L’Università come attivatore di capacitazione e mediatore nel conflitto sulla riqualificazione dell’informalità urbana. Il caso dellla Comunità del Porto do Capim a João Pessoa – Brasile

This paper aims to illustrate how the entrance of the university in a situation of urban informality can be a vector of community capacitation, starting from cultural growth and, through support that does not seek to impose established models, but instead helps to further develop common urban practices of the community, and thus activates processes of deep democracy that allow residents to deal with institutions, leading to the development of new urban requalification models which consider community issues and are based existing practices. The most significant urban development of the 21st Century is currently taking place in the Third World. Paradoxically, however, theories regarding the functioning of urban areas remain rooted in First World models (Roy, 2005; Lara, 2013) even while it is no longer possible to analyze the problems of the Global South from the point of view of the North. It is necessary to recalibrate urban theories, to develop new theories and discuss them from the Southern perspective, to replace old practices of importing Northern planning solutions, which still recall colonialism, with a new theoretical geography from the South (Roy, 2013). In this context, the experience of the Comissão Porto do Capim em Ação is collocated, defending the territorial identity of the community, from policies of eviction and the revitalization of the area they occupy, as dictated by the municipal administration of João Pessoa (Brazil), through a struggle comprised of cultural acts which constitute a form of re-appropriation of the city and the birth of new spaces of citizenship (Miraftab, 2009) as alternatives to institutional ones. The Comissão increased awareness of their rights, becoming insurgent (Holston, 2008), also thanks to the multifaceted presence of the university in the community. The university began to gradually work with the community, through field work, extensive research and experimentation, becoming an activator of a process of capacitation of the most receptive part of the community that mobilized, first, in order to support its cultural development, and then to defend the interests of the community itself, becoming the representative figure for the inhabitants (Comissão) in their relations with public institutions. The university, at the same time, by carrying out research partnerships with municipalities, configured itself as junction between the two parties and acted as a mediator in the conflict that arose from the transformation of the territory.

Questo paper vuole illustrare come l’ingresso dell’università in una situazione di informalità urbana possa essere un vettore di capacitazione della comunità che parte da un accrescimento culturale e che, attraverso un sostegno che non mira ad imporre modelli prestabiliti ma aiuta a sviluppare pratiche e capacità già presenti che permettano agli abitanti di confrontarsi con le istituzioni, possa portare a sviluppare nuovi modelli di intervento di riqualificazione. In questo quadro s’inserisce l’esperienza della Comissão Porto do Capim em Ação che difende l’identità territoriale della propria comunità con una lotta fatta di atti culturali, forma di riappropriazione della città e di invenzione di spazi di cittadinanza (Miraftab, 2009). L’università, attuando allo stesso tempo partnership di ricerca con la municipalità, si configura così come anello di giunzione fra le due parti e mediatore nel conflitto creato dalla trasformazione del territorio.