Mulher, Negra e Favelada: The 1982 Campaign of Benedita da Silva in Brazil’s Transition Politics

This article explores Benedita da Silva’s 1982 triumphant campaign to be a city councilor in Rio de Janeiro under the slogan of “Mulher, Negra, e Favelada” (Woman, Black, and Favela Resident). It argues that da Silva’s candidacy embodied the ascendancy of civil society engagement with politics in the early 1980s. This was a revolutionary moment in modern Brazilian history marked by calls to more inclusive national projects. It seeks to illuminate how Afro-Brazilians came to understand their socioeconomic and political disenfranchisement as incongruous with the prospects of an inclusive and participatory society wrought by the impending return of a democratic system.