The Elitist Production of the Urban Space of Rio de Janeiro

Authors

  • Lina Machado Magalhaes FLACSO-Ecuador

Abstract

The city of Rio de Janeiro, as other Latin-American cities, have been experiencing the impacts of neoliberal policies exaggerated in periods of FIFA World Cup and Olympic Games: Among them, the persistent violations of the right to housing and the right to the city, especially of marginal and marginalized sectors of population. Nevertheless, the exclusionary and elitist city project was planned before, in the beginnings of the modern urban planning in Brazil. In this way, the present article pretends to analyze –from the review of previous studies– the process of social production of urban space in Rio, in order to confirm the hypothesis that the social-spatial segregation is the result of an historic process of an elitist development, that materializes on the urban reforms from beginnings of the twenty first century. The modern and contemporary urban reforms define and reinforce the characteristic informal scenario of Latin- American cities: favelas, villas miseria, barriadas and many others forms of popular habitat.

Keywords:

Classist urbanism, megaevents, right to the city, social spatial segregation, urban reforms

Author Biography

Lina Machado Magalhaes, FLACSO-Ecuador

Maestra en Estudios Urbanos por FLACSO-Ecuador. Investigadora de FLACSO-Ecuador y del Instituto de la Ciudad de Quito