This is a linkpost for the article The Environment as an Obstacle: The declared war and the veiled war between the Bolsonaro government and the forces resisting deforestation

It's a translation of an article published in the edition #153 of the Piauí Magazine, on June 2019 - a profile of the Brazilian Minister of Environment.

This article might concern those interested in climate change, since the Amazon Rainforest is considered one of the tipping points in the global climate system; of course, it will interest those focused on environmentalism, too. It might be relevant for EAs interested in advocacy and lobby.

It's interesting to see this article in the light of posterior events, such as the international pressure demanding the government to take action against loggers and forest fires in 2019 and 2020. Curiously, even the Minister of Agriculture, Tereza Cristina, has been shown as closer to protecting the forest than the Minister of Environment - well, basically because, even though most of the production in Brazil is outside those areas, and they're affected by the consequent bad reputation. It might also be interesting to contrast it with a previous contexts: for instance, the environmental policy in Brazil used to be described  as having made huge progress thanks to some sort of bureaucratic activism since 2007 - precisely because of the lack of political interference.

As I said in a previous crosslink:

I'd also highlight that this magazine is acknowledged for providing high-quality material - well, it's funded and managed by a billionaire philanthropist documentarian, so they don't seem very concerned with appealing to the general public. I think finding out what can be considered high-quality material about a particular country might be somewhat difficult for outsiders; you can use PageRank or data on influence to filter BS, but that's likely not enough - e.g., you will end up ranking Wired above Nautil.us. I think there should a place where people interested in reading high-quality material about foreign places could find articles like this one.

Finally, it might be relevant to disclose that this magazine is openly critical to the government, and even has recently published an article accusing the President of having decided to intervene in the Supreme Court during a meeting on May 22 in response to the possibility of the Court ordering him to deliver his cellphone - before he was talked down by retired Army Generals who serve as Ministers. Notice that, on the same day, the Minister of Institutional Security (with oversight over Intelligence services) oficially stated that apprehending the President's cellphone could lead to unpredictable consequences for national stability.