From the Mocambo to the Favela: Statistics and Social Policy in Brazil’s Informal Cities

Abstract

This article explores the history of censusing in the informal neighborhoods that have always been foundational to the Brazilian cityscape. Focusing on Rio de Janeiro and Recife, it argues that the censusing of favelas and mocambos was at once a technology of governance and a performance of North Atlantic modernity. The eventual emergence of the “statistical favela”, which defined urban informality as a problem of collective social dysfunction, had important implications for twentieth century urban and social policy.