ABSTRACT

In Brazil, urban management has usually concentrated on planning the physical and territorial development of the city and the provision of a basic technical and social infrastructure in order to attain a reasonable quality of life in the growing cities and, above all, to guarantee progress and economic development. However, the rural exodus and immense population growth obstructed efforts to attend efficiently to the demands of the increasing number of urban poor. Thus, the democratization process of the last two decades had been accompanied by social and economic stagnation, uncontrolled and disordered city development, deterioration of the urban environment, aggravation of social inequalities, and an increase in criminality and violence in the big urban agglomerations of the country. An enhanced urban agenda and the growing complexity of local decision-making processes revealed difficulties of local political and administrative institutions in dealing with these new policy challenges.