil shifted from the sense of inferiority towards linking the will to modernise with the construction of Brazilian national identity.54_{The crises experienced in both North-America as well as in Europe in the first part of}

the twentieth century forced Brazil, and Latin America as a region, to refocus on their own (cultural) identity formulations, rather than copying the (then not too successful) examples from North-America or Europe. However, as Larraín argues: “[…] the assessment of others on the Self seems Latin America’s self-evaluation”.55_{He continues that an incredible pessimistic view on}

Latin American (self-)identification still prevailed in the first half of the twentieth century. Despite Larraín’s critique on the process of identity formation in Latin America as whole in this time period, he notes one exception: Brazil’s novelists and essayists, most notably the works Casa Grande e Senzala by Freye and Raízes do Brasil by Buarque da Holanda, who are more optimistic

about the formulation of a national identity in their nation state.56

With the Brazilian Revolution of 1930, a new area in Brazilian politics and national identity construction arrived. Riograndean Getúlio Vargas was installed as the head of the government until his overthrow in 1945.57_{Looking at the historic placement of this new regime,}

it is not surprising that, as part of a counter reaction to the economic and political crises of the 1930s globally, the focus of the Estado Novo was on inward centralisation and unification. In

terms of national identity formation, this meant that subnational identities during this era were actively suppressed. Oliven describes how one of the first acts of Vargas was the Ceremony of the Burning of the State Flags. “In this ritual, which symbolised a greater unification of the country and a weakening of regional and state powers, twenty-one Brazilian flags were raised in the place of twenty-one state flags which were burned on a large bonfire in the middle of a plaza in Rio de Janeiro, the then federal capital, to the sound of the national anthem played by several bands and sung by thousands of schoolchildren under the direction of Heitor Villa Lobos, the celebrated Brazilian composer.”58

Not only state officials followed this path of focussing on internal affairs rather than external ones, also Brazil’s intellectuals, particularly those part of the Modernist Movement of 1922, generally agreed that “the only way Brazil could become modern, was to become national first.”59_{Instruments created for this process of ‘becoming Brazilian’ were for example national}

54_{Jorge Larraín, “}_{Identity and Modernity in Latin America” (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2000), p. 94.} 55_{Jorge Larraín, p. 107.}

56_{Jorge Larraín, p. 108.}

57_{Ruben Oliven, “National and Regional Identities in Brazil: Rio Grande do Sul and its Peculiarities”, in:}_{Nations and}

Nationalism, Vol. 12(2), 2006, p. 305.

58_{Ruben Oliven, p. 305.} 59_{Ruben Oliven, p. 306.}

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school curricula, a strong interest in cultural heritage and traditions with as most well-known example carnival and other cultural expressions that could contribute to building a single Brazilian national identity.60

After the overthrow of Vargas in 1945, the Second Brazilian Republic continued policies of populism and nationalism throughout the 1950s and early 1960s. When the military took power in 1964, emphasis on the national market, in various forms, continued. The military followed a policy of conservative modernism with an “increased political, economic, and administrative centralisation through the integration of the national market, the deployment of road networks, telephony, mass communication, the concentration of taxes at the federal level, the control of state military forces by the army and interference in state policy.”61_{The regime}

continued to some extent the centralist, nationalist policies that were also accentuated by the regime of the Estado Novo, albeit from a perspective of conservative modernisation, as explained

by Martins.62_{Continuations on a cultural level are also visible. As the military emphasised the}

need to develop the Brazilian internal market in all possible ways, also television and other mass media communications were part of that strategy. As such, mass media have had a considerable impact on the development of a national identity in Brazil, most notably through the use of national television networks to broadcast programmes that promoted or at least included the idea of Brasilidade. An often used example of the communication of national identity through national

television networks are the telenovelas, soap operas that were, and still are, an important factor in

the creation of popular Brazilian identity until this day.63

Another important instrument for national identity construction have been and still are (sub)national flags. In Brazil, a state flag that illustrates the symbolism that a flag carries, is the state flag from Rio Grande do Sul. Brazil’s national flag is one that is assumed to be recognisable to most. It consists of a green base and a yellow rhombus with a blue disk in its centre. In the blue disk a starry sky is depicted, with a white banner that includes the motto ‘order and progress’ (ordem e progresso), running across. The flag of Brazil’s southernmost state Rio Grande do Sul, is

perhaps less familiar to most. The flag consists of three banners in the form of coloured stripes that are placed diagonally over the flag and a coat of arms with a motto in the centre. The first coloured stripe is a green one, and the second a yellow one, not by coincidence the same colours as are on the Brazilian national flag. The third coloured stripe, crossing through the middle of the

60_{Ruben Oliven, p. 306.}

61_{Ruben Oliven,}_{A Parte e o Todo: A Diversidade Cultural no Brasil-Nação, (Petrópolis: Editora Vozes, 2006), p. 55.} 62_{Luciano Martins, “Reforma da Administração Pública e Cultura Política no Brasil: uma Visão Geral”,}_Cadernos

ENAP, No. 8, 1997, pp. 20-21.

63_{Sarah Radcliffe and Sallie Westwood,}_{Remaking the Nation: Place, Identity and Politics in Latin America. (London:}

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other two stripes, is a red one. This colour refers to the spilling of blood in the history of the state.

The coat of arms that is placed in the centre of the red stripe carries an emblem that notes the name of the independent republic the state formed from 1835 to 1845 and the start date of the war that initiated this period of independence, the Revolução Farroupilha. As a motto the

flag notes the words liberty, equality and humanity. This was also the motto of the revolutionaries who fought for independence in 1835.64_{As the elaboration on the significance of the state’s flag}

in comparison to the national Brazilian flag clearly demonstrates, the memory of a once independent República Rio-Grandense is of great importance in Rio Grande do Sul, even though the

state now is part of the Brazilian nation state.

Figure 1. Brazilian national flag Figure 2. Rio Grande do Sul state flag

Brazilians by Choice: Subnationalism in the South of Brazil

The section below will illustrate the counter reaction to the focus on Brasilidade and how

this reignited subnational identities in Brazil and particularly in the southernmost state Rio Grande do Sul. Despite the existence of various other subnationalisms and related separatist movements in other parts of the country,65_{the focus here is on the subnational identity of Rio}

Grande do Sul as an example of subnationalism in southern Brazil. One could also consider discussing the peculiarities of identity formation in Santa Catarina and Paraná in this section, however, due to the distinctiveness of the process of identity formation in Rio Grande do Sul and the influence this particular identity has had to the subnational identities of neighbouring Santa Catarina and Paraná through migration flows, only the first will be discussed here in detail and will serve as an example for the otherness of Região Sul.

As the southernmost state of Brazil, the history of Rio Grande do Sul is strongly connected to wars and conflicts to settle the political frontiers between the Portuguese and Spanish Empires in the region, as well as conflicts between the Brazilian state and insurgent

64_{Ruben Oliven, “National and Regional Identities in Brazil: Rio Grande do Sul and its Peculiarities”,}_{Nations and}

Nationalism, Vol. 12(2), 2006, p. 314.

65_{Movements similar to O Sul É O Meu País exist most notably in the Northeast region, the state of São Paulo and}

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groups fighting for an independent republic. The area that is now Rio Grande do Sul became

relatively late of economic and political importance within the Portuguese Empire.66_{For the}

purpose of this thesis, the point of departure for the historic overview of the region will be the Ragamuffin War (Revolução Farroupilha) that started on the twentieth of September 1835 and

created the independent República Rio-Grandense from 1835 until 1845. This confrontation of

armed groups against the Brazilian Empire is explained by various authors67_{as an “armed}

insurgency of the landed elites of Rio Grande do Sul against the authoritarian power of the Brazilian Empire established with independence from Portugal in 1822”68_{and can be interpreted}

as a direct reaction against the centralising policies created on both the political and economic level by the central state. The ten year period of independence that followed this conflict, is still widely commemorated in Rio Grande do Sul. The twentieth of September still marks an important state-wide holiday and is celebrated with festivities, parades and cultural activities throughout the month September.

The collapse of the Brazilian Empire, eventually brought Getúlio Vargas to power. In his politics, this politician from Rio Grande do Sul and member of the PRR (Partido Republicana Rio-Grandense) since his youth,69_{reacted strongly against the decentralised Old Republic (1889-1930),}

by emphasising the centralisation of the state and the creation of a national identity that left little room for expressions of subnational identities, as discussed above. This emphasis on the unification of Brazil as a nation state with a corresponding single national identity continued under the military regime that lasted from 1964 until the mid-1980s. From the late 1970s onwards however, when the military regime started its policy of political openness (abertura), Brazil’s

population started to gather in various social movements, varying from environmental activist groups to gay rights groups. In this frame of increasing openness of the military regime, a revival of interest in subnational cultural identities, including the Gaúcho-identity in Rio Grande do Sul, emerged. As Oliven describes: “Once the integration of the nation has been achieved there is once again room for a greater degree of diversity, allowing different groups and regions to express their identities and differences.”70

66_{Oliven, “National and Regional Identities in Brazil: Rio Grande do Sul and its Peculiarities”, p. 309.}

67_{See for example various works by Campelo Bornholt, Maestri (2003), Oliven (2006) and Shirley (1991) on this}

topic.

68_{Luciano Campelo Bornholt, “What is a Gaúcho? Intersections between State, Identities and Domination in}

Southern Brazil”, (Con)textos. Revista d’antropologia i investigació social, Vol.4, 2010, p. 26.

69_{Campelo Bornholt, p. 27.}

70_{Ruben Oliven, “National and Regional Identities in Brazil: Rio Grande do Sul and its Peculiarities”, in:}_{Nations and}

"Here in the South, we do not like Carnival": Subnational Identity as a Political Stategy in Southern Brazil