This text explores the dialectical relationship between the social movements, the State and the Brazilian society in the XIXth-XXth centuries. Its approach identifies the social movements as "translators" of the complex developing mechanisms of the Brazilian society. This reveals areas of structural deficiencies, centers of dissatisfaction, and collective desires, and allows mapping the topography of the social relations during this period. It also shows that far from peripheral movements - as they are hegemonically represented -, the social movements are actually explanatory keys to understand and interpret each historical period of the Brazilian society. The paper then rebuilds the articulation between form and content of the social movements in their relation to the historical determinants and discusses the theoretical paradigm shifts in the 1970s, 80s and 90s.
Social movements in Brazil; Social movements, State and society in Brazil; Social movements in the history of Brazil; Brazilian social movements and theoretical paradigms