Favelas: Towards a Fairer Space? Democratic Transition and Collective Mobilisation in Authoritarian Space

Abstract

International audience Favelas which, as spaces, are often considered as urban margins or, more exactly, as being outside of the right of/to the city, have been witnesses to various consecutive repressive systems. From military dictatorships to criminal armed groups including a police institution, favelas have always been subjected to one form of control or another, generating a violent social order imposed authoritatively upon residents. While collective actions and social projects can be affected by the violence generated, they are not absent for all that. The intermediary sphere, i.e. between public and private, seems to be the privileged place for claiming socio-spatial justice. In these "authoritarian spaces " , a new security policy, established these last years, brings us to question whether a possible democratisation of these spaces and a transformation of collective action have taken place.