1 INTRODUCTION

Cachaça, a typical Brazilian drink, refers to the exclusive designation of sugarcane spirit produced in Brazil, with alcohol content between 38% and 48%, obtained from the distillation of fermented sugarcane juice (Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Supply [MAPA], 2019). Among the distilled alcoholic beverages, it is the most consumed in Brazil, representing 87% of the national market, and one of the four in the world leadership. With sales of 520.9 million litres and handling 7.5 billion reais per year, the sector employs 600 thousand direct and indirect workers and has a market growth forecast of 5.1% by the year 2022 (Brazilian Micro and Small Business Support Service [SEBRAE], 2019).

The drink also emerges as an important export product in the Brazilian trade balance. In 2018, exports were made by 21 Brazilian states that served 67 countries, generating revenues of US $ 15.8 million and a total of 8.41 million litres (Brazilian Institute of Cachaça [IBRAC], 2019). Despite the advances in cachaça for the sector, the industry has historically been marked by high levels of informality (Daniel, 2016; SEBRAE, 2016; MAPA, 2019), which negatively impacts the legitimating process of those producers who are in legality (Oliveira et al., 2008; SEBRAE, 2005; 2019).

In order to deinstitutionalize informality, a set of practices has been observed, largely by cachaça producer associations in partnership with regulatory agencies. Among them, there is the National Association of Producers and Members of the Cachaça Productive Chain (ANPAQ), created in 1988, in Minas Gerais. The surfacing of the organization emerges in a context in which a group of producers articulated, in order to carry out a work of disassociating moral and symbolic precepts from artisanal cachaça.

Traditionally seen for its low quality, the reframing occurred from a renewal of traditions, whose focus was to serve classes A and B, whilst a product of higher quality (Silva, 2009; Paiva & Brito; 2018; Souza, 2018). When establishing an articulation with a network of actors that involved the State and funding agencies, the association proposed to carry out, among its objectives, a work of interruption in the still (alembic) cachaça.

Such particularities in the cachaça field guided the formulation of the central question that guides this study, which aims to answer: how did the practices of the managers of the National Association of Producers occur in interrupting the informality of cachaça in Minas Gerais? From a theoretical point of view, it is proposed to analyze the ANPAQ experience, based on the recent sociological aspect within institutionalism, called institutional work.

Formulated by Lawrence and Suddaby (2006), Lawrence, Suddaby, and Leca (2009) and Lawrence, Leca, and Zilber (2013), the Institutional Work approach aims to understand how the agency influences social structures. The emphasis is on the work done by individuals and groups to promote the creation, maintenance, and disruption of institutions. The choice of theory is justified by providing mechanisms to understand the institutional work developed by certain actors, capable of influencing a whole field, thus helping to identify aspects of the efforts undertaken by ANPAQ managers in an attempt to deinstitutionalize informality in the artisanal cachaça field.

The focus of analysis of the research that gave rise to this paper was the institutional work socially built within the State of Minas Gerais under the leadership of the Association in the last three decades (1989-2019). The justification for choosing this locus is due to the fact that the cachaça market in the state of Minas Gerais is set up as the largest alembic producer in the country, as well as for presenting in its history a set of actions that led to changes in the values ​​and perceptions of artisanal cachaça in the last decades (Silva, 2009; Andrade et al., 2018; Thomé, 2018; Paiva & Brito, 2018).

As a theoretical contribution, it should be noted that the choice of Institutional Work is configured as a current of recent thought and that has attracted the attention of academia in recent years, due to the significant increase in the publication of studies that adopt the perspective, especially in organizational studies (Lawrence, Leca & Zilber, 2013, Zarpelon et al., 2019). However, the studies that have focused on this theoretical current are predominantly concentrated in North America and Europe, with few studies developed in Brazil (Jacometi, Gonçalves & Castro, 2014; Coraiola et al., 2015; Miranda & Calmon, 2016; Lino et al., 2019; Zarpelon et al., 2019; Lima et al., 2019; Amarante & Crubellate, 2020), thus revealing an open field for scientific research[1].

From an empirical point of view, cachaça as a theme offers the option of being studied under different approaches in organizational studies, with emphasis on the analysis of institutional theory (Sunderman, 2017; Andrade et al., 2018; Thomé, 2018; Paiva & Brito, 2018). Despite the wide scope of this perspective, so far, there were no studies that explored the theme from the perspective of institutional work, and especially in the context of informality, considered one of the major institutions in the field of Institutional Work (Hampel, Lawrence & Tracey, 2017).

2 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

2.1 Institutional work and the interruption of institutions

The precursor of Institutional Theory applied to organizations was Phillip Selznick in 1957, based on the seminal work “Leadership in Administration”. Widely debated and branched out, the Institutional Theory, from a sociological perspective, contributed with analysis on the sharing of values, the search for legitimacy, power relations, isomorphism, and insertion in organizational environments (Dimaggio & Powell, 2005). From the 1990s and 2000s, the concepts of Institutional Logics, Institutional Entrepreneurship and more recently, Institutional work, proposed by Lawrence and Suddaby (2006), Lawrence, Suddaby and Leca (2009) and Lawrence, Leca, and Zilber (2013).

Institutional Work houses a set of assumptions, concepts, and categories that make it possible to understand the effects of the practice of actors on social structures in an institutional field (Lawrence & Suddaby, 2006). From an etymological point of view, the authors make distinctions about the conceptual perspective of "Work", "Institution", and "Practices" to illustrate the theory. By institution, they understand as how the lasting elements of social life affect the behaviour and belief of actors. The concept of work is understood by the physical or mental effort performed with a specific objective and it can create, maintain, or interrupt an institution. And the practice refers to concrete acts of institutional work, materially mediated by human action and organized around institutions and intentions in shaping institutions. Although it is not possible to detach from the action as a practice, however, the authors resort to the concept of Schatzki (2002) that delimits the action as everything that people bodily perform in their daily lives, while the practice represents a temporary involvement of coordinated actions that express themselves while prescribed for certain purposes.

From this perspective, institutional work encompasses efforts capable of influencing organizational fields, which demonstrates how actors develop and promote actions to create, maintain, or interrupt institutions (Lawrence, Leca & Zilber, 2013). Institution building is related to the construction of rules, limits, beliefs, and changes in meanings. Perpetuation is linked to the repair of mechanisms that guarantee the legitimacy of existing institutions. Finally, the interruption of institutions involves the dissociation of practices, customs, rules, and beliefs under which institutions are anchored, aiming at organizational change (Lawrence & Suddaby, 2006; Yan et al., 2018).

Specifically, on the third pillar, studies that analyze the interruption of institutions arose from the conception of the agency's influence on the deconstruction of institutions. While most analyses focus on the predominance of institutions, deinstitutionalization, or institutional interruption, they refer to the discontinuation of institutionalized organizational practices (Maguire & Hard, 2009; Yan et al. 2018).

When adopting this institutional position, the actors choose certain institutions in order to render them ineffective, if they do not meet their interests (Coraiola et al., 2015; Yan et al., 2018). This happens when the legitimacy of practices that occur within organizations is put in check, they start to lose importance or are questioned by the actors that make up the organization. Therefore, there is a need to intentionally interrupt these institutions, so that there are no legitimacy problems (Lawrence & Suddaby, 2006; Maguire & Hard, 2009; Coraiola et al., 2015; Yan et al., 2018).

This pillar of institutional work can be carried out both by actors who occupy the organization, and by those who are outside the environment, and who, when perceiving the possibility of changes to achieve benefits, start to act in favour of interruption. The disruption process of institutions generally occurs in three forms: disassociate moral and symbolic foundations; undermine assumptions and beliefs; and oppose sanctions and rewards (Lawrence & Suddaby, 2006).

The first, the dissociation of moral and symbolic foundations, occurs when institutional work is capable of disturbing institutions and interrupting them based on the possibility of disassociating the practices and rules of the moral and symbolic foundation that a given institution will carry. The interruption can occur from the gradual weakening of the symbolisms present in organizations. The foundations of a lasting institution are interrupted by means of a set of indirect practices that will surround and weaken these institutions.

The second process, undermining assumptions and beliefs, considers that institutions are maintained based on beliefs associated with actors who maintain a particular practice and follow rules imposed by that institution. The beliefs that keep institutions alive generate an aversion to the possibility of changes and differentiation within institutionalized environments. Thus, institutional work is successful when it eliminates beliefs, making room for new ways of acting that replace existing standards within organizations (Lawrence & Suddaby, 2006).

The last category of interruption of institutional work is the opposition to sanctions and rewards, which usually occurs through central actors of change in partnerships with state entities. By allying themselves with the State, they legitimize actions to change rules in the organizational field, aiming to oppose sanctions and benefits that are applied in case of non-compliance or compliance with a certain institution. The State represents a lever for the interruption of institutions, when it has the possibility of acting, through new laws, in changing obsolete laws, premises and technical issues, which directly affect an institution.

Among the various approaches to Institutional Work, the interruption is the one with the least number of academic investigations (Jacometti, Gonçalves, & Castro, 2014; Hamper, Lawrence & Tracey, 2017). This occurs, therefore, much of what is known about deinstitutionalization are analyses of the creation processes, and when one institution is interrupted, another one immediately appears to take its place. Thus, researchers tend to pay more attention to the institutional creation process, to the detriment of the events that culminated in the interruption of an old institution, which places in the area the relevance of new studies that can contribute to this theoretical-empirical approach (Lawrence & Suddaby, 2006; Lawrence, Leca, & Zilber, 2013).

2.2 The informality of cachaça as an institution: A brief historical rescue

In Brazil, informality has been discussed since the beginning of the 1990s, being considered a way to make work more flexible, taking into account the problems that arise from it or those that may result when faced with the absence of legal aspects. Informality can be understood in opposition to situations where legality is possessed. Thus, informal is that which does not follow the minimum standards and works without proper records in competent agencies (Silva, 2009; Souza, 2012). In addition, Williams and Shaid (2016) note that informality involves socially shared rules, usually unwritten, but that are created and maintained outside the officially sanctioned channels. Therefore, it is a socially constructed institution that incorporates non-prescribed norms, traditions, bonds of trust, secret scripts, and worldviews that set them apart from formal and prescriptive institutions.

In the cachaça sector, informality is mainly characterized by small establishments (90% are artisanal micro producers), which have a complementary income in cachaça production, mainly in the off-season (SEBRAE, 2016). Most of these producers carry the problems arising from the rural environment, therefore, subject to low schooling, evasion of young people, dispersion of public policies, and domination exercised by large landowners (Daniel, 2016).

Oliveira et al. (2008) point out that the high level of informality within the scope of the alembic cachaça is also harmful for the entire sector. In their study, it is pointed out that these stills that operate in informality develop their activities and work in a disorderly manner, not respecting basic principles of competition, which leads to predatory measures, in view of the tax burden on duly regularized establishments.

In addition, it can pose a risk to the consumer's health and compromise the rupture of the sector, since establishments not regulated in MAPA do not pass the verification audit on the conditions of elaboration / production and do not carry out laboratory analyses, according to legislation to prove the product quality standard (SEBRAE, 2005, 2019).

In order to understand the informality of artisanal cachaça as an institution, it is necessary to recover the historical aspects of the formation of the field whose origin goes back to the beginning of the era of the sugarcane cycle, around the year 1530. As remarkable facts, in the 17th century, cachaça production grew with the intensification of sea voyages. The sugar trade, however, proved to be more profitable in northeastern Brazil, which meant that the mills around Rio de Janeiro and the São Paulo coast started to dedicate themselves more to the manufacture of cachaça. The production of the drink soon gave rise to a prosperous trade that competed directly with Portuguese wine in the preference of consumption, which generated sanctions from the Portuguese crown. Among them, the prohibition of production between the years 1635 and 1639, and the repulsion by the court, for being considered responsible for deaths and diseases that affected consumers of the drink, generally slaves and poor men (Silva, 2009; Dias, 2014; Barbosa, 2014).

In the 18th century, with the discovery of gold in Minas Gerais, an avid domestic market for cachaça was opened. The drink was used to reinforce the slaves' food. This custom soon caused apprehension on the part of the Portuguese crown, generating a new ban. The crown understood that the consumption of cachaça hindered the development of work in the gold mines, hampering the withdrawal of the ore (Silva, 2009; Daniel, 2016). On June 12th, 1748, the operation of the Captaincy of Minas stills was banned because they jeopardized slave labour in the mines and was considered responsible again for the various health problems and disorder caused by slaves (Silva, 2009; Barbosa, 2014).

The Crown's action, however, proved to be ineffective, in view of the conflicts triggered. To deal with this situation and after the earthquake in 1755 that devastated Lisbon, another strategy was adopted: taxation (the “fifth of hell”) on the production of cachaça. The situation only began to change with the arrival of the Court in Brazil, in 1808, when cachaça became one of the main products of the economy.

However, with the coffee cycle, from the 19th century until the 1930s, cachaça began to suffer a decline in its economic importance, starting to be discriminated against, as members of local elites sought ways to identify themselves with European cultural aspects, prevalent at the time. The attempt to adopt European customs at the expense of Brazilians reaffirmed cachaça, seen as a low quality and inferior drink, compared to what was brought from Europe (Dias, 2014; Daniel, 2016).

This long institutional process transferred a fragile social structure of production and commercialization, configuring a delegitimization of the preference for cachaça, thus making it difficult to enter the international market (Daniel, 2016). It was only in the mid-1980s that the first programs and organizations that supported the production and sale of artisanal cachaça emerged, in order to remodel the drink for sectors with high purchasing power (Silva, 2009; ANPAQ, 2017; Paiva & Brito, 2018; Souza, 2018).

From a legal point of view, until that moment, cachaça did not have exclusive legislation, since it was based on Law no. 8,918, of July 14th, 1994, which now provides for standardization, classification, registration, inspection, production, and inspection of beverages. However, written on many demands for formalization, the difficulties faced by producers increased, which resulted in the updating of informal practices, which were not adapted to the new imposed situations (Dias, 2014; Daniel, 2016).

Likewise, while legislation was being created to strengthen the idea of ​​artisanal cachaça as a national product and increase its quality (Decree No. 4062 of December 2001 defined that the name cachaça should be used only and exclusively by Brazilian producers for trade), the requirements for its standardization have become stricter, in addition to burdening producers to adapt to structural changes in their stills[2].

It is also worth mentioning the inheritance of high taxation, which since the end of the 18th century has reproduced the same taxation system specific to the drink, according to the activity of sugar production in sugar mills. In the same logic, in 2006, with the withdrawal of the manufacture of cachaça that was part of the Simple National taxation regime, the tax burden increased even more. Taxes now represent 81.87% of the sale price of the drink (IPI: 60%, ICMS: 17%, ISS: 3 to 5%, plus ITR, license, fees, and licenses). And, as there was no distinction between the taxation of producers of alembic cachaça and the large cachaça industries, the activity of the former was excessively burdened, consequently making formality more difficult (SEBRAE, 2016; Sunderman, 2017).

It is noted, therefore, that informality in the cachaça sector can be defined as an institution because it features elements that are distant and long-lasting, playing a strong role within organizations and in the organizational fields in which they are inserted (Sindzingre, 2006). Institutions are present by exercising actions in the environments in which they operate, influencing, and at the same time being influenced, for an institutional reconfiguration, if necessary (Lawrence, Suddaby & Leca, 2009).

In this scenario, the work developed by ANPAQ is located in an institutional environment historically penalized since the colonial period. Due to moral aspects, punitive dimensions, influenced by tax aspects and more recently by regulatory aspects, they end up contributing to the institutional maintenance of informality (Souza, 2012; Daniel, 2016).

3 METHODOLOGY

In order to investigate the institutional work of interrupting informality by ANPAQ in Minas Gerais, a qualitative research approach was adopted. The choice of the qualitative method is justified because it contributes to the realization of a reading on the field in a contextual way, with the identification of conjunctures that triggered certain events, thus offering contributions to analyze how disruption practices took place, based on the perception of actors involved.

The qualitative data collection process followed two paths: documentary research and in-depth interviews. Documentary investigation, understood as the use of records that contain information for the construction of the research process (Sá-Silva, Almeida, & Guidani, 2009), maintains coherence with the institutional approach itself, which uses the historicity of organizational events to understand events in organizations.

Thus, from July 2018 to January 2020, documentary research was carried out on the materials made available on the online platform of the ANPAQ collection, such as regulations, circulars, and newsletters produced over the organization's thirty years; the reading and writing of theses, articles and papers in the mainstream media that constituted the themes of Institutional Work, the production of cachaça and informality in the artisanal sector.

As for qualitative in-depth interviews, which took place between July 2018 and January 2019, their choice enabled flexibility in data collection, allowing respondents to provide answers based on constructs that were not limited to the exclusive direction of a structured script. Thus, the first contact with the managers occurred through the institutional email, provided on the association's website. In this email, the objective of the research was presented, as well as a formal invitation to participate.

The interviews, carried out by means of a pre-structured script, were based on the theory of institutional work, which guided the categories for the identification of the central themes of the research, divided into three blocks of questions: the historical dimensions of the institution, the political, technical, and cultural aspects of the adopted practices, and the consequent organizational legitimacy (Attachment A).

For the treatment of data from documentary research and interviews, the thematic analysis method proposed by Braun and Clarke (2006) was used, which is organized in five stages, in order to understand the meaning conveyed by the message and what may be implicit in the content (Figure 3).

In the first stage, the database was read using documentary and interview methods, to understand the research environment and gather descriptions of the ANPAQ institutional historical context, relating to the sector's inheritances and the economic scenario of the time (1980-2019).

In step two, we sought to understand the conditions of informality, comparing the norms and rules of the sector, with the limitations found by producers to formalize themselves. The results reveal twelve aspects considered central to maintaining informality. The choice of topics was justified because the central aspects emphasized by the participants during the interview for the perpetuation of informality, as well as, reported in the literature of the area, in other academic investigations. This internship helped to model the obstacles to the rupture of informality, and the consequent action of ANPAQ's institutional work, which shaped the next internship.

In step three, we sought to understand the practices of ANPAQ members, in order to manage institutional demands for disruptions. The incidences of responses to demands were sought, which resulted in a set of institutional work activities for deinstitutionalization. The incidences of responses to the demands generated a set that were interpreted and reorganized. The codes were interpreted again and brought together in thirteen central dimensions, which described the actions of ANPAQ members in an attempt to interrupt informality.

In the fourth stage, the studies of Institutional Work by Lawrence and Suddaby (2006), guided the creation of theoretical categories referring to the processes of interruption of institutions. From the ways of disassociating moral and symbolic foundations, undermining assumptions and beliefs, and opposing sanctions and rewards, the data were analyzed again, to understand the practices of the actors with the presented theoretical perspective.

Finally, the crossing of the empirical data with the theory made it possible to point to the advances and challenges in the interruption of informality in the sector. For the presentation of the results, more than providing a descriptive report or with excessive excerpts, an attempt was made to incorporate them in such a way, to illustrate the research narrative within the history of the institution, presenting the results generated by the institutional interruption procedurally.

4 ANALYSES AND DISCUSSION OF RESULTS

4.1 Foundation of ANPAQ and the first work to interrupt informality

The emergence of ANPAQ was marked by a context in which the sector articulated itself to manage a network of actors. The aim was to reduce informality, since in the late 1980s the number of producers in this situation was almost 98% in Minas Gerais (Excerpt from interviewee 3).

In the words of one of the managers, artisanal cachaça came close to extinction as an activity, given the difficulties that producers faced. The sugar and alcohol industry had high federal subsidies, which affected the competitive capacity of the alembic cachaça, since the industrialists also produced it industrially (Excerpt of interviewee 2). In addition, at the time, Minas Gerais imported distillate from industrial sugarcane spirits from other regions, and sold at low cost to the end consumer, competing directly with artisanal producers (Silva, 2009; Souza, 2018).

Thus, AMPAQ emerged from the union of thirty members, in an attempt to reorganize producers to have access to government entities. The interest, however, was not one-sided:

At that time, I was approached by ... (an) employee of some agency of the government of Minas Gerais, who was working together with BDMG. According to him, the Government of Minas Gerais was making efforts to face informality, bring stills to the formal world, as a way of quality control, development of incentive policies, development of research centers in state and federal universities to give access to formal producers and the possibility for informal ones to [have access to] cutting-edge technology for the production of cachaça, cost control, sustainability and, of course, with all of this, increase State revenue (Excerpt from interviewee 1).

When they founded the association, on January 11th, 1988, the first pillar of institutional interruption was to untie the old production practices, to adhere to modern technological processes. The institutional work aimed to change the symbolic value of the drink as a low quality product, renewing the tradition of cachaça by increasing its added value and improving its quality (ANPAQ, 2017). Based on the elaboration of public policies to encourage the sector, they could thus increase the market, attracting more producers to the formality, and consequently, expanding the State's revenue.

In this sense, in 1992, State Law No. 10,853 of the “Pro-Cachaça” was created, through The Mineiro Incentive Program for the Production of Spirits. The program was the first state initiative, as a law, for the appreciation of the Minas Gerais product, through the modernization of the stills structure. In addition, by offering credit for production, it aimed to facilitate the formalization of the enterprise.

Nine years later, the political articulation of ANPAQ and the State, together with research centers and universities in Minas Gerais, guaranteed the creation of Law No. 13,949 of July 2001, which established the identity pattern and the characteristics of the process and elaboration of the “Cachaça de Minas" (Cachaça from Minas Gerais). Under the use of technical standards and supported by scientific knowledge, public policy proved to be aligned with the interests of the actors in standardizing cachaça as a typical regional product (Silva, 2009; Paiva & Brito, 2018).

Another initiative in the scope of public policies was State Law 16,688 of January 2007, which declared the process of making alembic cachaça as a state cultural heritage, with a view to compete with other spirits in the domestic market and meeting export criteria.

In December 2016, a relevant initiative took place when its members decided to transform the Association, at the time of Minas Gerais, into the National Association of Producers and Members of the Alembic Cachaça Production and Value Chain, accepting members from all states, and consolidating their position as the oldest institution in the industry.

The alignment between different actors, including the State, has been pointed out by scholars as one of the essential mechanisms to promote disruptions in practices that support a given organizational field (Coraiola et al., 2015). In the analyzed case, the practices illustrate the relevance of the rapprochement between ANPAQ and the State of Minas Gerais, which had a prominent role in the institutionalization of a new legal-normative framework that started to regulate the production and market relations of cachaça. In addition, this alignment gave rise to the creation of public policies that contributed to the institutional work of breaking informality as an institution.

ANPAQ has also signed partnerships with Research Centers linked to different Brazilian universities, such as the Federal University of Lavras, Federal University of Minas Gerais and Federal University of Viçosa. In addition to helping to define a quality standard for cachaça produced in MG, the technical-scientific works carried out by researchers from these research centers served as a reference for the reconstruction of the distillate's image. This articulation has been instrumental in rebuilding the reputation of cachaça in the national and international market. The definition of this standard and its certification has also had some effects on the ongoing informality interruption process.

4.2 The work of disassociating: moral and symbolic foundations of cachaça from Minas Gerais

In addition to participating in public policies jointly with the State of Minas Gerais and research centers, ANPAQ carried out, under its management, a series of practices to renew the image of cachaça, not only within the State, but for other regions of Brazil. Among them, the creation of a quality seal as a drink differentiator:

Since 1990, ANPAQ has offered its associates a quality seal, guarantee of production in accordance with standards that allow them to obtain a superior product, with specific characteristics that highlight their performance. Through the Quality Assessment Commission (CAQ), ANPAQ's pioneering seal in the cachaça sector certifies the product of its members, guaranteeing the consumer a good drink and free of substances that are harmful to health. For the member, the seal brings credibility and differentiation from competitors (Cachaça com notícias 52, 2017).

The fragment exposed in the newsletter demonstrates that the seal started to promote the possibility of recognizing and differentiating the drink to the field of artisanal cachaça. By instituting a process of good production and quality practices to guarantee certification, the association aimed to provide a new look to the so-called quality product, while distancing the product's relationship with the cultural traits of the poor, since the beginning of colonization (Dias, 2014; Barbosa, 2014; Daniel, 2016). Thus, a focus on positive perceptions in relation to cachaça was created, building work that had technical characteristics to shape quality standards, guaranteeing differentiation to formal producers, to the detriment of those who do not have certification, seen as informal.

Another institutional practice to dissociate symbolism was the offering of the Master Distiller (Master Alambiqueiro) course[3]. The proposal aimed to train professionals specialized in gustatory analysis of the drink and who could spread a new image of alembic cachaça, untying the old image, seen as inferior, and consequently informal.

[...] we work with this course (Master Alambiqueiro), with opinion makers, which we know that in one ... One by one it is difficult, so we look for these opinion makers, provide them training, [...] so that these opinion makers can pass this concept on to consumers... Because these fraternities hold events in bars, so when you go to an event and these guys are there and if there are informal cachaça in these bars, surely they will say ''so and so, this and such, we have these products here and they can have this, they can have that" and the brother teaches the bar owner, the bartender, the waiter the same thing , so we're looking for this type of work… (Excerpt from interviewee 2).

As results, for one of the directors of ANPAQ, after three decades of practices of disassociating values and symbols, the effects came:

As observed in the interviewee's report 2, by valuing alembic cachaça through courses, at the same time, a network of opinion makers is created, able to perceive and disseminate the changes that have occurred around cachaça in the last decades. From a theoretical perspective, the case illustrates how the promotion of the dissociation of moral and symbolic foundations requires the participation of actors who have centrality and legitimacy, both within organizations (in the case of ANPAQ) and in their organizational fields (the master distillers), thus constituting what Zietsma and McKgniht (2009) call a strong network in the interruptions of institutions.

As results, for one of the directors of ANPAQ, after three decades of practices of disassociating values and symbols, the effects came:

[...] after occupying this space that it (cachaça) was losing, I think it had the role, in an era to inspire Brazil in relation to artisanal cachaça. So, when it did this restructuring and importance work and the search for the quality of alembic cachaça in Minas, after that it became a reference, because, because it did a job well done, it occupied the space and then it started to overflow Minas and descend throughout Brazil, and Brazil itself started to come to Minas to understand what happened here, so there was ... Our cachaças going out, because they didn't fit here anymore or it was natural, that's why, you rarely hear... from someone has already drunk cachaça ... "cachaça de Minas, hey, it's good! '', so, say Cachaça de Minas, people say, it's good! (Excerpt from interviewee 4).

The speech of interviewee 4 seems in line with the current image of cachaça from Minas Gerais within the country, because, in addition to the state leading the number of brands with 1,400 records in a total of 3,648 in MAPA (2019), in the last ranking of the summit of the cachaça in 2018 (main event in the area and with the evaluation of 40 thousand people over the internet), Minas Gerais obtained the first place in the Golden Cachaça category, also ranking 10 brands among the 30 best, from a total of 1,100 labels.

The selling price of champion cachaça, R$ 797.00 in a 700 ml bottle, is noteworthy, as well as the prestige given by articles in the mainstream media that covered the event and reinforce the work of disassociating values. According to the Estadão newspaper (2018): "The cachaça changed places, left the left an insignificant place at the bar and ended up on the shelf". Still, in the article they highlight the speech of one of the judges: “You can't lump everything together”, “it is clear that producers are taking better care of their cachaças” (Mesquita, 2018). It is observed in the statements the dualism of the words used to illustrate the change in the status of cachaça. Before, left an insignificant place at the bar and in the same lump, now, for the shelves, better cared for, removing the relationship with the old values ​​of the drink, traditionally seen as inferior.

If in the 1980s the State of Minas Gerais had to import cachaça from other states to meet local demand, a recent survey conducted by Sebrae (2019) with 246 respondents placed Minas Gerais among the states with the largest number of brands sold throughout the country and in the leadership among the “top of mind” for consumers.

The achievements of institutional interruption work, according to Lawrence and Suddaby (2006) and Yan et al. (2018), illustrate the way in which agents can seek to dissolve a perception or practice, disassociating rules that give moral foundation for a particular institution to perpetuate. In the case analyzed, when adopting a set of practices (public policies of appreciation, technological advances, elaboration of production standards and norms, quality seals, courses of master distillers, networks of opinion makers, media coverage and dissemination), The actors involved fostered improvements in the perception of the quality of cachaça from Minas Gerais, while at the same time detaching the symbolism of the old cachaça, informal and seen as an exclusive drink for the poor strata of society..

4.3. The work of undermining assumptions and beliefs

Despite the advances and results in improving the image of cachaça over the last few decades, however, there is still a belief that cachaça from the farm, produced in a rustic way, without refinement nor labels, is the “good cachaça”. This type of assumption, however, keeps informality alive, and tends to generate aversion to the possibility of changes within institutionalized environments. (Lawrence & Suddaby, 2006).

What is curious is the demand for the “legitimate alembic cachaça” which, in the view of tourists, from Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo is rustic, is not bottled, and has no seal or label. A tourist is willing to pay R$100.00 for a bottle with a simple stopper or corncob, but is reluctant to pay R$40.00 in a beautiful, well-labelled and packaged bottle. (Excerpt from interviewee 1).

In contrast, ANPAQ has been working to demystify this belief, that is, that cachaça from the farm only has positive attributes, even though it is made in an archaic way and not respecting the legal requirements. As a strategy to undermine the assumptions of cachaça from the farm as good, the actors have adopted practices to rescue the importance of consumer health:

[...] I think that for many, many years you’d say... Ahh! The cachaça from the farm is the good one! But you cannot generalize this, saying that all cachaça from the farm is good ... So much so that today, people already know that it is very risky to get a cachaça from the farm, right? Because of that ... You don't know what's inside ... This is a misleading advertisement, it can be from the farm and it can be of very bad quality, it may cause you health problems, even. (Excerpt from interviewee 3).

In order to legitimize the discourse, the central actors of this process, in partnership with scientific research centers, started, in the early 2000s, a set of practices to illustrate the harmful effects of cachaça consumption without minimum quality standards. It is possible to notice the advance of dissertations and academic theses that analyze the presence of metals (Canuto, 2004; Cantão, 2006) and inorganic contaminants (Silva, 2015) in spirits manufactured in regions of Minas Gerais; studies that investigate the contamination processes of sugarcane (Tfouni, 2005; Vicente, 2011); derivatives of hydrocarbons in the drink (Pereira, 2012), as well as analyzes based on hygienic-sanitary standards (Santos, 2019).

Accordingly, in recent years, the reproduction of these scientific studies has been disseminated by the mainstream media. This can be seen in the headlines of reports on online platforms, such as the Uol website in 2012, “clandestine drinks have methanol, copper, and a carcinogenic substance, says a study by Unifesp (Cruz, 2012)”, on the Estadão website in 2016 ”Good cachaça is legal cachaça: the importance of consuming registered beverages (Maia, 2016)”, as well as, in Veja Magazine in 2018 “Ingesting illegal alcohol may have health risks” (Vidale, 2018).

In all contents, the articles report analysis of the components in cachaças defined as clandestine, showing the presence of toxic elements such as methanol "a type of highly toxic alcohol that if ingested can cause blindness and lead to death" (Cruz, 2012), ethyl carbamate "a carcinogen, present in 65 of the 87 drinks in Minas Gerais" (Maia, 2016), and copper "which can impair the absorption of minerals in the body” (Vidale, 2018).

From a theoretical point of view, there is an emphasis on carrying out institutional work that eliminates beliefs, making room for new ways of acting that replace existing standards within organizations (Lawrence & Suddaby, 2006). Thus, through technical-scientific knowledge and the mainstream media in informing consumers, it was observed that ANPAQ's work sought to establish the relationship of informal cachaça with possible health problems, attacking the belief of cachaça from the farm, seen before as good, to the risks that informality can bring to consumers.

4.4 Opposition to sanctions and rewards

One of the main complaints of producers, until mid-2018, was the absence of the State at the time of the inspection of informal producers. This was due to the reduced number of inspectors and the consequent difficulty in accessing producers in the most diverse areas. The lack of inspection, however, benefited the informal, since they did not bear the same production costs, in addition to being less penalized by tax authorities.

In my region there are hundreds of informal stills operating for more than 20 or 30 years. Most are much more profitable than formal stills. They work without registration, do not have a CNPJ (formal registration of companies), do not register employees, do not pay accountants, produce and sell without any supervision. Formal stills, on the contrary, are constantly inspected by inspectors (Excerpt from interviewee 1).

The issue is, about 7 years ago, there was a federal inspector, it seems that he had 2 or 3 months to retire ... He came here to visit and then he went out to see everything... [going to the organization's deposit] I am obliged to keep... So the guy fined me R$ 25 thousand reais because of that, saying that the simple fact of having a closed bottle without the IPI seal was tax evasion... And suspended the company. My neighbour up here has an informal still and produces cachaça as hell. Did he go there? No! (Excerpt from interviewee 6).

As seen, informality in the field of artisanal cachaça has stability and strength guaranteed by values, tradition, and socially constructed standards since colonial Brazil, thus legitimizing institutionalization (Silva, 2009; Souza, 2012; Daniel, 2016). Therefore, if the producer does not need to follow any strict criteria, such as paying taxes, informally, the perpetuation of these ongoing practices is preferred.

This perception is in line with what Lawrence and Suddaby (2006), Zietsma and McKnight (2009) and Yan et al. (2018) report in their work, because when a practice is highly widespread, behaviours are established, which end up being legitimized and making institutional perpetuation a comfortable issue for those who stick to it.

To establish a process of opposition to the rewards of informality, ANPAQ was able to transfer, from Ordinance No. 1, of June 26, 2018, from the Agriculture Ministry (MAPA) to the Agriculture Institute of Minas Gerais (IMA), the exercise of inspection and examination of production and beverage trade.

Yes... We are now leaving the mark of 5 inspectors, and we are moving towards around 50 inspectors, so we can see that things will tighten up more ... And ANPAQ managed a very important negotiation with IMA, which is as follows, before, MAPA only inspected the legal, and only went to the informal through complaints. Not now, 50% of the inspection is still in the legal productions, 25% in commerce and 25% in illegal productions (Excerpt from interviewee 2).

By relocating the inspection to a body with a larger number of employees and closer to the producers (the IMA is located in the State of Minas Gerais), the change in the scope of the inspection also started to operate on traders who sold informal cachaças, contributing to informality in the field of alembic cachaça.

As a result, it is already possible to observe the partial effects of institutional work. If in the first six months of the implementation of the ordinance, in 2018, IMA carried out 15 inspections and trained 48 employees for the purpose, in the first half of 2019 the numbers increased significantly: there were 265 inspections and inspections in 202 producers and 63 commercial establishments, which generated 76 subpoenas, 53 terms of seizure, 25 terms of closure and 63 notices of infractions (IMA, 2019).

The impacts of inspection work in the state also reverberated in the local press. While one of the first articles on inspection, at the end of 2018, warned in its headline about the risks of producers continuing in the informality “Clandestine cachaça stills are a target of IMA” (Encontro digital, 2018), the articles of the year of 2019 pointed to some of the inspection results in the sector, such as: “The association of Producers of Cachaça from Abreus regrets the 12 closed stills and other 60 without direction” (Barros, 2019), and “Inspection in stills makes producers seek legalization” (Fernandes, 2019).

It is interesting to note that the last two articles address the impacts caused by the inspection, until then, “unprecedented”, in one of the regions known for the high number of artisanal producers, the municipality of Alto do Rio Doce, in the area of ​​Mata Mineira. If, on the one hand, one of the headlines illustrated the harsh character of inspection in the region (Barros, 2019), the other recorded that after the action, at least five stills already sought IMA for regulation, and others articulated themselves for the adaptation process (Fernandes, 2019).

The partial developments seem to reproduce the strategy expected by ANPAQ, in the fight against informality, since, as the punishments of the first informal producers would begin, this would serve as an example to oppose the rewards of informality in the sector:

What will start to happen is that from the moment the neighbour saw that the guy three blocks away from him was inspected and had a problem in his bar, he will... Yeah ... He will also charge (be charged), so we will attack two fronts, one is the one who buys ... Because it is the same as drugs, right ... If you end with the one who buys the drug, the drug dealer will not have anyone to sell it to... Right? So IMA will act looking for the informal producer... If you go to a city that has eighty clandestine stills, inspect one... Everyone will know! (Excerpt from interviewee 2).

In the theoretical perspective, it is observed that the institutional work of opposition to sanctions and rewards is developed by actors in partnerships with state entities, capable of changing rules in the organizational field, applied in case of non-compliance or compliance with a certain institution (Lawrence & Suddaby, 2006).

In the present case, the State, through the IMA, fulfilled its important role as an actor in the use of its legal power to punish or take advantage of organizational practices, traditionally legitimized among informal producers. Add to this the process of the local media that reverberated the impact of inspections and punishments in the sector, until then unaffected.

4.5 Achievements and challenges in the deinstitutionalization of cachaça informality

Understanding the impact of institutional work in an attempt to interrupt informality in Minas Gerais, also implies carrying out a macro-structural analysis of the sector. In other words, to understand the evolution of the number of establishments and their consequent formality facing state agencies. However, during this research, it was observed that the sector lacks unified data that analyzes the dimension of informality.

In addition, the little information available from official institutions (MAPA, IMA, Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics [IBGE], SEBRAE, IBRAC), often presents conflicting results, illustrating divergent figures on the estimates of stills in the sector. Even with the limitations, it is considered that it is possible to interpret the data from the crossing of data in the documents available in the area. In this sense, the first data about the stills in the State was the oral registration of one of the members of the board of ANPAQ, during the interviews, which addressed that until 1988, the sector registered 98% of the producers in the informal sector.

If the respective record lacks published sources, it was only possible to find the first data referring to the sector, from 1995, in an indirect citation from Sebrae (2001). The information referred to a report on the systematic survey of agricultural production in Minas Gerais, in which Minas Gerais had 8,466 cachaça establishments, without, however, distinguishing between formal and informal producers. It is noteworthy that in another 2002 Sebrae document, the number of establishments reported was 8,466 establishments (the same as in 1995), however, with 500 enterprises registered at MAPA, it represented a 95% rate of informality (SEBRAE, 2002).

When comparing this data with the Agricultural Census conducted by IBGE in 2006, it is possible to notice that the numbers differ. The Census registered in Minas Gerais only 4,238 establishments (IBGE, 2006), illustrating a difference of almost 50% less establishments. The same trend is observed in the last Agricultural Census of the year 2017, whose number of cachaça enterprises increased by 24%, mounting up to 5,512 establishments (IBGE, 2017). However, IBGE data (2006; 2017) does not distinguish between formal and informal establishments either.

The most recent document on the sector is the Cachaça yearbook in Brazil, 2019. When citing the number of formal establishments registered at MAPA until December 2018, it informs that of the total of 1,562 establishments, there were in Minas Gerais 576 formalized enterprises (MAPA, 2019). In an effort to cross-check information to estimate current informality in the sector, IBRAC, in December 2019, merged the information from the 2017 Agricultural Census and the 2019 MAPA data. Thus, it was concluded that in the State of Minas Gerais there were 576 formal enterprises (Brazil, 2019) out of a total of 5,512 establishments (IBGE, 2017), which totals a formality percentage of 10.4%.

Thus, if the information presented over these three decades is considered reliable, an evolutionary approximation of the sector would indicate that until 1988 formal establishments were 2% (Excerpt from interviewee 2), raising to 5% in 2002 (SEBRAE, 2002) and 10.4% in 2018, in the State of Minas Gerais (IBRAC, 2019).

Despite the advance in the numbers of formalized enterprises, it is observed that informality still presents itself as a solid institution in the cachaça sector. One hypothesis for the slow change in the institutional interruption work is a legacy of almost 500 years of public policies and cultural values ​​that created and maintained informality in the sector.

It is no wonder that from 2006 until January 2018, the taxes that taxed the drink represented 81.87% of the sale price, which made it very restrictive for a small producer to opt for formality. Only with the recent change in tax legislation (as of January 2018), that artisanal cachaça companies were able to opt for Simples Nacional (a tax regime)[4].

If the recent tax legislation presents itself as an achievement, however, it still lacks legislation that differentiate for small artisanal producers, who represent more than 90% of the informal ones. By having to follow the same rules of competitiveness and formalization as large industrialists, informal workers face challenges such as opening the business, access to credit:

Because today for you to set up a factory and regulate within all agencies, you spend a year and a half ... So it is very complicated, this is one of the factors that leads to hiding... I am talking about it because I founded my factory about 8, 10 years ago, and I was impressed by the difficulty of those who [have to regularize] (Excerpt from interviewee 3).

Look ... Today it is weak ... Because, for example, the BNDES, the BNDES card, to buy equipment, we have it, do you understand!? But the BNDES is not yet financing... And most of these small stills that are informal, the guy's renovation is general... It's not just about equipment, sometimes it's about putting it down and starting over again. (Excerpt from interviewee 2).

As noted, the regulatory aspects and the minimum requirements to afford the reformulation of a still, in addition to the difficulties in accessing credit, are aspects that serve as an entry barrier for small producers. The only Bill presented on the topic was dragged from the year 2013, until it was filed with the end of the last legislature, on January 31st, 2019. In the view of the legal requirements and the disadvantages of competition for small producers, the legislation, also helps to perpetuate the practices of informal stills, posing challenges to be overcome by producers.

5 CONCLUSIONS

The article aimed to understand the institutional work carried out by ANPAQ, showing the attempts to interrupt informality in the State of Minas Gerais. To this end, the historical aspects about informality in the field of alembic cachaça, the disruption practices carried out and its consequences were portrayed, in the light of the theory of institutional work.

It became evident that efforts to disassociate practices from a moral foundation, seen as appropriate within a cultural context, occurred through the historical deconstruction of the image, which has affected the reputation of cachaça in the market for centuries. By detaching it from a drink of slaves and the poor, institutional work involved the creation of a new quality standard, based on public policies, standards and technical procedures, capable of defining quality and certifying the production process. These factors were decisive for the construction of a niche market with high purchasing power and the cachaça brand from Minas Gerais, as a reference in artisanal production.

It is also worth mentioning the work to reduce the perception of the risk of differentiation and innovation, undermining the core of assumptions and beliefs by demystifying the cachaça from the farm seen as good, in order to associate it with health risks. Through partnerships with research centers and universities, the results of technical-scientific knowledge disseminated by the mainstream media established the relationship between informal cachaça and the risks of death, thus deconstructing the assumptions that support the acceptance of the drink from the farm. In this scenario, the master Alambiqueiro (Master Distillers) as opinion makers also took the lead in defining good cachaça, the one that is formal, regulated, distinguishing it from the harmful drink to the consumer, clandestine cachaça.

In addition, efforts to disconnect rewards from practices, technologies, and rules instituted by changing the inspection and inspection laws of the State. Through the Agriculture Institute of Minas Gerais, the legal power to punish or take advantage of organizational practices traditionally legitimized among informal producers was delegated to this more structured body. Add to the process, the local media in order to accentuate the opposition to the rewards, by informing about the punishments arising from the recent inspection by the State.

It should be noted, as soon as the deinstitutionalization involved a network of actors that pervaded not only the protagonism of ANPAQ members, but also the State Government, the inspection agencies, master distillers, researchers from centers and universities, and the mainstream media, in articulation to delegitimize informality over three decades.

As a consequence, if on the one hand institutional work has achieved positive results in creating a new image of Minas Gerais drink across the country, also opening up a new market niche, on the other hand, the numbers of informality are still very high, which implies that the institution continues to perpetuate in the sector.

Thus, it is concluded that the work of interrupting or deconstructing informality is not complete. There is much to be done, mainly because of structural factors, such as: the high costs for the restructuring of stills, the bureaucracy involved in the formalization process of companies and the unified application of legislation that makes no distinction between artisanal production and large industrial production, create an entry barrier for the formal market. Therefore, this seems to indicate that the colonial heritage of the drink still reflects, in particular, small producers, whose tendency is to remain on the margins of regulation, if the legislation does not change in their favour or if they are not suppressed from the market by strict supervision that seems to emerge.

Finally, it is noteworthy that the article, in addition to contributing to the understanding of the institutional work approach, signals the relevance of applying this approach to the understanding of different processes of institutional change that are underway in the scope of agribusiness. It should be added that the results of the research, which gave rise to this article, show how people's power of agency contributes to the interruption of informal institutions. The choice of disrupting informality was in the effort to overcome one of the gaps in Institutional Work, since researchers have given greater attention to institutional creation, to the detriment of practices that can culminate in the interruption of an institution anchored and sustained by tradition. Therefore, a line of research opens up that can take as an object of analysis the particularities of the informality institution as a constituent element of different sectors of the Brazilian economy, such as the imported electronics market, craft beer, market for fruits and vegetables, labour market, among others. The study of the informality of cachaça production and market as an institution may also serve as a stimulus for the development of other researches based on historical institutionalism and recent developments in institutional theory, such as the study of logics and institutional work in other institutional fields.

Acknowledgments

This research was supported by CAPES, CNPq and FAPEMIG. The authors appreciate it.

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