The Political Economy of the BRICS Countries. Группа авторов
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Despite recent increases in financing for education, the population as a whole remains poorly educated, especially in relation to Brazil’s overall levels of development. Educational mobility is exceedingly low. Social mobility in Brazil remains closely tied to family background. Brazil’s high incidence of poverty, low educational achievement, and middling health indicators explain its low ranking in overall human development indicators (Hunter and Sugiyama, 2009, p. 32).
The access to education, social security, healthcare, and housing are the core social sectors where the governments in Latin America, and Brazil, have tried to implement reforms for the marginalized. Of all the marginalized, the women suffer a kind of ‘double discrimination’.2 For instance, indigenous girls’ performance in school contrasts sharply with the rule that throughout the region girls do as well and even better than the boys. In Guatemala, for instance, indigenous girls complete fewer than two years of schooling on average. Indigenous girls start school later and drop out earlier. For Afro-Brazilian women in urban labor markets in São Paulo in the 1990s, a lower return in their education and age, compared with ‘white-men’, accounted for 50% lower overall wages (Naercio and Scorzafave, 2012). In regard to physical violence statistics, the World Health Organization (WHO) surveys of 1999 and 2000 indicated that, for instance, in Nicaragua 27% of women had reported being physically abused (in Quito, 37%; in Lima, 31%; in Colombia, 1 out of 5 in 1995, which has since risen to 27%) (Naercio and Scorzafave, 2012). Social surveys also show that for instance, in urban households in 1999, poor and younger women with fewer years of schooling were likely victims of domestic violence than wealthier, older, and more educated women. Each year of schooling reduced the probability of victimization by 1.4% (World Bank, 2007). In order to deal with the issues related to race and identity, countries in the region, like Peru and Honduras, have established mechanisms for the promotion of racial and ethnic equality.3 In contrast, Panama, Venezuela, and Dominican Republic although having significant Afro-descendants have failed to advance policies and address racial discrimination. Indigenous representation rose in Bolivia, Ecuador, and, to a lesser degree, in Argentina and Colombia. By 2004, 11 countries had instituted quotas establishing a minimum level of representation (20–40%) for women in political parties. The overall quotas increased women’s presence in legislatures, but there was significant variation in the law. For example, whether it was obligatory, whether it only reserves a slot as in Brazil, or if it required a slot to be filled by a woman, or whether a woman must be placed in an electionable position, like in Argentina, also depended on the country’s electorate system (Htun, 2003).
More than 15 countries have been collecting information on ethnicity through the census, but only a few, Brazil and Colombia, collect data on Afro-descendants. Peru and Guatemala follow the same for indigenous peoples. In Brazil, minorities like Afro-descendants account for 45%, Japanese 1%, and indigenous groups like Yanomami, Tukano, Urueu, Wau-Wau, Awa, Arara, Guarani (0.2–2.4%), and Jews 0.00056%. Brazil currently has 197 forest-dwelling indigenous groups (Telles, 2015).
In Brazil, nearly 80% of Afro-Brazilians live below the nation’s poverty line compared to the ‘whites’. Only 4% of Afro-Brazilians between the ages of 18 and 24 are in universities, compared to 12% of the ‘whites’. Three-fourths of all Afro-Brazilians have not completed secondary school, and 40% do not complete elementary school. In the UNDP’s Human Development Index, Brazil’s rank continued to stay at 79 among 159 odd countries (HDI Ranking, 2017). In 2007, Afro-Brazilians earned 50% less than the national average income. Afro-Brazilians suffer from the highest homicide, poverty, and illiteracy rates in the country. They are seriously under-represented in professional positions and in middle and upper classes and over-represented in prisons (56%). The situation is similar among the indigenous peoples in the region. FUNAI’s data (National Foundation for the Indigenous) showed that the indigenous people continue to suffer from disease, poor healthcare, loss of native culture, and recurring incursions, especially in rain forests (National Native News, 2017).
Historical Antecedents of the Racial Issue
Often contrasted with the United States, Brazilian post slavery race relations were said to be harmonious, tolerant, and devoid of prejudice or discrimination. The image of presumed equality was based primarily on Brazil’s unparalleled level of miscegenation among European, African, and indigenous peoples. Widespread intermixing of the population gave rise to a unique pattern of social differentiation in which, allegedly, ‘racial appearances’ (phenotype) rather than ‘origin was key’. Due to the resulting ambiguity of racial identity, many Brazilians denied the existence of race or racism in their country. Race relations in Brazil, as a result, received much less attention among social scientists in Brazil. However, recent empirical research has amply documented the persistence of racial prejudice and discrimination. Brazil’s image of racial equality has eroded greatly over the past two decades.
Today, vigorous public debate over Brazil’s image of racial equality has displaced the ideology of ‘racial democracy’.4 The overwhelming evidence makes it clear that racial inequality, prejudice, and discrimination are Brazil’s social reality. Scholars have often argued that one of the basic determinants of contemporary racial inequality is the geographic polarization of Brazil’s economy and population (Andrews, 1992, Figueiredo, 2015; Skidmore, 1992). Of the total population, it was found that Afro-Brazilians lived in the impoverished and underdeveloped Northeast, while the white population (52%) was concentrated in the industrialized Southeast (Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estaistica, IBGE, 1996). Thus, because of locational disadvantages, Afro-Brazilians are said to be handicapped as they are concentrated in regions where there are fewer social and economic opportunities. Unequal regional development and population distribution has characterized Brazilian society since colonial times (Merrick and Graham 1979; Wood and de Carvalho 1988).
Population and regional imbalances are the legacy of the boom and bust cycles of three colonial export commodities: sugar, gold/rubber, and coffee. The scarcity of labor to fuel sugar plantations during the 16th and 17th centuries was the impetus for importing African slaves into the Northeast. In the 18th century, with the discovery of gold/rubber and the concomitant decline in sugar production, the economic and population center of gravity shifted to central and southern Brazil. This shift left the once wealthy northeastern plantation economy in ruins, and from this point on development favored southern Brazil.
It was the southern expansion of coffee exports during late nineteenth and early 20th centuries that led to the incipient industrialization of São Paulo, built first on slave and later subsidized European immigrant labor. Following the abolition of slavery in 1888, southeast coffee growers used the tax revenues from the great fortunes accumulated from coffee exports to provide the foundation to build São Paulo’s industrial economy and attracted roughly 3.5 million European immigrants. By the 1920s, São Paulo became the most advanced region of the country, and by the 1940s the state had the largest concentration of manufacturing in all of Latin America (Wood and Carvalho, 1988).
The predominantly white regions of São Paulo and the southeast remained the nation’s locus of manufacturing and finance (Kowarick and Campanario, 1986). Over time, the consequence of such cumulative effects was the sharp spatial disparities. Continued growth and diversification of the Brazilian economy lessened but did not eliminate the unequal distribution of wealth and population. From the 1950s, industrialization in south-central Brazil lured Afro-Brazilian migrants from the Northeast and rural areas to the dynamic urban metropolises, especially São Paulo. This was accompanied by notable gains in Afro-Brazilian urban employment. Between 1950 and 1980, the proportion of individuals of African descent employed in cities rose from 36% to 62% (Oliviera et al., 1985). Yet, at the same time, the occupational structure moved toward more skilled jobs.
As a result, in 1991, Afro-Brazilians continued to be disproportionately concentrated in agriculture, construction,