Quotasracial they are reserves of vacancies in entrance exams, exams and public competitions destined to people of black, brown or indigenous origin. the quotas aim to end racial inequality and the racism structural resulting from years of slavery in Brazil, which still exclude black and indigenous people from the university, the labor market and public spaces.
How do racial quotas work?
the quotas are vacancy reserves for certain minority segments of the population, such as black people (black or brown), indigenous people and people with special needs. In the case of allocation of quotas for admission to undergraduate courses in federal public universities, in addition to the origin ethnic-racial, the candidate for the reserved place must have completed all of their secondary education in public schools.
Thus, public universities offer a dual quota system: a portion of the vacancy reserve is intended for public school students, regardless of the ethnic-racial origin, and the other portion is for public school students who declare themselves black, brown or indigenous.
In the current affirmative action system for admission to universities and federal educational institutes, 50% of the vacancies must be destined to people from public schools. Of these vacancies, 25% are for people with a family income of less than 1.5 minimum wages, and the other half are free for people with a family income above 1.5 minimum wage, provided they have completed three years of high school in schools public services.
Vacancy offers restricted by ethnic-racial criteria fit into this reserve of 50% of vacancies totals offered by the university and for each course, according to the announcement of the entrance exam or Sisu. To calculate the number of vacancies aimed at blacks, browns and indigenous people, data from the censuses demographics. Regions with a greater number of blacks should offer a greater reserve of places for these people, states with a greater number of indigenous people should offer a greater reserve of places for indigenous people and so successively.
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In case of competitions for investiture in public office, there is a reserve of 20% of the total vacancies offered in a notice for people who declare themselves black or brown. In these cases, the self-declaration with supporting documentation (such as birth certificate, military enlistment certificate or RG of the candidate and even his ascendants rights – mother and father) is enough for a person to apply for a place in the competition by the law of quotas.
In the case of federal universities and institutes, Besides the self-declaration, the candidate must go through a interview with the examining board in order to prove the veracity of the self-declaration. A problem resulting from this last case is that there is no way to express a concrete objectivity for recognize brown people, and the subjectivity of the criteria adopted by examiners has already caused injustices and even frauds.
In 2007, at UnB (this institution has adopted an affirmative action system since 2004, eight years before the sanction of the quota law, placing the institution at the forefront among federal universities in terms of actions affirmative), two identical twins who declared themselves brown had different confirmations: one was accepted as brown and the other was not. Upon appeal, the brother who had his quota request denied was accepted as a brown man. This shows that there may be flaws in this verification system.
Read too: Social inequality: a problem to be tackled through quotas
racial quotas law
Given the demands of social movements, the Legislative Power had to create specific laws to establish affirmative actions for the entry of people black, brown or of indigenous origin in higher education courses at federal public universities and in public examinations for public administration agencies and companies federal. The justification for these laws is found in the lack of racial equality and representation of black and indigenous people in higher education courses and public examinations.
Although most of the Brazilian population is black (54%, according to the 2017 PNAD/IBGE), this population is still strongly excluded from higher education, she occupies jobs that require less qualification and has a monthly income lower than that of the population considered. White. At Affirmative action laws have emerged to try to correct these social distortions. caused by the enslavement of people from Africa in Brazil for almost 300 years.
We currently have two specific laws on quotas that include the racial theme: Law No. 12,711, of August 29, 2012, and Law No. 12,990, of June 9, 2014. The first refers to access to federal public universities, and the other to public examinations at the federal level.
Read too: Brazilian culture: a miscellany of races and ethnicities
Who created the racial quotas?
A quota system was first adopted in India in the 1950s, to promote affirmative actions that integrate the population traditionally belonging to the castes excluded in the educational systems, in public administration and in political positions.
The old one indian caste system made a distinction between people based on the origin of the family, creating a strong social apparatus. exclusion of populations belonging to the lowest caste or caste: you dalits (Without castes, they were considered in the traditional Indian system as people so unworthy that they could not even be touched by others, as this would cause spiritual contamination) andhudras (People who belonged to the lowest caste and, in the traditional system, had a servile nature that condemned them to occupying the worst jobs).
In Brazil, the State University of Rio de Janeiro (UERJ) was the first public educational institution to adopt an affirmative action system, in 2003. The first federal public institution to adopt a quota system was the University of Brasilia (UnB), in 2004.
From 2007, the elaboration of an expansion and investment program in federal universities and institutes, called Reuni, expanded the debate on racial quotas through university councils. The proposal to implement quotas for public school students with sub-quotes for blacks, browns and indigenous was analyzed by the Supreme Court, which unanimously voted for the constitutionality of the actions affirmative. Thus, in 2012, Law 12.711/12 was enacted, which regulates the quota system in universities and federal educational institutes.
Read too: Human Rights - category of basic and inalienable rights
Racial quotas in the world
Different countries adopt different quota systems to include vulnerable and excluded populations in education, public service and political systems. See some countries that make up the list:
South Africa;
Australia - promotes quotas for aboriginals;
Canada – promotes quotas for Inuit (Eskimos);
Colombia – quotas for blacks and indigenous people at universities;
India – quotas for the inclusion of people excluded by the old Indian caste system;
New Zealand;
United States - With the end of official segregation and the explosion of movements for the rights of the black population, President John Kennedy introduced a quota system for black children to access public schools that were generally attended by children white. There was also a process of installing quotas in some universities. Some critics point out that such affirmative actions only benefited black middle-class families. Harvard University and Columbia University were the first to adopt quota systems for blacks in 1969.
Arguments in favor and arguments against racial quotas
The debate on racial quotas intensified in Brazil after the sanction of the quota law. on the one hand, social movements, NGOs, intellectuals and jurists defend the need for quotas social and racial issues to solve the problems of inequality in the country. What these sectors of society defend is that social exclusion and racism lead us to a need to implement measures that promote equality, recognizing that first it is necessary to have an equity system, that is, given the difficulties faced by excluded layers, it is necessary to create affirmative actions that effectively include these people in society, after years of exclusion resulting from enslavement and racism structural.
See the arguments for and against affirmative action policies:
The racial criterion adopted does not exist biologically, since all human beings have the same genotypes, regardless of skin color. As a counter-argument, defenders of quotas claim that the phenotype of black people places them in the condition of exclusion due to ethnocentrism historic.
Racial quotas create a distinction that overwhelms the abilities of black people. As a counter-argument, the defenders of quotas claim that, at first, this unequal treatment is necessary for initiate a process of inclusion of vulnerable populations, who, for social reasons, do not have access to many spaces and services public.
Quotas violate the principle of meritocracy, putting someone with a lower score at an advantage over someone with a higher score. As a counterargument in favor of quotas, they say that it is impossible to establish a fair meritocratic system in a place where there is no equality of opportunity.
We should not think about a quota, but about improving the public basic education system, giving everyone the same chances to enter university. As a counter-argument, those in favor of quotas say that affirmative actions are a first solution to the problem, which must be accompanied by investments in the public basic education, so that, in the future, with quality basic education and black people in higher education, quotas are no longer needed.
by Francisco Porfirio
Sociology Professor
