Estudo sobre as inter-relações entre formalidade e informalidade do trabalho no segmento de minerais não metálicos no seridó da Paraíba.

Abstract

Mining to boost the national economy, although an old situation, has been used as an economic strategy for the past 20 years. Notwithstanding the accumulated debate and criticism of Brazil's model of economic insertion, which is centered on the exportation of primary products, the commodity boom that occurred between 2002 and 2011 made the government resume the already known prescription and bet on ore exports. According to recent data from the Brazilian Mining Institute, the share of the mineral sector in industrial GDP in 2018 was 16%, and the trade balance of these products had a positive balance of 36%. Although the export products was limited to a few substances, the gains made during the boom period allowed the government to invest in social policies and establish housing and infrastructure programs that stimulated the construction sector, impacting the extraction of minerals. non-metallic, including in the Northeast. Despite the favorable scenario for the expansion of the mineral sector, the insertion of the regions, at this juncture, was marked by inequality and heterogeneity not only due to the natural distribution of the mineral deposits, but also by historical, social and political factors that influenced modes of exploitation of mineral wealth. In the state of Paraíba, the mining activity was developed through the association between mineral processing enterprises and the industry with state incentives, in the most dynamic centers of the Northeast. Although settlements and cooperatives have also received state funds to hire workers and modernize their operating structure, what has happened is the maintenance of traditional labor force exploitation systems, which are marked by informality. Based on this framework, this thesis intended to contribute to the debate on how, in the development of mining in Paraíba, informality not only remained a structuring factor, but also updated its forms of articulation / composition with formality. In the research problem, we question the reasons for the persistence of informality if, since the 1940s, there was a set of state investments in the expansion of productive capacity, in the modernization of enterprises and in the formalization of the workforce. Thus, the purpose of the thesis was to analyze which types of articulation between informality and formality were established in the non-metallic minerals sector of Paraíba and which factors have been important for the reproduction of this articulation in the dynamics of mining work. We took as an empirical case for analysis the extraction and mineral processing in the municipalities of Junco do Seridó and Várzea, where we conducted 35 interviews and field observations. Such research techniques were complemented by documentary surveys, reports and secondary data. The hypothesis worked was that the persistence of informality in the Paraíba mineral sector has a strong correspondence with the new ways of relating the traditional production systems with the new forms of invested capital and state action. Among the conclusions of this study, we can state that the dynamics of informality are reproduced based on three aspects: the action of companies in the appropriation, through titling of areas, of mineral resources and their conversion into an instrument of power exercised over workers and companies; the ambivalence of state action, while stimulating, at the same time as regulating the conditions of development of mineral activity, what happens under the influence of the most powerful economic agents; and, finally, the appropriation of personal relationship networks as a workforce regimentation mechanism and as a means of circulating information and seeking help in maintaining the activity.