“Places you shouldn’t go to”: (Im)mobility, violence and democracy in Brazil and South Africa

Abstract

Pursuing the broader political effects of the relationship between violence, mobility, and inequality, the article describes some of the grounded political-economies (re)producing social inequalities in Brazil and South Africa, and a discontinuous experience of the urban space. This fragmented spatial experience is produced by the simultaneous operation of a discursive apparatus projecting a split ideal of “city”, and grounded social mechanics, in the intersection of values and power relations. In Johannesburg, South Africa, we’ve described the creation of Maboneng, a “urban development project”, to highlight the role of social mobility and growing class aspirations as powerful political vehicles for neoliberal markets reissuing old apartheid socio-spatial divisions. In Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, we’ve explored the relationship between the State and its margins to understand the production of the milícia as a violent anti-modern capitalist venture, aiming to control the circulation of people, capital and political support in the city.