Epistemologies of the South: Justice Against Epistemicide - Softcover

“Empistemologies of the South is an ambitious book on an important topic.”
―American Journal of Sociology
"The author's solidarity with the emancipatory movements and his acceptance of the urgency of their struggle for justice are apparent throughout the book. At the same time, the book is carefully researched, thoroughly argued, critically alert, erudite, original, and challenging. It contains detailed inter-connected arguments. . .that defy brief summary, defending a variety of provocative claims that deal with political, economic, social, social scientific, and historical, as well as scientific matters. . .Nevertheless, whether or not the conclusions of Epistemologies of the South are endorsed, I hope that it contributes to making central in the agenda of the philosophy of science questions about the role that science might play in fostering ― or undermining ― cognitive and social justice, and under what interpretation it should do so."
―Metascience

"A blockbuster work, disconcerting and judicious. Santos calls upon us to unthink all our most entrenched biases. He wants us to see the world from the bottom up, to view the 'universal' from the South rather than from the North. He thereby outlines a truly different possible future to construct."
―Immanuel Wallerstein, Yale University

“Epistemologies of the South is a brilliant testimony about today's tensions within our inter- and trans-cultural spaces.”
―Valentin Y. Mudimbe, Newman Ivey White Professor of Literature, Duke University

“To what extent is the Global North still a West? And to what extent is the old West still just a North? These are not only geopolitical issues, but epistemological questions, whose resolution at the level of practices, disciplines, experiences, and affects, will shape a new Humankind in a new Environment. An original and timely critique. The combination of Santos’ many fields of inquiry is impressive. ”
―Etienne Balibar, author of Equaliberty

“This is the World Social Forum transposed to a World Forum of Knowledges, argued with radical democratic passion and with an immense erudition in philosophy, science, art, and politics.”
―Göran Therborn, University of Cambridge. Author of The World: A Beginner´s Guide (2011) and of The Killing Fields of Inequality (2013).

"One of the most original world social thinkers of our time, Santos finds the Latin American region a great intellectual challenge, as he considers, according to José Martí, that this is the Nuestra América century, where we can find the greater "emancipatory counterhegemonic potential."
―Raquel Sosa Elízaga, sociologist, historian, activist.

In a world of appalling social inequalities people are becoming more aware of the multiple dimensions of injustice, whether social, political, cultural, sexual, ethnic, religious, historical, or ecological. Rarely acknowledged is another vital dimension: cognitive injustice, the failure to recognize the different ways of knowing by which people across the globe run their lives and provide meaning to their existence. This book shows why cognitive injustice underlies all the other dimensions; global social justice is not possible without global cognitive justice. Santos's argument unfolds in two inquiries. No matter how internally diverse, Western Modernity provided the knowledge underlying the long cycle of colonialism followed by global capitalism. These historical processes profoundly devalued and marginalized the knowledge and wisdom that had been in existence in the global South. Today, working against epistemicide is imperative in order to recover and valorize the epistemological diversity of the world. Such recovery and valorization is the book's second inquiry and is based on four key analytical tools: sociology of absences, sociology of emergences, ecology of knowledges, and intercultural translation. The transformation of the world's epistemological diversity into an empowering instrument against hegemonic globalization points to a new kind of bottom-up cosmopolitanism. It would promote a wide conversation of humankind, celebrating conviviality, solidarity, and life against the logic of market-ridden greed and individualism and the destruction of life to which world populations large and small are condemned by the dominant forces of globalization.