Os espinhos, as flores e os frutos do mandacaru: as transformações na configuração social de uma comunidade rural camponesa a partir da intervenção de atores externos.

Abstract

The thesis aims to ascertain how collective action encouraged by external actors - entities and organizations that are part of the Paraiba Semi-arid Articulation (ParaibaASA) - was developed in the rural community of Mandacaru, located in the Cariri Region, State of Paraiba Cariri. Our goal was to analyze how the actions of external actors and peasants changed the configuration of the community Mandacaru, causing changes in the way of production, lifestyles and identities in the construction of the peasants. The history of the establishment of the Community Mandacaru highlights the social changes, over time, in its social setting. This process focused on the formation and division of the Rural Propriety called Fazenda, which led to the Community, and turned to the present day. The social organization of the Community has gradually affected and transformed by the emergence of collective action, enabling the development of a process of change, more than fifteen years, which changed the social trajectory of the peasants who live there and work. It was through the introduction of innovative techniques and organizational initiatives that new forms of social life and environment with the semi-arid region were introduced into the Community. Collective action driven particularly by the Union of Rural Workers of Solitude (STR) and the Program for Application of Appropriate Technology for Communities (PATAC) brought to a new look at their social and economic organization. The major organizational innovation, which is juxtaposed to the community organization, was the Revolving Funds Solidarity System (FRS). This system is a strategy applied to all technological and productive innovations: a set of simple, low cost and great potential adapted to environmental conditions, such as: tank plates, underground dams, some screens, silos and ecological various forms of sustainable management of natural resources and native forest, breeding herd, pastures and crops, in particular with the adoption of agro-ecological paradigm. The result of this work is the collective learning and community management of common resources and public through the exercise of solidarity. The community is strengthened and its members have gained confidence. The peasants learned to exchange ideas and found that collective action delivers results difficult to be achieved by individual action. This process of collective construction took place not without conflict and intense way, resulting in a profound transformation in the production practices of farmers, their way of life and identity.