Dossier: Urbanism, politics and pandemic in Latin America

Abstract

This article introduces in a substantial way the dossier "Urbanism, politics and pandemic in Latin America" that brings together a series of articles that present postcards, signs, relevant data and indications of the impact of the pandemic in various cities, especially in Argentina and Brazil, from a comparative perspective. The topics that crosscut this dossier are those of governance, the public management policy of the pandemic, the administration of the health crisis and its impacts on health sectors and the most vulnerable populations in various types of cities, conflicts between federal, state, regional and municipal powers, in addition to the performance of different types of leadership. In addition to this introduction, the dossier has 5 articles: Di Virgilio and Perelman, on Buenos Aires; Torres, Travassos, Moreira and Fernandes, on São Paulo; Arantes and Galvão, on Salvador;  Gledhill, who comments upon and compares this first set of articles, expanding the analytical scope to include other Latin American countries;  and a final article by Marques and Garzón that closes the dossier with an article on health systems in Amazonian intermediate cities, the genocide of indigenous populations and the case of Manaus in the North of Brazil. The main conclusions reached by the authors are about the existence of an enormous process of spatial segregation and what can be called "environmental racism", especially in the case of Brazil. Among the common elements in the region is that peripheral and poorer areas were the most affected, although the discussion also covers other types of changes in urban life and impacts of the pandemic on the middle classes. The pandemic exposed various forms of militant resistance and resilience from below to face the crisis. Argentina showed a better management of the health crisis, but in the cases of Brazil, Mexico and other countries of the continent, the fragility of public policies for the management of the pandemic and their health systems was evident. All this resulted in the widening of existing inequalities. Paradoxically, the processes of urbanization produced two types of results: on the one hand, they expanded the living conditions of certain sectors of the population but for the majority sector they only brought deindustrialization, precariousness and gentrification. At the same time, there were new social mobilizations in countries such as Chile and Colombia reflected growing increase in dissatisfaction in the face of the pandemic and the neoliberal urban development model. Urgent measures are suggested to address the problems: the eradication of poverty, a revision of the urban planning model, spatial redistribution and an improvement in sociability and urban mobility to achieve inclusion and social justice. The dossier closes with a new article on the health system crisis in Amazonia, with special emphasis on the tragic case of the lack of oxygen in Manaus.