Memory is central to postcolonial critique and diasporic identity; however, the nexus of memory politics, legal status, and temporal experience remains underexplored. Therefore, this article outlines how memory is both narratively contested and temporally regulated within the racialised context of contemporary Belgium. Interviews and participant observation with ten undocumented Congolese women and ten Afrodescendant activists with Belgian citizenship emphasises how individuals, within the same racial category, experience time differently according to legal status. Specific racialised experiences and legal temporalities shaped each group’s political repertoires, mobilisations, and distinct political agencies and priorities. These insights enrich Mills’ ‘chronopolitics of racial time’ by illustrating how race, class, and legal identity jointly shape the varying political priorities of Black and Afrodescendant engagement with Belgium’s colonial past.
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Taibou Sal (2026) studied this question.
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