Rinus Michels, coach of the Clockwork Orange, the Dutch national team that startled the world in 1974 (alas, they didn't win), once said that football is war (compare it to maverick director Samuel Fuller, who said cinema is a battlefield). The World Cup is war by other means; an officially sanctioned, ritualized clash of nationalisms. So it's all about Pick your Tribe; only that after your tribe is out of play you switch to another, replacement tribe -- which any effete epicurean would arguably define as Italy. After all they have the most stirring national anthem. They've got the best food and the best clothes. And of course, they've got Andrea "the Magician" Pirlo.
A new way of playing ball?
Brazil, widely praised as The Land of Football, also happens to be the global leader in reduction of carbon emissions, according to recent research published by Science magazine, managing at the same time to increase agricultural production while saving more rainforest.
And yet, and as usual with all things Brazil, all things World Cup got incredibly messy -- a running metaphor of the typical assortment of ills faced by the struggling Global South. Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff has been forced to appeal to the historical stereotype of the Brazilian "cordial man" and stress tolerance, diversity, dialogue and even sustainability, as well as condemning racism and prejudice, to exhort the population to forget about their troubles and welcome an army of foreign visitors.
That's a given, considering the average Brazilian is heartwarming and exceedingly friendly; the devil is in the details -- as in, for instance, at least 200,000 poor people evicted from their places or at least threatened with eviction, to make way for major works bound to increase "urban mobility." Well, only 10% of these works were finished, due in most cases to massive corruption. In Rio, not a single real was invested in a chaotic transport system serving the proletarian peripheral sprawl.
Wildly popular Lula, when he was still the president of Brazil in 2009, said that no taxpayer money would be spent on the World Cup. Well, not directly; most of the funding came from the National Bank for Economic Development, a bank that lends money to banks. Builders of new stadia also benefited from generous tax exemptions.
The bottom line is that Rousseff's government ended up losing the media battle. Over and over, Rousseff has had to explain that the Cup will cost a fraction of what is invested in health and education (that's open to debate.) Virtually half of the Brazilian population is not convinced.
And still what's certain is that a Brazilian World Cup win automatically ensures Rousseff's re-election.
But the recent wave after wave of protests has in fact transcended the current administration. It's as if all these diverse social movements have been manifesting the ultimate utopian desire; to erase, in one go, centuries of injustice perpetrated by Brazil's notoriously rapacious and arrogant/ignorant elites -- which have always implemented total political and economic exclusion based on noxious race and class prejudice.
So this whole drama is not simply about "anti-neoliberal" or "anti-capitalist" stirrings. It goes way beyond nationalism. And it could be way more transcending than the textbook for a revolution using football as a pretext. Whatever the final result of this war revolving around a football, Brazil could yet teach a lesson to the whole Global South.
In victory, and even in glorious defeat, Brazil may end up finding the stamina to pursue a new strategic overture -- a new, non-arrogant, non- neocolonial, non-weaponized, non-exceptionalist way to lead and exercise power, build alliances and clinch grand geopolitical agreements in a multipolar world. A new way of playing ball. So let this New Great Game begin.
A new way of playing ball?
Brazil, widely praised as The Land of Football, also happens to be the global leader in reduction of carbon emissions, according to recent research published by Science magazine, managing at the same time to increase agricultural production while saving more rainforest.
And yet, and as usual with all things Brazil, all things World Cup got incredibly messy -- a running metaphor of the typical assortment of ills faced by the struggling Global South. Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff has been forced to appeal to the historical stereotype of the Brazilian "cordial man" and stress tolerance, diversity, dialogue and even sustainability, as well as condemning racism and prejudice, to exhort the population to forget about their troubles and welcome an army of foreign visitors.
That's a given, considering the average Brazilian is heartwarming and exceedingly friendly; the devil is in the details -- as in, for instance, at least 200,000 poor people evicted from their places or at least threatened with eviction, to make way for major works bound to increase "urban mobility." Well, only 10% of these works were finished, due in most cases to massive corruption. In Rio, not a single real was invested in a chaotic transport system serving the proletarian peripheral sprawl.
Wildly popular Lula, when he was still the president of Brazil in 2009, said that no taxpayer money would be spent on the World Cup. Well, not directly; most of the funding came from the National Bank for Economic Development, a bank that lends money to banks. Builders of new stadia also benefited from generous tax exemptions.
The bottom line is that Rousseff's government ended up losing the media battle. Over and over, Rousseff has had to explain that the Cup will cost a fraction of what is invested in health and education (that's open to debate.) Virtually half of the Brazilian population is not convinced.
And still what's certain is that a Brazilian World Cup win automatically ensures Rousseff's re-election.
But the recent wave after wave of protests has in fact transcended the current administration. It's as if all these diverse social movements have been manifesting the ultimate utopian desire; to erase, in one go, centuries of injustice perpetrated by Brazil's notoriously rapacious and arrogant/ignorant elites -- which have always implemented total political and economic exclusion based on noxious race and class prejudice.
So this whole drama is not simply about "anti-neoliberal" or "anti-capitalist" stirrings. It goes way beyond nationalism. And it could be way more transcending than the textbook for a revolution using football as a pretext. Whatever the final result of this war revolving around a football, Brazil could yet teach a lesson to the whole Global South.
In victory, and even in glorious defeat, Brazil may end up finding the stamina to pursue a new strategic overture -- a new, non-arrogant, non- neocolonial, non-weaponized, non-exceptionalist way to lead and exercise power, build alliances and clinch grand geopolitical agreements in a multipolar world. A new way of playing ball. So let this New Great Game begin.
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