Afro-Descendant Territory and Social Movement in Latin America: Perspectives from Mexico and Colombia

Abstract

This article is an introduction to the political agenda of the Afro-descendant social movement in Mexico. We provide ethnologic data retrieved from a fieldwork practice in Costa Chica, Guerrero, one of the regions were socio-political action has gained strength. There is also a comparative analysis of afro-Colombian movements —in specific the ones in rural areas of the Pacific region— contrasting their different historic trajectories in order to understand their peculiarities. In general, we discuss that today, the socio-political demands of afro-Mexicans are focused on constitutional recognition, statistics visibility, and a design of public policies that alleviate and reverse the inequality of conditions in which they live. This happens in a context marked by multiculturalism and the acknowledgement of a cultural diversity that, since the mid-nineties, conforms different actors that have changed African history and culture within the construction of a national society. They defend the presence of afro-descendant populations that are culturally and historically marginalized by the post-revolutionary State.