Toward a Conclusion

Abstract

This book was conceived as a journey that draws on my knowledge, impressions, and ethnographic experiences of Brazilian race relations in the framework of student quotas in public universities. The narrative has addressed race, class, gender, and space, presenting the latter as an effect, reflection, and metaphor but also as a structuring factor of these other variables. Having said this, I could not draw conclusions to my ethnographic study of affirmative action without commenting first on the actual performance of cotistas, and whether they are able to make any progress toward achieving their dreams. One of the main critiques of the quota system, in fact, has been that cotistas would not be able to keep up with their courses. Due to their low educational levels, these students have been largely expected to have low academic performance; this, accompanied by a lack of finances, would result in high dropout rates among the beneficiaries of the quota system, causing a waste of resources that could be used more efficiently by skilful others. Many final-year informants remember how prevalent these catastrophic predictions were, especially in the first years following the introduction of quotas. According to them, some teachers had made very overt comments about the fact that cotistas would affect the prestige of the university. These feelings were present across the university, but especially in the Law Department. UERJ law students had held until 2003 the highest pass rate of the OAB1 (Association of Brazilian Lawyers) examination in the State of Rio de Janeiro compared to other state and federal public universities, and one of the highest in the country overall. Not only were there assumptions that quotas will affect the prestige of UERJ courses but also, somehow implicitly, that criteria of performance are in the end quite democratic in defining the sharing of public resources.