03 ISSUE VI
JUNE 2025
JUNE 2025
The global Mutirão
Ahead of COP30, Brazil’s government is deploying some popular Brazilian-Portuguese expressions to encourage greater social participation in climate summit.
By Fernanda Rebelato
One of the most exciting phrases that keeps appearing in recent speeches by Brazil’s President Lula and his team of ministers and diplomats is that of “COP da Virada,” or “turnaround COP.” It emphasizes that COP30, scheduled for late November, appears to be the last chance in global governance negotiations to avoid an irreversible rupture in the climate system. It also opens up the narrative that a democratic country will host COP under a progressive government that also has a long-standing tradition of positioning itself as a regional and emerging leader, in a type of goodwill soft power effort.
The most recent letter from Ambassador André Corrêa do Lago, COP30 President, further develops this concept, introducing another popular Brazilian Portuguese word to convey a will to work together.
The incoming COP30 Presidency has embarked on a pioneering experiment to trigger an unprecedented global mobilization against climate change, based on the proliferation of self- organized initiatives throughout the world. This unprecedented mobilization – the Global Mutirão – aims to build momentum around climate action and ambition, and to create the conditions for an inflection point in our climate fight.
A “Mutirão” is a common phenomenon in Brazilian communities, representing a form of de-hierarchized mobilization that is spontaneous and organic in response to an urgent need. It's typically used to build houses in informal settlements. In this case, it’s being called upon to create a new social participation initiative over a highly disputed global negotiation structure.
Another layer of that strategy is the launch of four Circles of Leadership: the Circle of COP Presidents led by Paris Agreement leadership Laurent Fabius; Circle of of Peoples led by Brazil’s Minister of Indigenous Peoples Sonia Guajajara; Circle of Finance Ministers led by Brazil’s Minister of Finance Fernando Haddad; Global Ethical Stocktake Circle led by Brazil’s Minister of Environment and Climate Change Marina Silva. Not coincidentally, the initiative highlights three of Lula’s most publicly respected ministers, who have a large amount of influence and global respect. The actual influence that these circles will wield remains to be seen, as they are currently being defined by official channels in a rather vague definition: “Like waves forming and merging into an unstoppable tide, these circles will flow together, channeling collective wisdom to create renewal and evolution.”
What these efforts show, without a doubt, is the opportunity presented by the Brazilian government to question, suggest, influence, and advocate for other structures to negotiate the climate futures. The civil society organizations that are paying attention do not show any indication that they will let that chance pass them by. A recently launched set of recommendations for the Host Country Agreement, developed by LEAD (Leaders’ Network for Environmental Activists and Defenders), demonstrates a commitment to examining each aspect of the organization, and even the construction, of an event such as COP30.
The Host Country Agreement (HCA) would not be the obvious first choice for advocacy, as it is a legal agreement between the UNFCCC and the host government that primarily governs logistical matters. The idea, however, is that such an accord shapes how people are actually encouraged and protected to participate in this civic space. Therefore, it brings attention to how we guarantee visas, freedom of assembly, protection of data, accessibility measures, accommodation, and even affordability of such an event. These are areas central to the participation of frontline human rights and environmental defenders anywhere, arguably the ones who most need to be heard. In a country that consistently ranks among the deadliest for human rights defenders, like Brazil, it has an even more fundamental role.
The influence of a mechanism such as the HCA might seem pragmatic, but it has the potential to yield longstanding change. An actual change that produces an innovative model for the Agreement can be applied in future events, such as those that do not receive significant attention from local governments or that occur in nations with less commitment to democracy or social participation.
If there is one thing that Brazilian civil society is aware of, it is that all things in a political climate can change. Built upon a repressive military dictatorship from 1964 to 1985, the civic space in Brazil has grown since the 1988 constitution and has seen neoliberal governments from the 1990s, the first two Lula’s terms with a hopeful feel over the left wave in Latin America, only to be brutally tested under Bolsonaro’s far right mandate from 2019 to 2022. The environmental and climate justice civil society, specifically, knows exactly that working in networks and being prepared for all attacks goes a long way, irrespective of who is in charge.
The particularity of a strong, grounded, civil society that operates in networks is particularly important when considering the impact of a global event on local perspectives and lives. The choice of Belém do Pará as a host city is rooted in the symbolic power of bringing global negotiations to the center of the Amazon. However, it also highlights the logistical difficulties of a major construction project in a city already facing a set of challenges for the local population, such as a 2% rate of sewage treatment. This is not to say that local authorities are incapable of doing so; instead, a paternalistic and discriminatory vision has been widely held in Western media as the major problem for COP30. However, to highlight that, if left unchecked, these efforts will most likely exclude local communities and cause harm to the very people the event is intended to positively impact.
The residents of Vila da Barca, a community adjacent to the large construction sites for COP30, which the state government leads, know this all too well. They are currently protesting and bringing light to the fact that their community is at the receiving end for all the untreated sewage from the Nova Doca, one of the largest conference centers set to receive the event. Notably, in a recent public hearing, they challenged a director of Cosanpa, the State Sewage Company, to drink the water they receive everyday through their taps. The director refused to drink, while still affirming that there was absolutely nothing wrong with the cloudy and brownish water placed in his face by the protesters. As local leader, Suane Barreirinhas, puts it:
It's important to understand that talking about climate adaptation means talking about sanitation. In the COP president's letter, he doesn't mention environmental racism. When the president himself doesn't recognize the practice, he opens the way for it to be reproduced. What we are experiencing in Vila da Barca is a case of environmental racism.
The words “COP da Virada or Mutirão Global” may be new to many Brazilians. “Pra inglês ver,” however, is not. The latter is a local phrase which means “For the English to see” to do something just for someone to be convinced, originating from fake strategies used by Brazil in the 19th century deceive the English government that Brazil was moving towards the abolition of slavery, even though there was no actual political will or pragmatic action to do so. What the Brazilian civil society knows too well is that it’s in their hands to make sure that the COP30 is not made just for “the English,” or in this case, the world, to see. What remains to be seen is how much support, financing, and allyship will be available to them to achieve this, whether from the Brazilian government or global stakeholders as a whole.
Fernanda Rebelato is an MA candidate in International Affairs.