RIO DE JANEIRO - For most of the 20th century this multihued
nation prided itself on what it called its racial democracy,
in
which tolerance and accommodation kept peace between groups despite
the yawning socioeconomic gap between blacks and the rest of
society. This vision of racial harmony made Brazil the envy of the
world. And it was a powerful source of national esteem, especially
when Brazilians observed the sometimes explosive racial resentment
that has bedeviled the United States.
Today, in an extraordinary shift in how this nation views itself, Brazilians no longer deny the pervasive force of race in their society. Tugged along by a torrent of research, Brazilians have come to the startling conclusion in recent years that race affects everything, from education to employment to justice.
Blacks in general are burdened with disproportionately high rates of unemployment, illiteracy and infant mortality. And Brazil's poorest blacks are targets of racial stereotypes that often lead to extreme police violence against them.
In a poll released last month by the Center of United Marginalized
Populations, 93 percent of those surveyed in Rio de Janeiro state said
they believe racism exists in Brazil, and 74 percent said there is
a lot
of bias.
One result is an invigorated civil rights movement and the quiet emergence of race as part of Brazil's national debate over how Latin America's largest and most populous country can bridge its stubborn socioeconomic inequities.
Black Brazilians have begun to assert themselves more in daily
life. Dozens of black organizations have been born in the past
decade. T-shirts bearing messages such as 100 percent Negro
are
a common sight in cities such as Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo. Black
hair-care products are being marketed for the first
time. Black-oriented magazines have made their way to
newsstands. Blacks now appear in television commercials.
No one today writes about Brazil being a racial democracy,
said
Livio Sansone, director of the Center of Afro-Asian Studies in Rio de
Janeiro. Today, people will tell you that there is racism in
Brazil, which wasn't the case 20 years ago. They think a racial
democracy is a nice thing to work toward, or dream of, but no one
would say that's the way things are today.
Black activists say they are frustrated that Brazilians still do not believe they could be racist. In the poll by the marginalized populations center, 87 percent of respondents said they themselves were not racist, even while large majorities saw racism as a societal problem.
So we're fighting an invisible enemy,
said Ivanir dos Santos,
the center's executive secretary.
In the latest, and arguably most dramatic, evidence of the importance of race in daily life, a report by the respected Institute for Religious Studies found that police in Rio de Janeiro's slums kill nine out of every 10 black suspects they shoot--nearly double the ratio of white suspects.
That comes as no surprise to people such as Ivanilde dos Santos. Nearly two years ago, police in the Rio de Janeiro shantytown of Babilonia shot her son, Wallace de Almeida, in the back as he entered dos Santos's yard.
Witnesses said the police, who had accused the slim, dark-skinned 18-year-old of dealing drugs, initially refused to call an ambulance. They called only after learning that he was a soldier. Their allegations against him ultimately were proved baseless.
They were just used to shooting people up here and getting away
with it,
said dos Santos, 41. He died because he was black.
Babilonia is one of dozens of crumbling hillside shantytowns in Rio. Nationwide these communities tend to be majority black--and they have come to symbolize the persistent economic gap between the races.
One recent study found that in Sao Paulo, the country's most populous state, blacks had the highest unemployment rate, rarely made it through high school, and were far less likely than non-blacks to work in jobs that paid more than $400 a month.
Nationwide statistics show that only 2 percent of black students ever make it to the university level, compared with 10 percent of whites. More than 50 percent of Brazil's blacks are illiterate, compared with 20 percent of the overall population. Black infants are almost twice as likely to die before their first birthday as are white infants.
In the past, majority opinion in this nation of 167 million people shrugged off such statistics as strictly indicators of economic inequality, not as evidence of racial injustice. But recent research, such as the report on Rio's police, has begun to question that conventional wisdom.
By comparing the fates of black and white suspects, the report removed
economic status from the equation, said Ignacio Cano, the study's lead
researcher. In the past, people said, black people,
the
country's poorest group, are more involved with crime, and so it
makes sense that the police kill them more often,
Cano
said. What this data shows is that that's not true.
Race in Brazil, which in 1888 was the last country to officially end slavery, has always been a profoundly complex issue. It is a fluid proposition, made so because of the extraordinary range of skin color that is the legacy of generations of miscegenation, and because each shade has a different social weight in the Brazilian context. In the survey conducted by the Center of United Marginalized Populations, respondents chose to identify themselves in 10 different shades. The 1991 census found that 47 percent of Brazilians considered themselves black or brown; 51 percent said they were white. (Two percent claimed other skin colors.)
Brazil's range of skin color was once viewed as a debilitating defect
by its leaders, prompting them to try to whiten
the society by
luring European immigrants during the late 19th and early 20th
centuries.
But by the 1930s, Brazilian sociologists and anthropologists were hailing the country's racial rainbow as a great gift. Throughout the 20th century, Brazilians of all shades took enormous pride in the fact that their diverse nation held little of the racial tension that seared the United States.
Racial slurs were not uttered in public. Legalized segregation never existed. Hate groups were nonexistent. Racial democracy became one of the society's signature myths.
And yet black Brazilians remained the country's invisible citizens, a status blamed not on racial prejudice but on their economic status. In truth, said sociologist Antonio Sergio Guimaraes, Brazilians were in denial.
Years ago you never saw black people on television because the
thinking was that they were associated only with things that were ugly
or dirty,
said Guimaraes, a professor at the University of Sao
Paulo.
Perhaps no institution has denied charges of racism as vehemently as the police--who are among the groups most frequently accused. For years human rights groups angrily argued that police were more likely to kill black and brown suspects.
Complicating the conversation was the heavy presence of blacks within the police force; historically, it has been one of the very few avenues blacks could take out of the slums. Today they make up at least 50 percent of Brazil's military police force.
Black police officers rejected the possibility that racial stereotypes
could taint their behavior. Black police discriminated against
black citizens without even realizing it,
said Jorge da Silva,
coordinator of public security, justice and emergency services for the
state of Rio de Janeiro. Today, da Silva said, the police have come
to agree that we have a problem.
He said that police officials now emphasize human rights training in courses and field preparation, with special emphasis on better basic shooting skills.
Those measures do not salve the bitterness in Ivanilde dos Santos's heart. She has sued the police over her son's death, a move that would have been unheard of a decade ago.
He wanted something better for me,
dos Santos said, standing in
front of her house, where 100 percent Negro
is scrawled on one
outside wall. He wanted to get me out of this place. And they
killed that dream.
The perception that Brazil is a racial democracy has been shattered of late, and most Brazilians believe blacks do face bias. Statistics on health, education and employment bear out that there are serious inequities between black and white Brazilians.
Deaths of infants before age one per 1,000 live births:
Blacks 62.3
Whites 37.3
A wide gap between blacks and whites persists in education
Years of schooling completed
Blacks 4.2
Whites 6.2
Pct. who had no formal education
Blacks 36
Whites 19
Pct. of adults who are illiterate
Blacks 50
Whites 20
Percent unemployed
Blacks 7.7%
Whites 6.6%
The Center of United Marginalized Populations recently asked 1,172 residents of Rio de Janeiro state whether they believe blacks face discrimination in Brazil.
Q: How much racism is there in Brazil?
A lot 74%
A little 19%
None 7%
Q: Do black and white Brazilians get along?
There are some problems 46%
Many problems 22%
No problems 32%
Q: Do you think the government has a special obligation to help blacks?
Yes 51%
No 49%
Q: Do you think discrimination keeps blacks from getting good jobs and from improving their lives?
Strongly agree 62%
Agree 20%
Disagree 7%
Strongly disagree 11%
Q: Do you think BrazilŐs educational system discriminates against blacks?
Strongly agree 37%
Agree 23%
Disagree 12%
Strongly disagree 28%
SOURCES: Center of United Marginalized Populations, Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics
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