From the Right to Consumption to the Right to City: Contradictions and Convergences

Abstract

Brazil has experienced the restructuring of the productive sector linked to processes of urban and city restructuring. In this context, population segments of lower acquisitive power have been recently incorporated to the society of consumption. This fact results in changes in the production of spaces and urban sociability. Therefore, the aim of this article is to discuss the dialectical contradiction inherent to the role of consumption in the construction of the right to the city. We consider that consumption must be understood as a matter of alienation, social demobilization and catalyzer of socio-spatial fragmentation as well as it is a potential element for city integration, the establishment of identities and citizenship construction. These are fundamental dimensions for theoretically repositioning and concretely achieving the right to city. The results obtained from fieldwork and interviews with city inhabitants of eight intermediate Brazilian cities allows us to observe the need to understand consumption through citizenship and politics, which is what allows the requalification of the spatial justice question.