Colombia’s first black woman vice president: an intergenerational dialogue

Francia Elena Márquez Mina made history in 2022 when she assumed office as Colombia’s first Afro-Colombian Vice President after leading a successful grassroots campaign to reverse decades of conservative rule. Affectionately known as Igualada for her unwavering commitment to social justice, especially for marginalised Afro-descendant and indigenous communities, the Vice President previously served as Colombia’s first Minister of Equality and Equity. How did she become an international political icon and symbol of courage under fire?

In this Black History Month 2025 public event Vice President Márquez will converse with black women scholars of different generations whose research centres blackness in all its complexities. They will discuss the Vice President’s upbringing, early activism, rise to political prominence, and four legacy agendas, namely: achieving racial and environmental justice, strengthening diasporic connections (between Colombia and Africa), fostering international cooperation and equality, and development of the Pacific.

Meet our speakers and chair

Francia Elena Márquez Mina (@FranciaMarquezM) is Vice-President of Colombia, a position she has held since 2022. She is a lawyer and received the National Human Rights Award in 2015 and the Goldman Environmental Award in 2018.

Robtel Neajai Pailey (@RobtelNeajai) is Assistant Professor in International Social and Public Policy at LSE. A Liberian scholar-activist working at the intersection of critical African studies, critical development studies and critical race studies, she centres her research on how socio-economic transformation is conceived and contested in ‘crisis’-affected regions of the so-called Global South.

Kandya Obezo-Casseres is an Afro-Colombian PhD candidate in Social Policy at LSE. Her current research centres the role of Afro-Colombian activists in designing and implementing cultural policies in Colombia. She also examines ethno-racial identity politics, black political thought, and Afro-descendant activism in Latin America.

Coretta Phillips is Professor of Criminology and Social Policy. She joined the Department of Social Policy in 2001, and her research interests lie in the field of race, ethnicity, crime, criminal justice and social policy. Since 2022, her major research efforts have focused on a multi-disciplinary ESRC project providing the first systematic, comprehensive and historically grounded account of the crime and criminal justice experiences of Gypsies and Travellers in England since the 1960s.

More about this event

The Department of International Development (@LSE_ID) promotes interdisciplinary postgraduate teaching and research on processes of social, political and economic development and change.

The Department of Social Policy (@LSESocialPolicy) provides top quality international and multidisciplinary research and teaching on social and public policy challenges facing countries across the world. From its foundation in 1912 it has carried out cutting edge research on core social problems, and helped to develop policy solutions.

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