Environmental inequality in São Paulo city: An analysis of differential exposure of social groups to situations of environmental risk

Abstract

This chapter aims to operationalize the concept of environmental inequality, measuring the association between disadvantaged socioeconomic conditions and greater exposure to environmental risks through the use of geoprocessing methodologies. We offer a case study of the city of Säo Paulo, Brazil, analyzing situations of environmental inequality, based on the level of risk exposure of different social groups. Our methodology is based on the construction of a geographical information system through which the digital layers of environmental risk areas are overlapped with the digital meshes of the census sectors of the 1991 and 2000 IBGE demographic censuses. The results show that people living in risky areas are in a much worse socioeconomic condition than those living outside them. Moreover, in recent years there has been an increase in the level of environmental inequality in the city of São Paulo.