Rights, Citizenship, and Reparations for Past Wrongs Ensuing From Slavery A Look at the Brazilian Black Movement
The Black Movement in Brazil has been debating – since the beginning of the Republic and the abolition of slavery in 1888 and even more so since the 1930s – the reparations that Blacks and Afro-Brazilians should receive after four centuries of slavery. The goal was to have their rights as quasi-citizens respected. Reparation is also a central issue in international debates about large populations subjected to some of the dehumanizing conditions of colonization and slavery. In the 1980s, the Black Movement in Brazil moved into the political sphere due to its increasing visibility, in particular in the context of the New Republic of 1988. The UN World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance that was held in Durban, South Africa in 2001 was a major occasion for the movement to step into the international and transnational arena and thereby validate its demands. This article looks at how the movement’s ideas have changed since Durban and at the explicit choice of a reparation model that, instead of financial compensation, concentrates on affirmative actions to enact social policies. The social policies chosen show that the fundamental objective is full citizenship and that affirmative actions, by guaranteeing a better future, can turn full citizenship into the ultimate reparation for past wrongs.