The Digital Primitives believe it, and repeat it: “Do The People have a right to mooove around freely? Mooove around, People, mooove around…”
“The People” is my favorite piece on the unconventional jazz-beat-funk trio’s new album, Hum Crackle and Pop, from Hopscotch Records. Like a good song, it moved my body, it moved my mind.
And it kept creeping back into my head as I listened to this NPR piece on African immigrants in South America. Dr. Clarence Lousane in part attributes this growing African migration trend to the relative openness of Argentinian and Brazilian societies. Protections for refugees were bolstered in those countries by the 2004 Mexico Plan of Action, signed by South American countries, the U.S., and Canada. It defined specific rights for refugees, says Lousane.
For example, the right to freedom of movement. In many European countries, you’re very restricted to not only certain cities but certain parts of certain cities, where in Brazil once you’re accepted as a refugee you can pretty much go anywhere.
Refugees, treated like citizens, with the right to move around. People, on par with The People. Of course it’s not all rosy, he says.
You also have a right to work. You also have rights in terms of access to education, access to health care… The reality of how these things are carried out, though, can be very very different.
The NPR article is a good one, but doesn’t it leave us assuming that the majority of these African refugees are choosing South America as their destination? Are they choosing, or are they hopping on whatever flight/truck/ship that will get them the hell out (as this article suggests)? When you’re in between countries with no money and no power, do you ever really get to move about freely?
