ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses the role played by the urban-legal paradigm in creating exclusionary patterns of urban development, and argues that a new legal order is an essential underpinning for an inclusive urban agenda based on the right to the city. Three complementary yet competing legal paradigms exist in Latin American countries – civil law, administrative law and urban law. Laissez faire approach to land development, the urban-legal order in many Latin American cities cannot be considered fully democratic. The process of informal development reflects the reality that more and more people have had to step outside the law to gain access to urban land and housing. Urban planning in some large cities has been supported by the legal principles of administrative law. Fundamental dimension of the City Statute in Brazil concerns the need for municipalities to integrate urban planning, legislation and management so as to democratise the local decision-making process.
