MARXISMANDNEWMEDIAPROCEEDINGS DUKEUNIVERSITY,2012

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TheemergenceofadecentralizedformofactivisminBrazil
RodrigoSavazoni(FederalUniversityofABCUFABC,Brazil) CiceroInaciodaSilva(FederalUniversityofSoPauloUNIFESP,Brazil)

Anauthenticknowledgeeconomywouldbeacommunitarianeconomy(AndreGorz) Revolutions arenotthelocomotivesofhistorybuttheemergencybrakesthatareusedto stopatrainthatisheadingforadisaster... (Oskar Negt in an interview in Alexander Kluge's film News from Ideological Antiquity: MarxEisensteinCapital) Abstract The goal of this paper is to analyze what we call the open networks ofimmaterial production and political action, which could also be called "cooperative and communicative networks of social work" as conceptualized by Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri in their now classic book Multitude. These networks appeared in Brazil in the 21st centuryandcanbeanalyzedbasedon the critical theories that focuson the transformations ofcapitalisminitspresentage.Thearticle analyzes three networks: (1) MetaReciclagem, (2) Fora do Eixo network (Out of axis network) and (3) Transparency Hacker, seeking similarities between them and that are aimed at the completion of this article when we describe what may be the embryo of a new political movement that perhaps already requires a new rationality about what may be called a postspectaclesociety.

Keywords: activism, digital culture, cognitive capitalism, information society, networks, hacker culture,culturalnetworks,immaterialproduction INTRODUCTION Open networks of immaterial production and political action are a contemporary political phenomenon in Brazil. In this analysis, we will explore how these networks evolve from a diaspora in order to obtain new spaces to free software communities displaced in different groups basically in the young sector of the Brazilian society.Thesegroupsaretransformingthe ideas of freedom present in the hacker movement organizing new ways to produce and act in differentfields,i.e.thestruggleforhumanrightsinslums. The focus of thispaper is a briefdescriptionofthe"cooperativeandcommunicativenetworksof social work" as we define themfromthe conceptualization made by Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri in the book Multitude. For theauthors,thenetworkscan keep"theconstituentpowerofthe crowd," which constitutes the main force to contest the "Empire" (Hardt & Negri, 2001). In this paper networks are analyzed due their power to copewithcapitalismwhichinitsculturalstep, focusing on immaterial production (Gorz, 2003), no more mobilizes only the production but waysofliving. The hypothesis here is that, precisely through the joints based on the appropriation of new advanced technologies, these networks operate inventing free colonies within the society of control. To substantiate our criticism, we analyze three networks operating in Brazil: (1) MetaReciclagem, (2) Fora do Eixo network (Outof axis network) and (3)TransparencyHacker. These networks will be described in their specificities, aiming to describe the course of their development and how they are organized. The choice of these networks is due to the fact that they have a great reputation among their peers and have strong international connections. It is not simple to create an approach between them, since each one is dedicated to a separate aspect of theeveryday lifein some cases they are not relatedbutoperateinsimilarways.Itis possible to identify several similar characteristicsin their formativeprocess,whetherthetactics in the interpretation of the political process, which taken together enable us to say that we are facing a work in progress, with potentialtoreorganizethepoliticalactionoftheyounggeneration inBrazil. In this article we understand the hacker culture as the culture of those who share an "ethics based on freedom of knowledge and the sharing of codes." (Silveira, 2007, p. 24) This culture began with theexpertsinprogrammingandsecurityofinformationsystems,butovertheyearsit has been appropriated by different social actors, i.e. a process that we call hacker diaspora, betterdescribedattheconclusionofthearticle.

NETWORKANDPOLITICS

The use of Internet as arepresentational tool that allowspeopletobuildpoliticalalternativesisa reality nowadaysin many countries around theworld.InBrazil, agroupofpeopletookpartinthe process of a political construction called altermundism, especially since crucial moments of global mobilization that took place in Porto Alegre, capital of the State of Rio Grande do Sul, a city that received the first edition of the World Social Forum. Analyzing the antiglobalization movement, Andr Gorz finds out that these networks are a common matrix of free demonstrationsat theturnofthe20thtothe21stcentury,basedon"nonhierarchicalstructures" and in "decentralized horizontal networks and in the process of selfproduction and selforganization,foundedontheprincipleofa"consensualdemocracy"(Gorz,2003). In the year of the second edition of World Social Forum, held in January 2002, the metalworker Luiz Inacio Lula daSilva was elected President of Brazil, taking forthefirsttimeinthehistoryof Brazil the Workers' Party (PT) to the Presidency of Brazil. This historical fact promoted the attraction of a set of antiglobalization activists and militants into the Lula government. Many of theseactivistswereresponsibleforthemanagementofmajorpublicpolicies. To understand this important induction, which was formed as a central aspect to the strengthening of networks of immaterial production, we must return to 2003, when two vectors are articulated within the Lula government: the policy for useandpromotionoffreesoftware,led by sociologist Sergio Amadeu da Silveira, newly installed president of the National Institute of Information Technology (ITI), under the Civil House of the Presidency, and the strategic redirection of cultural policies in the Ministry of Culture, which with the arrival of the musician Gilberto Gil, started to have a focus on the "forces of Brazilian culture" (Gil, 2003). These two events, as narrated by the researcher Eliane Costa in her book Jangada Digital, ended in the development of publicpoliciesondigitalculture that insertedBrazilintheinternationalspotlight in this field. During the next eight years, the organizers of thesenetworksofimmaterialproduction have become comanagers of policies in several spheres of government. Some example of actions that have been developed by sectors responsible for digital inclusion programs by fostering connectivity of the population and the share of popular culture are the Cultura Viva (Living Culture responsible for thenetwork connectivity of Points of Culture). These networks were alsopartnersinthefirstdraftsofpoliciesbillswhosefocuswas tostrengthenthefreedoms in the digital age, such as the proposed reform of the Copyright Act, the draft Law on Public Information, the Marco Civil da Internet, a civiliandigitalrightsdraftedby theMinistryofJusticein partnership with the society through an open web platform dedicated to the discussion and submissionofsuggestionsbythesociety. Andre Gorz in his book The Immaterial attributes to "artisans of computer programs and free networks" the role of confrontation of contemporary capitalism for opposing the enclosure of knowledge. For him, these groups constitute a "social and culturaldissent"(Gorz,2003,pg.63) that proposes a new conception of society. This were the perspectives that guided the cultural policies inBrazilunderLulaandthisarethetheanalyticalapproachesthatwewillusetoanalyze themembersofthesenetworksofimmaterialproductionandpoliticalactioninBrazi.

NEWPHENOMENOLOGYOFCAPITALANDEXCHANGENETWORKS "Given that there is a beach in agricultural settlements, Phoenician ships appear. The crew on the beach spread goods: pots, iron tools etc.. The inhabitants of the coast at night collect these interesting objects, they take it as a gift from the gods. Theship's crew organized a punitive expedition, which ignites some of the settlements. They returned to the ships. Now the people whodonotknowtheexchange,but thesacrifice, try to appease the gods. On the beach lay valuable giftsasfood.Astheship'screw,the night before the massacre, brought to the ship the stolen goods, spread them again during the morning. Two rows are displayed next to each other: the goods of the ship and the sacrifices of the inhabitants of the land. The educated people, after the departure of ships and much hesitation, in memory of severed limbs, destroyed homes etc. just take what they believe that would be fair. Untilthe next time theylearnedwhat isexchangevalue." (The violent impregnation of exchange according to Marx, Adorno, Benjamin and Kurnitzky AlexanderKluge'sNewsfromIdeologicalAntiquity:MarxEisensteinCapital).

(1)MetaReciclagem The MetaReciclagemnetwork, built around the platform http://www.metareciclagem.org,started from the mailing list project Met:Fora (a pun with the word metaphor), which brought together, from 2002 on, organizers of actions relatedtonewtechnologieswithinterestin"understandand propose applications for a reality where we will bepermanentlyconnected."Inthesameyear,in discussions on the mailing list, the term MetaReciclagem appears, as described onthe official website: The MetaReciclagem is a distributed network that operates since 2002 in developing decentralized and open actions to appropriate technology. The network started in So Paulo in partnership with the NGO Agente Cidado (Citizen Agent) as a project to collect and refurbish used computers that were later distributed to social projects. The MetaReciclagemideology is based on the deconstruction of the hardware, the use offree software and open licenses, in a networkbasedactionandinthesearchforsocialtransformation. Many of the agents of such a network would have a basic role in the digital inclusion public policies of the Lula government, especially in the Cultura Viva (Living Culture) project, whose main action is the Pontos de Cultura (Points of Culture). During the years 2003 and 2004, a network of young organizers proposed to the Ministry of Culture the creationof multimedia kits, using free software, which would be distributed to the Points of Culture, civil society organizations awarded through public grants and thatare recognizedfortheircontributiontothe Brazilianculture,especiallyfocusedonpopularculture.

From 2009, withthedissolutionofactionslinkedtothe MinistryofCultureandwiththedeepening of internationalcooperation,thegroupbegantobeunderstoodprimarilyas"anopennetworkthat promoted the deconstruction and the appropriation of technologies" in order to promote social transformation. As Fonseca says in his book PostDigital Labs, "a genuinely MetaReciclagem network was designed and implementedinadistributedandtotallyfreeway."(FONSECA,2011, p. 18). In the same text, theactivist makesfive claims about the origins of the Metarec, asit is known by its agents, which includes the comprehension of the "cultural character of free networks, the emergence ofnew formsof social networking and theinnovationthatitiscreated fromthem."(FONSECA,2011,p.18) Currently, MetaReciclagem network hasabout500members onitsmaillistandhasinoperation 10 local points of articulation, known as spores. This dimension of a stated quest for "social transformation" describes this eminently political network, whose decisions are taken internally bymeansofconsensusandselforganizedmeetings. (2)ForadoEixo(Outofaxisnetwork) The Fora do Eixo (www.foradoeixo.org.br) is a network of collective cultural production that is present in all states of Brazil. Its history dates backtothecreation,intheStateofCuiab,ofthe collective Cubo Mgico in 2002. It would be through the leaders linked to the Cubo (Cube), whose major innovation was the creation of a social currency, the Cube Card, that organized local youth musicians in the capital of the State of Mato Grosso begantheprojectForadoEixo. The network was articulated in 2005 through a partnership between producers in the state of Mato Grosso and its peers in the cities of Rio Branco (Acre State), Uberlndia (Minas Gerais State) and Londrina (Paran State). As Pablo Capil states, an activist who is the chief spokesmanofthenetworkinaninterviewinthebookCulturalProductioninBrazil. "The Fora do Eixo emerges as asocialmovement,withoutclearlegalstatus,butthatwasmore willing to discuss behaviors than the productive chain of music. It was a way to visualize how complementary currency could interfere with the behavior of the productive agent. We seek, instead of producers, collectives that wanted todiscusswith thissocialmovement.TheForado Eixo project worked to organize the third sector, understanding that from the movement connectedtomusic,wemightbetterunderstandtheanthropologicalsenseofculture,whichwas notonlymarket,butitwasbehavioral.Thecircuitappearsinthemiddleofit."(Capil,2010) The Fora do Eixo is nowadays a political and cultural Brazilian expression with national reach and great reputation. It brings together in itsarticulation about2000memberswhoparticipatein collective local and national organizations. Its conformation as a network of immaterial production transcends even what is often considered as culture by the government and the market,usuallycenteredontherecognizedartandartists. "The main point is the breakthroughthatwehavebeenabletodefinitelyleave,fromtheprospect of music collectives to a perspective of social technology collectives. The crew managed to

understand that culture is not exclusively artistic language. What we try to establish is a behavioral transformation in which each of these collective agentscanbuildaafoundationfora varietyoflanguages,butnotnecessarilywithintheart."(Capil,2010) As Capil states, it is important topayattentiontotheculturalshift provokedbytheForadoEixo network in the cultural production since they are a network of social production of technology. It was from the creation of projects like the Fora do Eixo that came other initiatives of great importance in the contemporary Brazilian cultural scene, as the strengthening of the Brazilian Association of Independent Festivals (ABRAFIN), the creation of the Party Culture, which has been seeking dialogue with the traditional political class on issues of interest among younger generations, the meeting of the University of Culture, which has developed open standards training. In 2011, the Fora do Eixo took a permanent action in Sao Paulo, where they rented a house in the neighborhood of Cambuci that serves as operational headquarters for the national command. That same year, similar houses were created in Porto Alegre, Fortaleza, Belo Horizonte, Manaus,SoCarlos,increasingthepowerofthe circuit.Itisimportanttonotethat,as the productivity publicly shared organization reports show, most of the value produced domestically isstillexchangedthroughtheuseofsocialcurrency,whichmakestheForadoEixo pioneer in theuse of economicsolidarityinthearticulationofcircuitsofimmaterialproduction.In the Fora do Eixo houses residents share all their property through a collective box, used for currentexpendituresandthebasicneedsofitsinhabitants. Pablo Capil, in the Fora do Eixo inauguration speech, declares that the access to high speed internet played acentralrolein the democratization of the information.ToCapil,itwasthrough the networkthathecouldarticulatethefirstactionswithpeers anditisthroughnewtechnologies thathekeepsbuildingassociationswiththeForadoEixonetwork. "The Internet is as fast as what we're building. This is a political platform that canlook at usas equals. We are affiliated with it. As fast as the internet. It is the ideal tool that made this story happen. Were not for this, we hardly would get to wherewe are,inthisdeterritorialization,inthe areaof contamination,intheexchangesintechnologyandcollaborativeintelligence." (3)TransparencyHacker Transparency Hacker community is the most recentnetwork in analysis in this article. For this reason, there are just afew documents published on what is being developed by this collective that is formed predominantly by developers, journalists and policy makers interested in promoting transparency in politics. Daniela Silva, one of the main articulators of the network, explains: "Transparency Hacker is a community of hackers and activists concerned with new ways of doing politics in the network. This includes the question of public information, data, open, free technologies, but also corresponds to a higher cause whichisabouttoreversethewayaswe deal with collective issues, engage with groups that previously did not participate in the public

action and in thepublic discourse (for lack of space in the debate or lack ofinterest in very old formats),tomakechangeusingtheresourceswehave, simply because it is possible. I like to thinkthat we are activists oftherightofdoing...It'sbizarre to realize the amountof impossibilitiesto which groups andindividualsundergowhentheywant to provoke change. (..) So the activists of the right of doing or the right to act publicly and collectivelyonbehalfofwhatwebelieveisimportantareneeded." The group gained notoriety when cloned the blog of the Planalto (the Brazilian White House), which was launched by President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva without allowing users to interact through comments. Hacker activists created apagesimilartothe officialone,whichreproduces in full the original content, with the difference that the fake one allows interaction without any moderation. After that they carry out public meetings to hack data and create political applications. Currently, the listof discussionofThacker,astheyarealsoknown,hassurpassed 800 participants. Daniela Silva evaluates the characteristics of thenetworkspecificpoliciesthat shehelpedtoarticulate: "Looking at these two years ofthe community, Irealizethat Thackerexpressedsomeprinciples in his practice. We haveno letterof ethics, rules of use. WhatImean isthat,accordingtowhat these 800 or more people do, we can understand what are the principles that make us participate in the same network. To cite a few: cooperation, freedom,autonomy,hacker ethic, openness to new ways of acting and thinking about the world, emerging and changing political values (ormutant)andacertaintasteforprovocation.Allthesethingsarehighlypolitical." One of the recent initiatives articulated by the community is the Queremos Saber (We want to know) project. The Queremos Saber is a portal where the user can send questions to online contact channels of public services. There is also SACSP (Service to helpclients ofthe State So Paulo), which hacked into the data of customer service of the citizens of the city of So Paulo, andtheCongressmanAnalytics,whichusespublicdatatocreatearankofcongressional behavior. These initiatives are builtvery quickly byactivistsfromThacker,basedontheperspectiveof"do it yourself." This way of acting is one of the central characteristics of this network, butnot only, asdetailedinDanielaSilva: "Talking about references and about our interactions with contemporary movements, I thinkitis worth noticing that we were inspired by the very independent and at the same time cohesive communities of free software, but we do not identify ourselves with anyof these restrictions of the traditional social movements. Many of us are active in several other groups linked to the opening to freedomfreeculture,openeducationalresources,freesoftware,forexample,which makesabsolutesense,itisanorganicandnaturalconnection. The activist, duringthe interview, also highlighted the fact that networks articulate processes in which the ability to create and invent new ways is more important than the reproduction of

establishedprocedures. "No individual would have been creative enough to create the Internet cafes. No government, NGO or social movement would have made an entrepreneurship project based on very few resources, experience and local marketing. The emergence of this idea ensures that we keep glimpsing the potential to transform the networkanditis implementedautonomouslybypeople who are on the periphery of politics and society and bringing their peers inside the communicationprocesses.Itisarevolutionnotonlyincontentbutinformat..."

CONCLUSION The movements analyzed in this article reinterpret, each in its own way, the hacker ethic, the ethic of free software developers, applying it to different areas of knowledge the production of art, communication andleisure to social mobilization for human rights in the suburbs. But what isthisethic?AsPekkaHimanenwritesinhisbookTheHackerEthic: "At the core of our technological timestands a fascinating group of people whocallthemselves hackers. (...) Their "jargon file" emphasizes that a hacker isbasically"anexpertorenthusiastof any kind. From this perspective, the hackerethicisanewworkethicthatchallengestheattitude to work that has held usin its thrall for so long, the Protestant work ethic, as explicated in Max Weber's classic The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (19041905), To some computer hackers, thiskind oflinking of thehackerethictoWebermayatfirstseemalien.They should keep in mindthatinthisbooktheexpressionhackerethicisusedinasensethatextends beyond computer backerism, and that for this reason it confronts social forces that are not normally considered in discussions concerned exclusively with computers. This expansion of the hacker ethic thus presents an intellectual challenge to computer hackers, as well. But first and foremost the hacker ethic is a challenge toour societyandtoeachofourlives.Besidesthe work ethic, the second important level of this challenge is the hacker money ethica level that Weber defined as the other main component of the Protestant ethic. Clearly, the "informationsharing" mentioned in the hackerethic definition cited above is not the dominant way ofmaking moneyinourtimeonthecontrary,moneyismostly madebyinformationowning. "(Himanen,2001,p.4.) To analyze the relations between these collectives described in this article,wepresentaninitial systematizationtointroduceadiscussionabouttheirmethodsandgoals. (1)theoperationofthenetworksistheprogram The networks of immaterial production and political action comes from articulations whose origins are not in the partystructures,unions or social movements thatemergedinBrazilinthe final threedecadesofthe20thcentury(suchasthe MovementofLandlessRuralWorkersMST or large associations of strugglesfor human rights asIBASEandEducationalAction).These

networks will not cling to rigid ideological affiliations. Their brand is the action. Practice is the program. They are strongly influenced by the libertarian left thought, butthese movements are also notable drawing methods and symbols drawn from the corporate culture, promoting akind ofdisputewithinthepostspectacle. (2)networksareproducinginnovationandcommon This allowsustosaythatnetworksareproducinginnovationanddirectingtheireffortstobuildan open source society, since the symbolic exchanges that operate are all done through flexible licensingofintellectualproperty,suchasGPLandCreativeCommons. The search for radicalpolitics and democracy, which are being graduallytrapped by economic interests and the vacillations of the traditional political representatives, is the central role of networksofimmaterialproductionandpoliticalaction. A notable difference, however, is that they are not movements that deny the traditional political act, since they are dealingand keeping the dialogue with the powers and also occupying some open spaces for participatory democracy promoted by the State. In the Metareciclagem case, they are helping in the design and implementation of public policies for digital inclusion, in the Transparency Hacker case, they are working in preparing and drafting the Law on Access to Public Information in collaboration with public transparency, such as with the public agency Comptroller General (CGU), and in the case of Fora do Eixo in the action with municipal and federal Culture councils. There are more examples that could be quoted. This relationship, however,"constructive",doesnotpreventtheseorganizationsfromaspeechstronglytowardthe constructionofanotherdemocracy. (3)networksareformedby"agentsdevelopers" It is common that peoplethatarticulateandactinthefieldofnewtechnologiesareusuallycalled entrepreneurs.In the caseof managers of startups, small businesses aimed atobtainingprofit, the term fits very well. It is not the case, however, to the organizers of free networks, whose action is not defined by the transformation of its creation into a traditional venture capitalist corporation. Even if they are not developers of code, they are developers of other forms of productionandwaysofliving,basicallybasedonthepursuitofpleasure. The diversity of methods and pluralityof views between members representing these networks is remarkable. Also the diversity in the production of language and expressions characterize mainly the work of these collectives in the contemporary multicultural kaleidoscope on the politicalandculturalBrazilianarena.