Towards the Integration of the "Morro" to the "Asfalto":

A Personal and Historical Journey through the Favelas of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Ella LazarteDepartment of Urban Studies and Planning

Massachusetts Institute of TechnologyProfessor Anna Hardman

Memoirs of My Favela Field Work in Rio de Janeiro

In my fieldwork in Rio de Janeiro from 2001-2003 which entailed interviewing micro-entrepreneurs and later, community leaders and residents, I learned about the challenges of microentrepreneurs in areas dominated by drug traffic gangs in Complexo da Maré, the community development priorities of Santa Marta, the struggle for urban and social services by Tabajaras/Vila Rica/Cabritos, and the hopeful situation in Cidade de Deus/City of God (which was negatively and pessimistically portrayed in the internationally-acclaimed movie City of God released in 2003). The stories and field notes in each of these communities can constitute several chapters of a book. But first, what I would like to do is provide a context for the research I have done and will do in the future on favelas and answer several questions which could help people who seek to influence or change policy towards the social inclusion and integration of favela residents into the formal city: First: Who lives there? What do they hope for the future and what are their priorities? Second: What is a favela and what are its origins? Knowing the origins, history and past policies can shed some light as to why there is such a distrust of government within many favelas that I have visited as well as provide hope for the integration of "morros" and the "asfaltos".

Introduction

Left to Right: Rocinha (the amalmagation of high-density housing on the mountain slopes overlooking the rich neighborhood of São Conrado), the largest favela in Latin America with roughly over 200,000 inhabitants (according to residents); Santa Marta, overlooking the middle-class neighborhood of Botafogo in the Southern Zone, Rio de Janeiro; Pictures taken by author, 2002 and 2003, respectively.

While Brazil ranks as one of the largest economies in the world in terms of GDP

size of US$452 billion, it also ranks high in terms of inequality with a Gini coefficient

of .6, higher than that of South Africa. A country of 178 million people, Brazil occupies

a vast area of land in the South American continent. Like most developing countries,

however, many people moved from rural to urban centers – with 81% of the population

living in urban areas. In large metropolitan areas, this percentage is even higher,

reaching 96% in the State of Rio de Janeiro. This high percentage of urbanization,

however, along with lack of a coherent national housing policy targeting the lower

income segments of the population, led to the development of informal settlements,

known as favelas, in the central and peripheral areas of Rio de Janeiro.

Favela – the Brazilian Portuguese word for lands occupied by invasions. With

only 3.5% of the total Brazil population living in "favelas" (approximately 6 million

people), it is almost hard to believe that 20% of them are concentrated in state of Rio de

Janeiro.1 In this Cidade Maravilhosa ("Wonderful City", as many Brazilians refer to it),

favela has come to be associated with drugs, violence, poverty, precarious living

conditions with inadequate water and sanitation infrastructure characterized by open

sewers. Even if many favelas have slowly been 'urbanized' in the last few decades --

replete with water and sanitation services and paved roads -- the socio-economic

difference between the world of favelas and asfalto (literally means "asphalt" and is a

word used to describe middle to upper-income neighborhoods) has been a long-standing

problem in many large Brazilian cities, especially in Rio where these two worlds coalesce

together spatially. Many of these dense informal housing settlements prominently and

1 Ricardo Barros, Mirela de Carvalho, and Samuel Franco. "Condições Habitacionais no Estado do Rio de Janeiro: progressos e desafios", p. 27, unpublished paper.

permanently perched on the beautiful hillsides and mountain ranges are located right in

the middle of wealthy areas such as in the world-famous beach districts of Copacabana

and Ipanema. This location combined with continued violence, social unrest and

exclusion have led many policymakers, private actors and civil society leaders to

introduce projects, programs and policies with the aim of improving the lives of favela

residents.

Part I: Socio-Economic Profile and Community Development Priorities

This section briefly discusses the results of research project conducted by the author on

socio-economic profile and community development priorities of favela residents.

Accurate data on favelas have been very difficult to find (not only due to the informality

of the settlements but also the high expenses required to conduct a census survey

reflective of each community). While official Census data reveals a population of around

1 million people in the favelas, neighborhood census surveys show very divergent results.

For example, while the Census 2000 reports show that Complexo da Maré has about

60,000 residents, the Censo Maré survey found the number of residents to be over twice

this figure, 138,000.2 Thus, typical of data in other countries on informal settlements, the

figures tend to be underestimated. The data I present, however, comes from a special

census survey undertaken by the Municipal Labor Secretariat in the late 1990s and

attemtps to paint a more accurate portrait of people who reside in these low-income

communities.

This section begins with a quick glance at some socio-economic data and then

launches on to provide a brief summary of the data gathered from over 20 interviews

2 See www.ibge.gov.br/home/estatistica/populacao/censo2000. Also for Censo Maré, see www.ceasm.org.br. CEASM is a nonprofit NGO founded and managed by local leaders from the community.

conducted with local leaders and residents in the community of Santa Marta in Spring of

2003. While the findings outlined here are incomplete, they reveal preferences which

coincide with the socio-economic data available on low-income communities as well as

speak to the current public policy trends in the city (as we shall see in the next section).

Socio-Economic Data: Age, Education, and Income

In the census data available on 52 communities included in the 1997-1999 study called

Pesquisa Socio-Econômica das Comunidades de Baixa Renda (PSECBR), the

population living in these low-income communities tend to be concentrated in the age

range below 20 years old. (Figure 1 below)

In terms of educationa attainment, much of the population, no more than 20% of the

population finished 7th grade or above, with only 8% who completed 1-3 years of high

school. Though some residents went on to obtain a college degree, the percentage, on the

aggregate, is very low (less than 1%). (Figure 2 below)

Given the education levels shown in Figure 2 above, it is not so surprising then that the

income levels tend to concentrate at 1-2 minimum salaries per month, which is equivalent

to around $60-120 dollars3. One must note, though, that although almost 50% of the

population earn up to 3 minimum salaries, there is a sizeable population earning between

3-10 times the minimum salary, indicating the presence of a middle-class segment within

these low-income communities. This suggests that the favela population is far from

homogenous, although "favelas" are often associated with poverty (as we shall see in the

second part of this paper). This finding is consistent with the literature on favelas (See

Perlman, 1976 and 2003), which discusses their heterogeneiety.

Figure 3

3 Brazilians tend to measure their incomes in terms of "salário minimos". It seems that this language is only used, however, among lower to working classes whose salaries can be measured in terms of how many times the set minimum wage rate they earn. For example, it is highly unlikely that a middle-class or a person earning over $1,000 reais would say that he or she earns around 5 salário minimos. This system of measurement is quite convenient

Educational Attainment as % of Sample Population

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If we look at the figure below on Employment Activity by Sector, we can see more clearly

which occupational sectors that favela residents occupy. In examining the Figure 4

below, we can then explain the trend in income levels pointed out earlier: the service

sector tends to have the lowest-paid jobs available and 57% of the residents in the 52

favelas work in the service sector. This could explain the prevalence of 2-3 minimum

salary-wage earners as shown in Figure 3 above.

Figure 4

Housing Data: Residency, Home Ownership and Household Assets

Another useful indicator is the length of residence in a community, which shows us how

old or young are these low-income communities. The surprising piece of information

here is not that around 55% of the residents have lived in their communities for over 10

years (since many favelas have been around for decades, as we shall discover in the next

section), but that around 12% have only been residing there for three years or less.

Figure 5

Moreover, an overwhelming proportion of residents, 87%, own their own homes (this

does not include owning the title, however) and only 8% of the people rent. Thus, one

can say that housing can be considered an asset for some favela residents. The issue

today is the verticalization of favelas and the increase in the number of floors that a house

has. This allows owners to rent a floor or room in their apartment, so perhaps, the 8%

rental-occupied housing underestimates the real number of renters in favelas. I have

anecdotal evidence that shows the increase in population of one particular favela by

constructing rooms or a house in the patio area or the top area of a house and renting or

selling the space to newcomers from the peripheral parts of Rio (Baixada Fluminense).

In terms of durable consumer goods, however, the favela residents have acquired the

basics, such as a refrigerator, radio and colored television. Thus, while a majority of the

population live in low incomes, they have been able to buy these goods partly because of

the Brazilian installment system which allows consumers to pay for a product they buy in

various installments.

Figures 6 (left) and 7 (right)

So, while the incomes and education level of the people who live in favelas are

lower than the residents of the formal city, their socio-economic situation do not seem so

dire in terms of home ownership and household assets.4 In Perlman's sample of 750

people in her 1968-69 research on poverty in favelas, she found that "only 64% of

families owned a TV, 58% refrigerators, and 25% stereos". 5 The data I presented above,

thus, show dramatic improvements in terms of ownership of domestic appliances/assets. 4 The data for comparison are left out of this paper due to time constraints, I would have had to link the raw data I have from the Socio-Economic Survey in 1997-99 with the Census 2000 data and/or other studies on poverty in Rio, such as the recent study by Marcelo Neri about the federal program Fome Zero/Zero Hunger which discusses the average income level in favelas such as Rocinha of around $127/month as compared to the wealthy, upper-class neighborhoods of Leblon and São Conrado where people earn, on the average six times that amount.

5 J. Perlman, 2003, p. 132.

Missing from the socio-economic survey data I obtained was racial composition.

While this paper does not focus on race and social inequality, it is important to mention it

because most of the poor people in Rio are of Afro-Brazilian descent. According to

Perlman (as well as from conversations and observations in the field), an overwhelming

majority of blacks live in favelas, but not all residents of favelas are blacks. In her

restudy of the original sample of residents in several favelas back in 1968-69, both the

original and the restudy sample population comprised of 21 percent black, 30 percent

mulatto, and 49 percent white.6

Now that we know a little bit about the favela residents, the next question we ask is:

What are their community development priorities?

The Voices of Favela Residents

Sports and Recreation, Culture "A recreational Area for children" (Senhor YY, Sports Leader)

“The dream is to have a space where we can have all types of activities, not just sports but also events, music classes, etc..we have all these ideas…" (Senhor YYY, Sports Leader)

Economic Development/Work Opportunities“We need more projects that give people the skills to earn money…to have a decent work to earn a

living…" (Dona XX, Seamstress)

Unity/Solidarity"We need to be more united” (Dona XXX, Senhor YYYY)

Direct Government Action and Presence:

“Tanto o governo quanto a prefeitura colaboram na area de assistência social e não na ação social que vai realmento resolver os problemas do presente e do passado”

assistência social: “…como se fosse um remedio, methiolate (?) ou uma cesta basica” (Pastor)

“A Prefeitura não dá valor à comunidade…Pedimos Favela Bairro, não fez…Cesar Maia não adianta, nem o asesor dele” (Frango/Associação)

“A presença do Estados e Município aqui é muito importante” (Seu Beto)“A gente sabe que não vão fazer nada, prometem mundos e fundos…a gente tem que correr atrás, não

ficar dependendo no Cesar Maia”

6 Ibid, p.128.

Urbanization/Favela Bairro

“With urbanization comes everything – water, electricity, sewerage. Urbanization must be in first place because health depends on urbanization. Up the hill, you see open sewers, that's why people are angry"

(Dona X, Health Worker)

"The government was going to start Favela Bairro here but the project began and stopped. Why? Because of lack of political will." (Senhor Y, Sports and Recreation Leader)

Discussion: Given the socio-economic data above, it is not so surprising that the

residents want more and better work opportunities and more space and recreational

options for children. The incomes are generally low in favelas and

underemployment/unemployment persists which and there is a high proportion of

children living in them. In terms of more "unity", this was also not a surprising result

because spending a few months in the community, I found that Santa Marta was indeed

very disorganized and separated.7 Part of this could be attributed to lack of participation

in community events and/or lack of opportunities to do so, as some residents have

complained to me. Even though many NGOs and social projects exist in the community,

the beneficiaries seem to be the same people each time. This finding is similar to the

PSECBR study which reports that only 7% of residents actually participate in community

events. Another explanation is the pervasiveness of the drug traffic trade in many favelas

and in Santa Marta, the control of the neighborhood association by people associated with

the trade. This trend could change, though. Since I left in July 2003, one of the

community leaders I interviewed won the seat of Neighborhood Association President.

This leader aims to connect the bottom, middle and upper sections of the hill. 7 I spent a few months visiting the community, attending meetings, participating in events such as those held by the Nazarene Church at the top of the hill, sitting down and talking to the seamstresses who are part of a cooperative supported by local and international NGOs. Methodology used: participatory observations, personal interviews, snowball method (where I talked to one community leader and he/she would indicate someone for me to interview). There was a lot of neighborhood politics which deserve space for discussion in a larger paper.

The last two priorities mentioned by community leaders relate to public policy and

government intervention in the favelas, with the most important intervention being the

Favela Bairro Program. While this paper does not aim to talk about the merits and

contents of this new program initiated in the mid-1990s, with the financial and technical

support from the Inter-American Development Bank (at least $300 billion disbursed by

the Bank so far to benefit over 120 favelas), it seeks to understand the origins of favelas

and the history of government policies aimed at improving or removing them.

Part II: What's in a Name? – Definitions Through Historical and Public Policy

Lens

As defined earlier, favelas refer to land areas occupied by illegal invasions. In

English, some people refer to them as squatter settlements, slums, or informal

settlements. It is interesting to learn about the different words for informal settlements in

other countries since theses words conjure up strong images and meanings that are

specific to the location and/or time period. For example, in Sri Lanka the general term

used is "under-served settlements" in official documents, but depending on with whom

you talk, the word changes to "tenement gardens" (deteriorating pre-1940s labor quarters

in the older parts of the city) or "shanties" (informal structures in pockets around the city

and along the edge of the road).8 In Lebanon, the word commonly used to describe

informal settlements is "al dahia" (or suburbs, in English). Although not all "al dahia"

consist of informal settlements, the Lebanese tend to use this term to describe the Shiite

population living in these southern suburbs. Because most Lebanese associate illegality

8 Information obtained from Dhakshike Wickrema, a Sri Lankan graduate student in Urban Planning at MIT.

with Shiism, the definition of "al dahia" has become not just political but also religious.9

Just like in Sri Lanka, Lebanon and many other countries in the developing world, the

definition and meanings associated to the word "favela" has historical, social and political

roots.

In Brazilian Portuguese, favela has been and continues to be used interchangeably

with the words morro, parque proletário, conjuntos habitacionais, loteamentos

irregulares depending on the actual characteristic of the settlement. By characteristic, I

mean physical, political and/or cultural which I will explain in this section. Today, the

trend in Rio has been to replace 'favela' with the word "comunidade". However, in my

interviews and informal conversations with many leaders of various "comunidades" in

Rio de Janeiro, I have stumbled across these diverse words mentioned above. As

researchers and practitioners, we need to be aware of the different distinctions and the

histories which go along with these varying terms. It may seem petty to many, but

knowing the history and meanings of these words can help us gain insights to the lives

and hopes of these citizens who have survived amidst conflicting policies of urbanization

and removal which permeated the public policy arena towards favelas from the 1940s

until the 1990s.

Favela as Morro

Favelas have been around for over a century. As Alba Zaluar and Marcos Alvito

wrote in the introduction to the book they co-edited Um Seculo de Favela (A Century of

Favela) which they first published in 1998 to commemorate the hundred years of

existence of favelas in Rio de Janeiro: "FALAR DE FAVELA é de falar da história do

9 Details on Lebanese informal settlements obtained from Hiba Bou Akar, an MIT graduate student in Urban Planning.

Brasil desde a virada do século passado. É falar particularmente da cidade do Rio de

Janeiro…/To talk about favelas is to talk about the history of Brazil since the turn of last

century. To speak, particularly, of the city of Rio de Janeiro"10. The authors went on to

describe the origins of the first favela which was situated on Morro da Providência close

to the center of Rio de Janeiro11. The inhabitants of the first 'favela' in Rio were mostly

soldiers who had just come back from fighting in the Canudos War in the northeastern

state of Bahia back in 1897 and had received permission from the Ministry of War to

construct houses and occupy that particular hill.

A morro means a hill. As described above, many of the dense informal

settlements are situated on steep hillsides. The word 'favela' itself comes from a type of

vegetation – "a bush abundant in the semi-arid Canudos area"12 where the soldiers had

just come from. Thus, Morro da Providência came to be known as Morro da Favela.

As the reader will see in subsequent pages, low-income communities are not all

favelas nor are all favelas located on morros or hillsides. It is not so surprising then to

see the two words used interchangeably. Perhaps a more important finding in the

research of the origins of favela is the negative connotation which came to be associated

with the word since its inception: dire poverty, violence, and poor hygiene. As early as

the 1900s, newspapers and public authorities have referred to areas where poor people

live as dirty, miserable and dangerous. The government response was to remove them

from the centers of the city.

10 A. Zaluar and M. Alvito. Um Seculo de Favela, p 7, 1998.

11 According to another source http://www.fau.ufrj.br/prourb/cidades/favela/frames.html, the website of the Department of Architecture and Urbanism of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Morro Santo Antônio was also occupied in 1897.

12 Ibid.

By the 1930s, the official government policy towards these housing settlements

(or habitações populares) was to eliminate them, as evident in the Código de Obras da

Cidade in 1937 which refers to favelas as an "abberation" and undeserving of being

included in the official map of the city13. As an alternative to favelas, the government

constructed parques proletários.

The Emergence of Parques Proletários (1940s)

By the 1940s, the government began to pay closer attention to the favela problem

by planning, funding and constructing parques proletários (author's translation:

proletariat parks) in the Southern Zone neighborhoods of Gávea, Leblon and the Central

port zone of Cajú. According to Leeds and Leeds, these public housing settlements

served not only as housing for low-income people who were forcibly transferred from

various favelas, but also as a school for moral teachings which would serve to civilize the

pre-citizens of the city14. One of the daily tasks of the park administrator was to go

around, at 9:00 pm with a microphone commenting on daily events and providing some

moral lessons he seemed necessary to instruct the residents. By 10:00 pm, the gates

would be closed.15 Today, the parques proletários still exist minus the rigid curfew and

public official instructing residents how to live morally.16 If it were up to the Mayor and

other public officials, more parque proletários would have been built to house the

13 Burgos, p.27.

14 Leeds and Leeds, A Sociogia Urbana, 1978, p. 196.

15 Ibid.

16 I first heard of a parque proletário through a woman community leader whom I met at a forum (Mulher em Ação) of community leaders representing dozens of favelas or 'comunidades' in Rio during the Spring of 2003. I was a note-taker for the NGO I was working with and when I asked the woman where she was from, she gave me the short name of Cajú and later modified her response and told me that if I was to correctly name it, then I better use Parque Proletátario de Cajú.

residents of favelas that the city sought to destroy. But fortunately, residents were able to

organize and by the late 1940s, the residents of the hillside favelas of Pavão/Pavãozinho,

Cantagalo and Babilônia formed commissions to oppose the city mayor's plan to remove

all the residents of favelas into these parks.

Government and Church Involvement

During the same period, the government, in partnership with the Archdiocese of

Rio de Janeiro/Catholic Church created the Fundacão Leao XIII which extended services

to 34 favelas in the city, providing services such as water and sewerage, electricity and

roads as well as social centers in the 8 largest favelas such as Rocinha, São Carlos,

Salgueiro, Barreira de Vasco, Praia do Pinto and Cantagalo17. By the 1950s, some

favelas were already linked to policymakers and politicians through institutions such as

Fundacão Leão, Serfha, and Cruzada São Sebastião18. The latter institution was

instrumental in negotiating with the government against the removal of three favelas:

Borel, Esqueleto and Dona Marta. By the 1960s, Serfha (which changed its name to

COHAB, or Companhia de Habitação Popular19) was actively helping stimulate the

formation of resident associations/neighborhood associations as a way to direct

government assistance as well as political influence in the favelas.

17 Leeds and Leeds, 1978, p 199

18 Serfha stands for Serviço Especial de Recuperação das Favelas e Habitação Anti-Higiênicas/Special Service for the Recuperation of Favelas and Anti-Hygienic Housing. For more information on these institutions, see Burgos, 1998 and Gay, 1994.

19 Perhaps the name change resulted from more progressive politicians entering the scene as well as protest from favela leaders. I would imagine that such a name would incense some people. The relatively progressive policy arena could be seen in the state budget which directed 3% of its revenues to favelas. Even though some say that much of the money was diverted by agency heads and politicians to projects of their own choosing, this seems like quite an accomplishment for communities which are supposedly marginalized. This information was obtained, again from Burgos, but more details can be found in Fortuna and Fortuna, "Associativismo na favela". Revista de Administração Pública, 8 (4): 103-52, October/December 1974.

What strikes me as interesting in this period was the active role of both the state

and church in the provision of urban and social services in some favelas. This puts into

question the notion of informal settlements as self-help communities, as Turner has

advocated. Although many residents do end up constructing their own houses with the

help of their neighbors and family members as well as pave the steps or roads of the

favelas, many communities received help from the state and church (which, at different

points, was closely allied with the state). For instance in the communities of Brás de

Pina, Morro União and Mata Machado, the ex-governor Negrão de Lima in the early

1960s authorized architects, planners, economists, and sociologists to form Codesco or

Companhia de Desenvolvimento de Comunidades (Company for the Development of the

Communities) to help bring urban services to these three favelas and integrate them into

the city. Moreover, this pilot project already adopted participatory planning, involving

residents in the design and construction of service improvements. The words

"integração" and "comunidade", which would dominate the favela discourse in the

1990s, were already present in the discussions of urban development and urbanization in

Rio as early as the 1960s.

Unfortunately, this policy of urbanization also coincided with removal. While

some politicians and policy-makers were slowly bringing urban services into favelas,

some or even the same ones (due to political pressure) were rapidly removing them.

Then came the era of conjuntos habitacionais (public housing projects).

The Rise and Fall of the Conjuntos Habitacionais (1960s)

By the mid-1960s, while the government sought to urbanize some favelas (as mentioned

above), it also sought to remove some and transfer people to public housing projects

located far away from the urban centers such as Cidade de Deus, Vilas Kennedy, Aliança

and Esperança. With the financial backing of international donors such as the USAID

(United States Agency for International Development), the government built these

massive housing projects which housed an amalgam of residents from dozens of favelas

in different parts of the city20. For instance, Cidade de Deus received residents from 63

different communities21. These housing sites had urban services included in the

construction, but these days, lack of operation and maintenance has led to inadequate

water and sanitation services in many parts of the community.

The Shrinking of the State and the Prominence of the Drug Lords (1970s-1980s)

With the dictatorship, installed in 1964, came worse times for many favela residents

especially during the 1970s and 1980s. This period was characterized by state repression

and the emergence of the institution known as the drug trade.22 The state repression not

only came in the intensification of the eradication of many favelas, but also in the

assassination of local favela leaders throughout the city, events which residents pointed

out in my interviews in 2003. As Perlman obtained from official data from the

municipality, the policy of removal dislocated about 100,000 people just in the 1970s

alone.23 Much more happened in the period of 1980s as Brazil underwent a transition

20 Older residents of Cidade de Deus whom I interviewed remember this period very vividly, articulating that the government sent them away from the central, richer areas of the city such as Catacumba by the wealthy neighborhoods of Lagoa and Ipanema, to a place far away with very limited transportation. These days, there are several ways of getting from the center to Cidade de Deus, but even with the variety of transportation available such as buses and kombis (vans), it still takes at least 45 minutes to the center. Imagine how it was back in the 1960s without all the roads and connections to the central areas of the city.

21 Prefeitura da Cidade do Rio de Janeiro, "O Rio de Janeiro e o Favela-Bairro" in RIO ESTUDOS n120, September 2003. 22 See Perlman, 1976; Gay, 1994; Leeds and Leeds, 1978; E. Leeds, 1996.

23 J. Perlman, "Marginality: From Myth to Reality in the Favelas of Rio de Janeiro, 1969-2002" in ed. A. Roy and N. AlSayyad, Urban Informality: Transnational Perspectives from Middle East, Latin American and South Asia (Maryland, Lexington Books, 2003).

from dictatorship to democracy. In the transition to democracy, we see a rise in

institutions and projects geared towards improving the physical and social conditions of

favelas such as the creation of the Secretaria Municipal de Desenvolvimento Social

(SMDS - Municipal Secretariat of Social Development), created in 1979 – the same year

that the National Housing Bank (originally created to fund the removal of favelas and

construction of housing projects in the 1960s and 70s) began Pró-Morar, a program

which urbanized 6 favelas in areas with palafitas (stilt wooden houses). Today, the

SMDS largely serves the favela population in the areas of education, sanitation, health

and recreation.

Towards the Integration of the "Morro" to the "Asfalto": Favela Bairro (1990s-Present)

By the beginning of the 1990s, with the support of Brizola and his successors, the Favela

Bairro Program was initiated by the City of Rio de Janeiro. As mentioned in the first

section of this paper, over 100 favelas have benefited from this program which

supposedly mixes physical, social and economic upgrading. Whether or not it has made a

difference in the communities served remains to be an important question. In a paper co-

written by Paulo Fernando A. Cavallieri and Ayse Pamuk, this comprehensive upgrading

approach to the favelas earned high marks in terms of poverty alleviation.24 Furthermore,

this expensive program which the city aims to expand to all favelas at a cost of $1 billion

seeks to integrate the "morro" to the "asfalto". If the slogan and main goal of the

program is to 'integrate the favelas into the city', social inclusion and integration, then I

speculate that the program has largely failed. However, one must also think about what

the Favela Bairro Program has done in terms of providing a 'model' for favela dwellers all

24 A. Pamuk and P Cavallieri, "Alleviating Urban Poverty in a Global City: New Trends in Upgrading Rio de Janeiro's Favelas", Habitat Intl, Vol 22, No. 4, pp 449-462, 1998.

over Rio de Janeiro. People want it. The City is proud that residents think that it is one

of the most effective programs they have.25

Lingering Thoughts and Future Research:

Does building a sports complex or park, day care center and a little road to connect the

bottom part of the hill to the top really make a huge difference in the residents' lives?

Will they? Or do favela residents need something else? If so, what do they need? Given

their responses to my questions, they seem to prioritize as their needs whatever the

Program Favela Bairro offers in its menu of services. Perhaps the city finally listened

and paid attention to the needs of these low-income communities. So, assuming that the

menu of services offered by Favela Bairro correlate to what the residents needs, how

effective is the city at delivering these services such as day care, road paving, health

services, etc? Now this is the question that merits an informed, well-researched answer –

perhaps in form of a thesis.

What I have done so far is just give some basic details of favelas to familiarize the

readers of the lives and priorities of the people who live on these steep inclines or

flatlands by the major highways of the city of Rio de Janeiro. While I have provided

some background on the origins of favelas and public policy interventions throughout

many decades of confusing trends between removal and urbanization, a next step would

be to focus on a few favelas and outline their relationships with government actors to

show us the possibilities and limitations of what favela leaders and politicians can do and

have done. Doing this could lead to better policy and more improvements to the lives of

the people who shared their stories with me.

25 Prefeitura da Cidade do Rio de Janeiro, "O Rio de Janeiro e o Favela-Bairro" in RIO ESTUDOS N120, Setember 2003, p.14.

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