On "environmental sustainability" and housing rights

Yesterday, I was walking home from the gym with my fiance. We got to talking about my research here, which is always a contentious topic for the two of us. Like many middle to upper class Brazilians, my fiance has a deeply ingrained bias against the comunidades and their residents. As you are well aware by now, I have little tolerance for this sort of anti-urban poor mentality. On this particular occasion, we began to butt heads over the environmental argument in favor of evictions. "Favelados* desmatam!" my fiance scoffed. "Favela-residents deforest!" In a dramatic flourish, he then flung his gum wrapper into the canal that parallels our street.

The hypocrisy of his statements and actions speak for themselves. Sure, comunidade residents deforest and pollute. But, don't we all, in a way? Just because a construction company - and not I - felled the trees to build my home in New Orleans, does that abscond me of blame for having deforested the land? Or do I get off scott-free because I'm not residing on it "illegally"? How can a "legal" resident like my fiance accuse an "illegal" resident of polluting, and then proceed to toss his trash in a river? These are the sorts of questions that our short-lived discussion prompted me to explore. Let's take a look:

Up until the 1970s, the policies and programs of major multilateral lending agencies failed to incorporate human impact on the environment in their agendas. "Development" and "environmental preservation" were considered incompatible goals, and rapid industrialization was viewed as the primary means of bolstering economic growth. In Brazil in particular, import-substitution industrialization (ISI) encouraged the city-centric model of growth, and migrants from the rural Northeast began their mass exodus to the Southern metropolises of Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. The height of the ISI model in the mid-1960s also marked the peak of the immigration wave. Comunidade growth rates outpaced those of overall urban growth rates by as much as 7%, and by the end of the decade Rio de Janeiro had over 300 informal settlements. Because zoning regulations had prohibited construction at elevations above 100m, Rio's hillsides were largely undeveloped and became the logical settlements for rural migrants. Initially, the state government paid little mind to the environmental impacts of both industrialization and precarious urbanization. The result was an increasingly polluted city for which comunidade residents would increasingly bear the blame. Comunidades were seen as hotbeds of hygienic and environmental disaster, whose residents were responsible for creating the "subhuman" conditions in which they were condemned to live. Few subscribers of the view that comunidades were ulcers marring an otherwise pristine cityscape were cognizant of the fact that the proliferation of informality was an innovative response to a metropolis incapable of and unwilling to absorb the influx of migrants.

The interconnectedness of the environment, politics, urban planning was not articulated in earnest until the late 1970s, with the rise of the Green Revolution. The product of increased awareness of the inverse relationship between population growth and the abundance of natural resources (see: 1973 oil crisis), the Green Revolution has made significant, irreversible contributions to the field of international development. Today, one would be hard-pressed to find a post-1980 World Bank project, government grant proposal, or UN Charter that does not include the phrase "environmental sustainability." Ostensibly, the establishment of international and domestic standards for environmental preservation is a positive development, as it has become increasingly clear that human strain on the planet jeopardizes the future of the human race.

The Green Revolution has suggested that development and environmental sustainability are not mutually exclusive, and that countries should therefore embrace "green" development over "brown" development. But what does "environmental sustainability" actually imply? What are the benefits and consequences of "environmentally sustainable" development? Is there any segment of the population that may not benefit from environmental regulations?

In the case of Rio, the answer to this last question is, unfortunately, yes. This is not to suggest that environment-friendly policymaking has an inherent, unavoidable bias against a certain group of individuals. However, the trendiness of "environmental sustainability" in Brazil coupled with its predominantly middle and upper-class proponents makes it an excellent rationale for forced evictions. Using the guise of "environmental risk," as outlined in the Lei Organica do Municipio, the municipal government can thereby harness support of Cariocas like my fiance, who believe that "favelados" degrade, pollute, and destroy.

The problem is, this argument is both hypocritical and discriminatory. Let's once again consider the case of Vila Autodromo, a community slated for removal because of its "environmental risk." What is the difference between the comunidade resident who constructs his humble, self-built home on Lake Jacarepagua, and the resident of a 20-story "legal" condominium some 500 meters away? Both constructions are located within the same radius  from the water's edge, both required some degree of deforestation, and both produce some degree of water-borne pollution. Yet, invariably, the "illegal" resident gets stuck with the blame, despite the fact that in most cases, his house predates the "legally" constructed condominium.

May 29th, 2011 storm that damaged the coastal boundaries
of  wealthy Zona Sul neighborhoods.
Photo credit: itapoapordentro.blogspot.com

Furthermore, the "environmental risk" clause is vague in nature. Who poses the risk to whom? Do the comunidade residents pose a risk to themselves, or to the "legal" residents of the surrounding "formal" neighborhoods? The municipal government's decision to raze Autodromo appears to have been predicated on latter; Autodromo's inhabitants have been accused of polluting the lake and deforesting the surrounding area, thereby sullying the region for the "legal" residents. The environmental hazards Autodromo residents confer upon themselves are negligible; the area has not experienced any significant flooding in residents' memory, natural soil filtration is used to purify sewage, and community's flat terrain presents zero risk for a landslide. If the municipal government is truly concerned about "environmental risk," perhaps they should consider relocating the wealthy neighborhoods of Ipanema, Arpoador -which are projected to be the areas most adversely affected by rising sea levels. 

The use of the environment to further criminalize informality seems even more dubious when one considers the average carbon footprint of a comunidade resident. They use public transportation, bicycles, and foot to commute. Cooling is usually provided by fans, not central air. Light, electricity, and water use is kept to a minimum. Yet, it's perfectly acceptable for the upper class Carioca who chastizes "aqueles favelados" for putting strain on the environment to hop in his car (despite living in an area well-serviced by mass transit), blast the AC, and drive home to his condominium where he will be greeted by a water-guzzling fountain illuminated by 24-hour exterior lighting. This sort of "fair-weather environmentalism" is hypocritical and self-serving; as Edesio mentioned this week in class, "I wonder what percent of Cariocas who clamored for the construction of "eco-limit" walls around Dona Marta have ever set foot in the Tijuca Rainforest preserve."

Lastly, it is abhorrent that the municipal government is insinuating that "environmental sustainability" should be prioritized over housing, livelihoods, and the preservation of social networks for comunidade residents. The hierarchy of needs of Eduardo Paes does not mirror the hierarchy of needs of someone living in Vila Autodromo, and the right to four walls and a roof trumps the prefeitura's right to reconstruct Rio de Janeiro as a playground for the wealthy and the powerful.

I pollute. I have contributed to deforestation. And I have definitely peed in a lake. But, because I am not living informally, I have not been criminalized for my actions. Until the municipal government and its clientelistic elite cronies agree to share the blame for environmental degradation, and until they cease to use the it as an excuse to forcibly evict, I will refuse to subscribe to their definition of "environmental sustainability."

*This is a pejorative term for a comunidade resident