For much of the twentieth century Brazil enjoyed an international reputation as a 'racial democracy, ' but that
image has been largely undermined in recent decades by research suggesting the existence of widespread racial inequality.
George Reid Andrews provides the first thoroughly documented history of Brazilian racial inequality from the abolition
of slavery in 1888 up to the late 1980s, showing how economic, social, and political changes in Brazil during the
last one hundred years have shaped race relations.