Gender, Race, and the Struggle for Social Justice in Brazil

Abstract

Brazil, along with many Latin American countries, has alternated between democratic and military rule. From 1964 until 1985, it was governed by a military dictatorship. During the late 1960s and early 1970s, the military brutally silenced all opposition movements through imprisonment, censorship, and decree (Dassin, 1986; Skidmore, 1988). Specifically prohibited through an institutional act was the discussion of race (Agier, 1995). Classifying any public discussion of race as subversive, military leaders forced the census bureau to eliminate the color question from the 1970 demographic census, thereby preventing documentation of racial inequalities. In the mid-1970s, however, a gradual process of political opening began, and social protest groups once again resurfaced. During the transition from military to civilian rule (direct presidential elections were held in 1989), Brazilian social activists sought to combine their struggle for democracy with the struggle for social justice (Andrews, 1996). Issues of racial inequality, as well as gender inequality, emerged as important rallying cries in opposition politics (Soares et al., 1995; Alvarez, 1994; Hanchard, 1994; Winant, 1992).' Women and Afro-Brazilians joined labor activists, church officials, and the rural and urban poor and began an unprecedented public dialogue on the role of gender and race in structuring opportunities and rewards in contemporary Brazilian society. With the return to civilian rule in the late 1980s, women and blacks played pivotal roles in Brazil's subsequent dramatic social and political changes. Their efforts focused, in general, on demanding better conditions of daily life and addressing issues of prejudice and discrimination. Feminists and Afro-Brazilians struggled in the streets, in Congress, and in the home for a more just and egalitarian society. Brazil's constitution was rewritten in 1988, and many of the activists' demands were transformed into constitutional rights. Provisions on equality between women and men, a chapter on the family, maternity and paternity leaves, new rights for domestic and rural workers,