Souza, Luiza Erundina de (1934–)

Luiza Erundina de Souza (b. 30 November 1934), Brazilian political figure and first woman mayor of South America's largest city, São Paulo, which has a population of 12 million (1989) and provides one-third of Brazil's GNP. Born in the small town of Uiraúna, in the backlands of the northeastern state of Paraíba, Erundina, as she is known, was one of ten children. An unmarried Catholic who considered becoming a nun, she trained as a social worker and in 1971 moved to São Paulo (which, despite its location in the southeast of Brazil, has the largest concentration of Northeasterners of any Brazilian city, the result of migration due to drought and unemployment in the Northeast). Politically active first in the struggle to unionize social workers, in 1979 she became a founding member of the opposition Worker's Party (Partido dos Trabalhadores—PT), which she later represented on the São Paulo City Council and then as a state assemblywoman. A self-proclaimed Marxist who has described capitalism as "unjust and inhuman by nature," Erundina successfully ran for mayor of São Paulo in 1988 on a platform defending the rights of the landless, the working class, and the poor. She held office until 1992, when she served briefly in the cabinet of President Itamar Franco but experienced constant conflict with her own party, the PT. Always outspoken, she denounced corruption within the government. In 1994 she ran for a Senate seat, once again without proper support of her party, and was not elected. In 1998 she decided to ally herself with the PSB (Brazilian Socialist Party), and with this party she was elected in 2000 as a federal deputy from São Paulo, a position that she won again in 2002 and again in 2006. In 2006 she was also an outspoken opponent of a proposed 91 percent pay raise for members of parliament.

See alsoBrazil, Political Parties: Workers Party (PT) .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Hanchard, Michael George. Racial Politics in Contemporary Brazil. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1999.

House, Richard. "São Paulo's Marxist Mayor Adjusts Her Tactics," Washington Post, 10 January 1989, A20.

Margolis, Mac. "Brazilians Turning Out Ruling Party's Mayors," Washington Post, 17 November 1988, A27.

Nêumanne, José. Erundina: A mulher que veio com a chuva (1989).

Patarra, Ivo. O governo Luiza Erundina: Cronologia de quatro anos de administração do PT na Cidade de São Paulo, de 1989 a 1992. São Paulo: Gereçao Editorial, 1996.

Riding, Alan. "A Mayor Bent on Inverting Priorities," New York Times, 18 March 1989, 4.

Singer, Paul. Um governo de esquerda para todos: Luiza Erundina na prefeitura de São Paulo, 1989–1992. São Paulo: Editora Brasilense, 1996.

                                        Daphne Patai