Mobilidade social, ações afirmativas e permanência: narrativas e experiências de egressos quilombolas da UFRB

Abstract

This thesis analyzes how access to, retention in, and the mediation of affirmative action policies contribute to processes of social mobility among quilombola graduates of the Federal University of Recôncavo da Bahia (UFRB). The methodological approach of the study was grounded in qualitative research, conducted through narrative interviews, bibliographic analysis, and a literature review. Theoretically, the thesis adopts the categories of race, ethnicity, quilombo, class, higher education, retention, and affirmative action as key analytical dimensions for structuring and grounding the research, seeking to understand how these categories intersect and how they are associated with processes of material and symbolic mobility among quilombola graduates. To this end, the theoretical framework draws on the contributions of Hasenbalg (1979) and Valle Silva (1999) to conceptualize mobility from an ethnic-racial perspective; Fernandes (1988) to engage with the categories of race and class; Quijano (2005), whose work grounds the decolonial perspective on society; Pitirim Sorokin (1968), Pastore (1979), and Scalon (1999), who contribute to the conceptualization of social mobility; and Munanga (2004), Guimarães (2009), Nascimento (1980), and Arruti (2008), whose works inform the analysis of ethnicity, race, quilombo, and quilombismo. The findings demonstrate that processes of mobility do not occur in a predetermined or immediate manner; rather, they are conditioned by social structures historically constructed along ethnic-racial lines. Nevertheless, the study finds that quilombola access to higher education, specifically at UFRB, when combined with retention and mediated by affirmative action policies, significantly contributes to disrupting historical cycles of social exclusion, economic vulnerability, exploitation, and labor precarization affecting this social group. The findings indicate that access to higher education and academic training result in improved material and objective conditions of social life, expanded opportunities in the labor market, increased income, and, consequently, greater capacity for consumption and access to goods and services. At the same time, the study demonstrates that access to UFRB has contributed to symbolic forms of mobility by reinforcing and strengthening quilombola identities and promoting social recognition, changes in social status, recognition as community leaders, and legitimation as intellectual references. It is therefore concluded that access to UFRB, mediated by retention and affirmative action policies, has contributed to two dimensions of social mobility: symbolic mobility, situated at the social level and characterized by social and collective representations, political emancipation, social valorization, and ethnic-racial belonging; and material mobility, situated primarily at the individual level and characterized by expanded consumption, greater access to goods and services, and improved material living conditions. The study also observes that, although these two dimensions of mobility constitute important mechanisms for mitigating social and racial inequalities and destabilizing a society structured along racial caste lines, the thesis demonstrates that mobility alone is insufficient to eliminate or break with the mechanisms and means of oppression and exploitation inherent in capitalism.