Peasants, the Truth and the History of Dictatorship in São Paulo

Abstract

While the post-World War II social history of the Brazilian countryside has yet to be written, rural social and labor movements have taken advantage of the fiftieth anniversary of the 1964 coup d’etat to push for inclusion of the peasant experience in reports written by the National Truth Commission, which was appointed by Brazil’s president to document human rights violations before,
during and after the dictatorship. Involved in various state and national endeavors to document repression and other human rights violations in the countryside,
historians have contributed to the construction of a framework for understanding the period 1946 to 1988. This article offers new information about the repression
of the São Paulo state peasantry in the period and a case study the human rights violations that occurred as the coup unfolded in the rural areas of Ribeirão Preto, São Paulo. Utilizing a diverse array of historical tools, the analytical narrative of this case seeks to demonstrate the challenges of producing history in the context of the short schedules allotted truth commission to generate reports, leading them to select “emblematic” rather than representative cases.