Brazil in black and white? Race categories, the census, and the study of inequality |
Brazil in black and white? Race categories, the census, and the study of inequality
Ethnic and Racial Studies
Volume 35, Number 8, August 2012
pages 1466-1483
DOI: 10.1080/01419870.2011.607503
Mara Loveman, Associate Professor of Sociology
University of Wisconsin, Madison
Jeronimo O. Muniz, Assistant Professor of Sociology
Federal University of Minas Gerais
Stanley R. Bailey, Associate Professor of Sociology
University of California, Irvine
Many scholars advocate the adoption of a black-and-white lens for the analysis of racial inequality in Brazil. Drawing on a nationally representative dataset that includes race questions in multiple formats, we evaluate how removal of the ‘brown’ category from the census or other social surveys would likely affect: (1) the descriptive picture of Brazil’s racial composition; and (2) estimates of income inequality between and within racial categories. We find that a forced binary question format results in a whiter and more racially unequal picture of Brazil through the movement of many higher income mixed-race respondents into the white category. We also find that regardless of question format, racial inequality in income accounts for relatively little of Brazil’s overall income inequality. We discuss implications for public policy debates in Brazil, and for the broader scientific and political challenges of ethnic and racial data collection and analysis.
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Tags: Ethnic and Racial Studies, Jeronimo Muniz, Jeronimo O. Muniz, Mara Loveman, Stanley Bailey, Stanley R. Bailey