NGOs and Neoliberalism: reflections on strategies and actions of FASE and SDDH in the state of Pará

Abstract

This article analyzes the strategies and actions of NGOs in the Amazon, considering the examples of the Federation of Organizations for Social Service amd Eduacation (FASE) and the Para Society in Defense of Human Rights (SDDH), from the decade of the 1990s, as neoliberalism was implemented in Brazil. It highlights the changes of these NGOs, considering their trajectory from the time of the military regime, through Brazilian democratization and then neoliberalism, with special emphais on the period when Cardoso was President. Employing a Marxist theoretical and methodological approach, the documents of these NGOs were researched and studied, identifying the strategies and actions in distinct historical moments. In addition, ten interviews of people involved in these actions were conducted. This is a reflection of the neoliberal policies in Brazil, the publicizing and the tertirary sector. The impacts of neoliberalism on these NGOs are
discussed, as well as the strategies and actions of the NGOs FASE and SDDH, during the neoliberal period and the struggles
and challenges are identified in this context. It is confirmed that these NGOs, FASE and SDDH, developed strategies in
defense of human rights in the Amazon, in spite of the difficulties imposed upon them by neoliberalsim.