PACS - Quem somos

Who are we?

Background

PACS was founded in 1986 as the Brazilian component of the Regional Economic and Social Research Programme for the Southern Cone of Latin America (Programa Regional de Investigações Econômicas e Sociais para o Cone Sul da América Latina, PRIES), an initiative by a group of economists committed to processes of social change, who were returning from exile to their home countries: Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Uruguay. The group’s aim was to place their professional, political and social experience at the service of social movements in their respective countries of the southern cone. This alliance was dissolved in 1995, however, following nine years of collaboration and collective production.

PACS is a non-profit Organisation for Development in Solidarity engaged in socio-economic research and education, whose main office is in Rio de Janeiro. PACS’ proposal is to place its staff’s efforts and creativity at the service of social movements, church bodies, grassroots governments, membership production groups (cooperatives, self-managed businesses, associations, informal groups and workers’ schools), public schools and other organisations for development in solidarity in the endeavour to rethink the economy and to head our social and economic system in new directions.

PACS produces research, studies and critical thinking in the form of publications, radio programmes, alternative policies and development projects, advisory services and educational activities.

Our critique of development in the context of capitalist globalisation is that it hinges on the illusion that economic growth can be unlimited and that it is and always will be synonymous with more employment, well-being and happiness for all humankind. The history of the 500 years of capitalism and of all systems centred on limitless production and consumption has shown that notion to be unreal. Rather, it has been a source of frustration for the majority of the working population and a cause of systematic destruction of the environment.

To us at PACS, the raw material of development is the material, mental and spiritual potentials residing in people, peoples and nations. Development consists in nurturing these potentials and helping them gradually to come to fruition, by fostering favourable environments, relationships and practices consistent with those people’s aims. Seen thus, development is first and foremost human and social development; that is, development of the human person and of human collectivities. Economic and technological development are merely means to human development.

Authentic development can thus only occur in a movement that goes from the person to the collectivity, from local to national and continental communities, from nations to the world; in short, from MICRO to MACRO.

Briefly, PACS’ acts, like any organisation at the service of a project of this kind, by offering all it can in terms of support, input and synergy to the process of empowering social actors to become fully conscious subjects, sovereign over their own development as people and as collectivities. Empowering involves a movement from within, a taking of control over oneself, one’s own potentials and the process of developing them or converting them into political action, of putting them into political practice.

For that reason, PACS’ more comprehensive, long-term aim is self-development centred on the attributes, resources and potentials of the person and the community. This is a process that unfolds from within and is controlled and managed by the individual and group that needs to develop itself. It unfolds out to the national and global levels, in what is coming to be known as cooperative globalisation, which is built up from the MICRO level by each person, community, municipality, ethnic group, country and region, respecting their subjectivity and singularity. This globalisation is being constructed through living networks of relationships grounded in sharing, complementarity and cooperation among a diversity of agents at the micro level. The networks constitute the MESO dimension, which is conscious interaction in solidarity among the various micro-level agents. This is globalisation based on respect for diversity among individuals, cultures and the networks themselves, which seeks to develop consensus in diversity, rather than in detriment to that diversity.

Our critique of competitive globalisation is neither unilateral nor moralistic. The micro-meso-macro dimension of PACS’ work focuses on identifying risks and threats, on the one hand, and opportunities and possibilities, on the other. The challenge facing societies and the dispossessed is not just to resist and oppose injustice and oppression, but also and at the same time to encounter specific, innovative ways of meeting those threats, while taking maximum advantage of the opportunities available for advancing their own history and their own development. From that perspective, as can be seen below, PACS associates the three dimensions, not just on the conceptual plane, but also in terms of policy and practice.

MICRO – Micro means the specific, local level, the sphere of personal, family and community concerns. Here we offer advisory and capacity-building services in community and cooperative development to urban and rural communities, municipal schools, self-managed cooperatives and workers’ associations. As we see it, action at the micro level can be daily or sporadic, but must involve two crucial elements: continuity and a multiplier effect. Particularly important are here are territoriality, identity-building and the restoration of self-esteem. Action at the micro level is designed to affect local leaders, but also the social base, most characteristically by empowerment for personal and collective self-development.

MESO - Meso is the level where interlinking takes place to form networks connecting several micro units in a non-hierarchic process of cooperation around common aims. PACS acts as one of the animators of the municipal and state Rio de Janeiro Forum of Grassroots Cooperatives (Fórum de Cooperativismo Popular do Rio de Janeiro), besides collaborating with other solidarity socioeconomy networks at the municipal and state levels, nationwide (Brazilian Network for a Socio-economy of Solidarity or Rede Brasileira de Socioeconomia Solidária), in Latin America (Latin American Network for a Socio-economy of Solidarity or Rede Latino-Americana de Socioeconomia Solidária) and the world (Socioeconomy of Solidarity Pole or Pólo de Socioeconomia Solidária and the International Network of Networks for a Socio-economy of Solidarity or Rede Internacional de Redes de Economia Solidária). It also actively encourages the construction of networks of education organisations as well as directly educating educators-teachers.

MACRO – Macro is the sphere of national and international socio-economic institutions and policies. It is vital, in an arrangement where the parts are organically interlinked, to understand how events in the macro sphere affect the other spheres, and vice versa. That is why it is so important that we act also in the macro dimension to make those interconnections explicitly clear to our social partners. PACS participates actively in networks engaged in macro issues: in coordinating the Jubilee South Campaign for a Debt-Free Millennium; in the Brazilian Network on Multilateral Financial Institutions (Rede Brasil sobre
Instituições Financeiras Multilaterais); in the Brazilian Network for the Integration of Peoples (Rede Brasileira pela Integração dos Povos); and, at the continental and global level, in animating the Socioeconomy of Solidarity Pole (Pólo de Socioeconomia Solidária), of the Alliance for a Responsible, Plural and United World.

PACS’ internal dynamics seeks to strengthen team participation by setting up contexts for discussion and decision-making in such a way as to contribute to greater convergence and synergy among the programmes, the administration and the project staffs.

In 2002, PACS set up the Institutional Development Programme, under which it is refining its social and political intervention as an institution and at the same time developing its internal organisation. At present, PACS’ management structure is decentralised and participatory. The organisation is democratic and transparent, in an endeavour to develop a non-hierarchic system for assigning responsibilities and sharing work that favours self-management.

In addition to its organisational features such as the Membership Assembly, Executive Directorate and Statutory Audit Committee, other exclusively executive or technical bodies have been set up, including the Management Collective and the Communication Working Group.

Executive Directorate

- President: Padre Agostinho Pretto
- Vice-president: Ana Mary da Costa Lino Carneiro (licensed)
- Financial Director: Ricardo Bebianno Costa

Statutory Audit Committee

- Anazir Maria de Oliveira, pela CMP - Central de Movimentos Populares
- Francisco Soriano de Souza Nunes
- Hermila Alcina Pereira Figueiredo

- Cláudio Nascimento
- Sebastião José Martins Soares
- Israel Segal Cuperstein

Father Agostinho Pretto
Ana Mary da Costa Lino Carneiro
Anazir Maria de Oliveira (Central de Movimentos Populares)
Israel Segal Cuperstein
Francisco Soriano de Souza Nunes
Gabriela Leite
Hermila Alcina Pereira Figueiredo
Elaine Caetano
Cláudio Nascimento
Reinaldo Gonçalves
Márcia Miranda
Leonardo Boff
Ricardo Bebianno Costa
Sebastião José Soares
Jether Pereira Ramalho
Guilherme Nunes
Peter Schweizer
Lycia Ribeiro

The Communication Working Group was set up to contribute to public debate by helping build a critical, creative public opinion able to participate in, and press for, the implementation of change-making public policies. This work is carried out by circulating the results of surveys and studies made by the PACS team in books, newsletters, radio programmes, videos and CDs.

The Management Collective is responsible for decisions on the institution’s functioning and day-to-day operations. In broader terms, an annual Membership Assembly (made up of guests from social institutions with which PACS partners and collaborates) to discuss the organisation’s work strategies. Periodic meetings are also held among the teams working on the three programmes run by PACS, so as to enable actions to be coordinated and potentiated to the utmost.

In terms of managerial instruments, PACS has drawn up a Three-year Plan, as well as a Manual of Administrative Procedures. Institutional Activity Reports and an External Audit Report are also produced annually.

The whole team, with support from an outside consultant, has made a priority of improving the system for planning, monitoring and evaluating the institution and the programmes and projects.

PACS ensures its financial sustainability by approving Three-year Plans and submitting projects to Brazilian and international financing agencies. Donor loyalty shows the credibility and commitment that the institution has achieved over the last 17 years.

Ana Cândida da Silva Gomes
Contadora, responsável pelo acompanhamento financeiro dos programas.
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Jussara Mendonça de Oliveira
Assistente social, coordenadora executiva; atua na área de Desenvolvimento Institucional.
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Leila Salles da Costa Gonçalves
Licenciada em Ciências Sociais; Educadora Popular do Pacs; atua com grupos de produção na Zona Oeste.
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Rita de Cássia Alves dos Santos
Graduanda em Ciências Sociais; Educadora popular do Pacs; atua com grupos de produção na Zona Oeste.
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Sandra Maria Quintela Lopes
Socioeconomista, coordenadora de programas do Pacs.
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Relationships and partnering with social organisations (particularly those in the most dispossessed social sectors) and with local agencies and governments committed to these sectors are diversified and have grown out of PACS’ history. Through them the institution has worked and learned, sharing visions and knowledge, and devoting its energy and creativity. Each one, in its way and from its side, has collaborated towards making a reality of the projects developed by PACS.

1. Supporters

CHRISTIAN AID (Reino Unido)
TRÓCAIRE (Irlanda)
Fundação Léopold Meyer para o Progresso Humano - FPH (França e Suíça)
Ação Quaresmal (Lucerna, Suíça)
DKA (Áustria)
Pão para o Mundo (Alemanha)
Appleton Foundation (EUA)
Fundación para la Noviolencia (EUA)
Fundação Rosa Luxemburgo (Alemanha)
SCIAF - Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund ( Escocia)

2. Other partners

Com o objetivo de potencializar a atuação de transformação da sociedade, o PACS vem se articulando com outros movimentos sociais em redes e fóruns, em nível local, regional, nacional e internacional. Essas articulações ajudam na mobilização e organização, além de otimizar recursos, e potencializar ações. Abaixo, algumas das redes em que o PACS atua: