Processos de ocupação e produção de “margens” na Baixada Fluminense: um estudo de caso sobre os bairros da Chatuba e Nova Aurora

Abstract

The purpose of this thesis is to analyze the occupation process in two neighborhoods of Baixada Fluminense (a region of the State of Rio de Janeiro), seeking to understand how the State, by taking action or being absent, was capable of promoting the “margins” in these territories. The methodology used to achieve that was, at first, the construction of a retrospective ethnography of the region (Cunha, 2005) of this occupation process. Through an ethnographic fieldwork, based on participating observation, detailed interviews were done with some dwellers of the two neighborhoods, in an attempt to re-enact the process from the point of view of these social actors. The interviews were analyzed from a socio-anthropological perspective, in reference to the theories of Veena Das and Deborah Poole, Michel Foucault and Pierre Bordieu, and others. We will notice throughout the narratives analyzed here that the production of margins attributed to the State was not an inert process. On the contrary, when looking for a solution to the problems of everyday life, the people who occupied this area faced several situations. Two occupation processes will be dealt with here: the one at Chatuba, a neighborhood in the municipality of Mesquita, the result of the subdivision of lands previously used for citriculture, and the one at Nova Aurora, in the municipality of Belford Roxo, where the occupation was undertaken thanks to a collective effort considered the largest one ever occurred in Latin America. The analysis will focus especially on the neighborhood of Nova Aurora, with the objective to outline a historical context of the process that lead to the present life conditions of the neighborhood, marked by precarious urban infrastructure and basic services. Our argument is that such “absence” of the State is directly linked to the production of margins (Das & Poole, 2008). The presence of the neighborhood of Chatuba in this text is justified as a comparative perspective, helping understand the process of occupation and production of margins at Baixada Fluminense.