At the end of August 2012, as students prepared to return to
universities in northern parts of Brazil for the new semester,
the country’s President Dilma Rousseff signed the new Law of
Social QuotasQuotas are quantitative restrictions on the import
of certain goods and services, a sweeping decree on the nation’s
policies of affirmative action for public Brazilian
universities. With the world watching, Brazil attempts to
rectify inequalities that have existed in the nation since its
inception. Brazil, the largest Latin American country and the
country with the largest population in South America, remains
one of the world’s most unequal societies (Glickhouse, Romero).
However, Brazil is not the only nation implementing a
potentially controversial affirmative action bill to counter-act
years of inequality. Colombia and South Africa have also, in
recent years, attempted to mandate practices that allocate
quotasQuotas are quantitative restrictions on the import of
certain goods and services for underrepresented po