Boaventura de Souza Santos denies charges and maintains innocence

Investigator Boaventura de Souza Santos today rejected the charges of persecution that were brought against him in the book chapter, and assured that he is innocent and is able to prove it in a place where he can defend himself.

“The accusations are in fact false, and I have good conditions to demonstrate this, but I must demonstrate this where I can defend myself,” he stressed in an interview with the Lusa agency.

Three researchers who passed through the Center for Social Research (CES) in Coimbra reported on situations of harassment in a chapter of a book entitled “Sexual Misconduct in the Academy – For an Ethics of Care at the University”, to which the researchers Boaventura de Sousa Santos and Bruno Sena Martins were suspended from all positions they held at CES in April 2023.

Months later, CES created an independent commission to investigate the allegations, releasing its report on March 13, nearly a year later, in which it confirmed patterns of abuse of power and harassment by people in hierarchical positions, without naming names.

“For 15 months I have been attacked based on this chapter and everything that followed. I have been attacked in the press and social networks, but I have never been able to defend myself because we cannot investigate such serious issues in the public square,” said Boaventura de Souza Santos.

In a conversation with Lusa, the sociologist noted that more than a year ago he was involved in a “media war,” where a “personality assassination” was committed in the first week.

“I don’t think that this is where a person should defend himself, so I waited in silence all this time. I really always thought that it was in institutions that I should defend myself and where this issue should be resolved,” he explained.

Boaventura de Sousa Santos said that during these 15 months he was never heard on this issue by the management, scientific council or general assembly of CES, nor by the courts.

The IC only heard him on December 4, 2023, where he handed over “approximately 600 pages of documents” and the names of several witnesses who “were never heard.”

The report, published by the independent commission, makes a sociological diagnosis but “never talks about victims” but only about “reported persons and complainants”, pointing out “contradictions, making a general diagnosis and proposing solutions for the future”.

“I thought that was the end of it, but a few minutes before the publication of the report, the CES management and scientific council published a letter of apology to the victims, boycotting and contradicting what was in the Commission’s report, with a one-sided reading that sought to confirm the narrative of the complainants, rather than with the impartiality that was needed at the time,” he said, accusing the CES of “bad faith”.

In an attempt to clear his good name, Boaventura de Sousa Santos said he had asked the prosecutor to name him as an accused in the context of the investigation launched following the independent commission’s report, and had also filed a lawsuit against the CES management in order to have access to statements and evidence to be able to defend himself.

In addition to these actions, it also decided to initiate actions to protect its identity against all those who question its fundamental right to a good name.

Boaventura de Sousa Santos said the stalking allegations had a “terrible impact” on his personal life, reputation and “invitation matters.”

“It was a brutal attack on my international reputation that led to the cancellation,” especially “after a mistake that wasn’t a mistake after all.”

“It was a malicious intent to turn my self-suspension into a suspension. It was not my self-suspension that led to the cancellation, but the message that I was suspended, because when a person is suspended, it is because he is suspected of something,” he said.

He also told Luce that he had no doubt that he would be able to clear his name, as he trusted the Portuguese justice system and the adversarial system.

“I believe in justice, and that is what I am addressing at this moment. You cannot question the good name of one of the most famous sociologists in the Portuguese-speaking world, destroying his reputation in the way that has been done in Portugal over the last 15 months with impunity,” he concluded.

SHM/SSS // JEFF

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