MST Pioneers

*Pioneers of the MST* is the result of a challenge faced by Folha de S.Paulo reporter Eduardo Scolese: to locate and tell the life stories of the movement's first national leaders, after finding their names in a yellowed 1985 edition of the Jornal Sem Terra (Landless Workers' Movement). In their luggage, a GPS device, maps, a recorder, and notebooks were mixed with a few questions: where were those men and women? How many were still active in the movement? How many had been settled in agrarian reform projects? And, most importantly, what were their origins and the reasons that led them to help create the MST? Although the Landless Workers' Movement has become a much-cited and discussed political actor in recent years, little is known about these people who wear red caps and t-shirts and wield sickles and hoes in the spotlight. Men and women portrayed in the news in a simplistic and generalized way, amidst the noisy land invasions across the country, appear differently in this book. To recount their trajectories, Eduardo Scolese and photojournalist Sérgio Lima, also from Folha, set out in search of the movement's pioneers, traveling 11,000 kilometers of roads across 11 states and the Federal District. In this intimate exploration of the MST, the reader will follow the characters through stories of tension, drama, migration, murder, and land disputes. This reportage-book paints a portrait of recent history, which, despite its proximity, rarely presents itself with the complexity and importance of the facts it deserves. More than showing the origins, objectives, contradictions, and tactics of Brazil's leading and most controversial social movement today, the location of its first national leaders, in unimaginable places and situations, reveals a tragic and surprising Brazil.