O internacionalismo em Chico Mendes

Abstract

The article analysesthe political trajectory of Chico Mendes,intending to expandthe concept of internationalism in International Relations. Drawing on a critical review of classical approaches to internationalism, the study proposes shifting the analytical focus toward territorialisedpolitical practices rooted in subaltern ways of life. Based on bibliographic research and documentary analysis of speeches and records of the rubber tappers’ movement, it argues that the “empates” and the Alliance of the Peoples of the Forest constitute forms of articulation that challenge the domestic–international dichotomy and broaden the scope of the political beyond the state sphere. It maintains that internationalism in Mendes emerges from the convergence of ecology, labour, and territory, articulating local, national, and international networks in defenceof common goods and the reproduction of life. By engaging with decolonial and pluriversal perspectives, the article demonstrates that the Amazonian experience not only connects toglobal agendas but also produces its own grammar of counter-hegemonic internationalism, grounded in solidarity among forest peoples and in the politicisationof nature as a collective subject. It concludes that incorporating this experience into the debate in International Relations contributes to an epistemological reconfiguration of the fieldby recognising historically marginalisedpractices and forms of knowledge as constitutive of the “international.”