Informality in Brazil

Informality is an important aspect of Brazilian society, with four in every ten people working in informal activities. It has been the focus of public policies for some time, which have framed informality as a source of practices that should be punished and as a problem to be solved through state action. Informality is a result of complex historical processes and in Brazil it reflects the brutal structural inequality still present in the country. Informality should be understood as a heterogeneous setting which encompasses different types of organizations and activities. In this chapter, we discuss informality from a situated perspective. We present a brief overview of the informal sector in Brazil and identify three different coexisting models of informal organizations: semi-structured businesses, platform capitalism businesses, and Solidarity Economy enterprises. These retain important differences which illustrate the complexity and the diversity of the informal sector in Brazil, and elsewhere. From this heterogeneous setting, we later argue, relevant grassroots strategies that often emerge from informality have played an important part in building up social capital and social cohesion through the shaping of resilience networks, creativity, and innovation in informal settings. These experiences suggest that informality is not simply a source of problems but might also provide interesting solutions for contemporary challenges and thus should be further explored and understood.