ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author traces the contours of how, while proponents of the projects studied sought to depoliticise hydropower in Brazil raising it above the terrain of everyday dissent those opposing hydropower repoliticised the projects by illuminating the interests that underpin the projects' planning and construction. Although anti-dam activists had reported on potential corruption in the Belo Monte project, it was not until the exposure of the scandal by the Lava Jato investigation that public opinion turned against Belo Monte. At the start of her second term as president, with Lula being arrested by Lava Jato and amid a growing economic crisis, Dilma sought to rebuild a political coalition with opposition parties. The use of security suspensions, the criminalisation of opposition and the circumvention of dissent are all presented as tactics adopted by pro-dam actors to ensure that the dam projects studied would be constructed, regardless of the costs.
