Spontaneous planning and management in Bogotá. Urban informality, 1940-2019

Abstract

This text tackles the Spontaneous Planning and Management in urban scenarios from a territorial reinterpretation of human settlements as social systems. This critical approach suggests a paradigm shift on self-managed development, as it reflects on how to address its complexity from the recognition of the territorial autonomy of its inhabitants. To do this, Systemic Thinking is used to structure a territorial reading whose purpose is to understand the territorial dynamics of San Germán (Usme) on the southern edge of Bogotá. The results include, first, a systemic analysis applied to a timeline that exposes the effects of a mechanical and linear institutional response. Second, the text exposes a simultaneous reading of both territorial logics: formal and spontaneous, making explicit the meeting points that involve confrontations. The article concludes that the lack of knowledge of the global implications of institutional action has been strongly linked to the establishment of measures to homogenize the territory under a unique logic of territorial construction. Likewise, that the non-recognition of the logic of Spontaneous Planning and Management will continue to restrict self-managed actions to contexts outside the dialogues in planning scenarios and, with it, to a continuous spontaneous development not assisted, isolated and inaccessible.