Eliana Sousa Silva
Founder, Redes de Desenvolvimento da Maré (Maré Development Networks)
In my professional life, I’ve learned to attentive and carefully listening to people - to accept different perspectives and help build a common ground, even in extreme situations. In the spaces where I work as an activist, educator and researcher, I seek to overcome conflicts and injustices by dialoguing and bringing to the table people of different positions, backgrounds and values. This approach has allowed for many partnerships and connections to blossom, always seeking to guaranteeing what should be ours all along: basic human rights for the population of slums and peripheries not only in Rio de Janeiro, but in other regions of Brazil.
Internationally recognised as one of Brazil’s most important social activists, Eliana Sousa Silva has a PhD in Social Service from the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro (PUC-Rio). Daughter of Northeast Brazil migrants, Eliana grew up in the favela complex of Maré in Rio de Janeiro where she married and raised two children. Eliana was elected president of the Maré Residents’ Association when she was only 22 years old and set up a community-based programme to enable residents from the largest of Rio’s favelas to follow her own path into university education. In 1996 she founded Redes de Desenvolvimento da Maré (Maré Development Networks), as a non-governmental organisation which has become a national reference point for its educational, social and cultural projects. Redes campaigns for better public security and supports citizens in advocating for their rights and created Maré’s first official streetmap. In 2018 she curated the first WOW - Women of the World Festival in Latin America and is part of the Global Advisory Board of The WOW Foundation.