Boaventura de Sousa Santos in Tlaxcala: Justice, knowledge and horizons of the South

On May 23, 2025, Portuguese sociologist Boaventura de Sousa Santos, one of the most influential voices in contemporary critical thought, made a profoundly significant visit to the state of Tlaxcala, Mexico. His visit to this enclave left its mark not only on the academic and legal fields, but also on education and the Latin American dialogue for epistemic justice.

World Law Congress: Justice Beyond the Law

The main reason for his visit was his participation in the World Law Congress, which brought together more than 1,500 people, most of them students. In this space, Boaventura gave a lecture that addressed topics such as legal pluralism, cognitive justice and the need to rethink law from the perspective of the epistemologies of the South. His intervention directly challenged the audience: What does it mean to apply justice in contexts marked by inequality, structural violence and the historical denial of indigenous and popular knowledge?

Meeting with Education Officials: The South in New Mexico Schools

Boaventura also held a meeting with the Secretary of Education of the State of Tlaxcala and his team at the headquarters of the State Secretariat of Public Education, specifically in the Lucio Cabañas Barrientos Room, a space that evokes the social and educational struggles of deep Mexico. During this meeting, the role of Southern epistemologies as a philosophical and political axis of the New Mexican School project promoted by the federal government was discussed. Boaventura emphasized that authentic educational transformation requires recognizing and valuing community knowledge, dismantling the colonial logic of knowledge, and building new pedagogies of hope from the bottom up.

Dialogue with Latin American academics

The day ended with a meeting with professors from several Latin American universities, in a fraternal atmosphere of sharing experiences, reflections and shared strategies. This meeting reaffirmed the internationalist spirit of Boaventura's thinking and his commitment to a more open, popular, decolonized university that is committed to social movements.