Latin American Megacities Research Articles

Urban growth and loss of green spaces in the metropolitan areas of São Paulo and Mexico City: effects of land-cover changes on climate and water flow regulation

Urban green spaces provide ecosystem services that directly or indirectly benefit people, however, urban growth (especially in developing countries) generates the loss of these green areas and consequently of their ecosystem services. This paper aims to present the effects of land use and land cover changes in the last 30 years on two basic urban ecosystem services, water flow regulation and local and regional climate in two of main Latin American megacities (São Paulo and Mexico City). The study focuses on urban green spaces because they reduce the urban heat island effects, improve air quality, create habitats for biodiversity conservation, provide cultural services, and contribute to flooding prevention and groundwater conservation. A spatial analysis with the aid of geographic information systems was performed to assess (i) the urbanization process of the Metropolitan Areas of both cities over time; (ii) how this process generated changes in the land cover in both metropolises, and (iii) how these changes caused environmental negative impacts on ecosystem services. The loss of green areas as a consequence of urban expansion in the Metropolitan Areas of São Paulo and Mexico City changed the spatial distribution of urban heat island and increased the surface runoff, generating floods during the rainy periods. Our results suggest the urgent need for implementation of ecosystem-based spatial planning and ecological restoration of urban green areas in both studied cities to prevent further losses in ecosystem services and to improve the quality of life of urban inhabitants.

Multidisciplinary contributions towards an evolutive interpretation of bipolar disorders: Could it be the pathological drift of a potentially adaptive condition?

This paper tries to summarize the results of studies from different disciplines supporting the idea that temperamental traits, such as "reckless/hyper-exploratory" attitudes, commonly believed to be associated with psychopathology, surprisingly turn out as adaptive under specific stress conditions. In particular, this paper analyzes an ethologic line of research on primates suggesting models for a sociobiological interpretation of mood disorders in humans; a study that found high frequencies of a genetic variance associated with bipolar disorder in people without bipolar disorder but with hyperactivity/novelty-seeking traits; the outcomes of socio-anthropologicalhistorical surveys on the evolution of mood disorders in Western countries in the last centuries; surveys on changing societies in Africa and African migrants in Sardinia; and studies that found higher frequencies of mania and subthreshold mania among Sardinian immigrants in Latin American megacities. Although it is not unequivocally accepted that an increase in the prevalence of mood disorders has occurred, it would be logical to suppose that a nonadaptive condition should have disappeared over time; mood disorders, on the contrary, persist and their prevalence might have even increased. This new interpretation could lead to counter-discrimination and stigma towards people suffering from the disorder, and it would be a central point in psychosocial treatments in addition to drugs. The aim is to hypothesize that bipolar disorder, strongly characterized by these traits, may be the result of the interaction between genetic characteristics, not necessarily pathological, and specific environmental conditions, rather than a mere product of an aberrant genetic profile. If mood disorders were mere nonadaptive conditions, they would have disappeared over time, however, their prevalence, paradoxically, persists if not even increases over time. The hypothesis that bipolar disorder may result from the interaction between genetic characteristics, not necessarily pathological, and specific environmental factors, seem more credible than considering bipolar disorder as a mere product of an aberrant genetic profile.

Forest fires and impacts of COVID-19 lockdowns on air quality in four Latin American megacities

Latin America, as other regions in the world, imposed mobility restrictions to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic. Although recent research has analyzed the effect of mobility restrictions on air quality in several regions, a scarce literature explores the causal effects of the lockdowns in Latin America at a city scale whose results may guide local policymaking. This article, based on a quasi-experimental approach, estimates the causal short-term impacts of lockdowns on air quality considering the influence of forest fires on pollution in four megacities in Latin America (Bogotá, Mexico City, Santiago, and Sao Paulo). Results show that nitrogen oxides and carbon monoxide consistently declined (from 16% to 68%), nevertheless, fine particles rarely decreased across cities. Only Bogotá exhibited an overall reduction in fine particles (45% for PM2.5). Mexico City obtained the lowest reduction in pollutants, whereas Bogotá outperformed other cities in several pollutants. Evidence from mobility statistics supports the decrease in air pollution by a reduction in driving, transit use, and other mobility indicators.

On the Use of Hedonic Price Indices to Understand Ecosystem Service Provision from Urban Green Space in Five Latin American Megacities

Latin American (LA) megacities are facing enormous challenges to provide welfare to millions of people who live in them. High rates of urbanization and limited administrative capacity of LA cities to plan and control urban growth have led to a critical deficit of urban green space, and therefore, to sub-optimal outcomes in terms of urban sustainability. This study seeks to assess the possibility of using real estate prices to provide an estimate of the monetary value of the ecosystem services provided by urban green space across five Latin American megacities: Bogota, Buenos Aires, Lima, Mexico City and Santiago de Chile. Using Google Earth images to quantify urban green space and multiple regression analysis, we evaluated the impact of urban green space, crime rates, business density and population density on real estate prices across the five mentioned megacities. In addition, for a subset of the data (Lima and Buenos Aires) we analyzed the effects of landscape ecology variables (green space patch size, connectivity, etc.) on real estate prices to provide a first insight into how the ecological attributes of urban green space can determine the level of ecosystem service provision in different urban contexts in Latin America. The results show a strong positive relationship between the presence of urban green space and real estate prices. Green space explains 52% of the variability in real estate prices across the five studied megacities. Population density, business density and crime had only minor impacts on real estate prices. Our analysis of the landscape ecology variables in Lima and Buenos Aires also show that the relationship between green space and price is context-specific, which indicates that further research is needed to better understand when and where ecological attributes of green space affect real estate prices so that managers of urban green space in LA cities can optimize ecological configuration to maximize ecosystem service provision from often limited green spaces.

Chemical composition and source apportionment of PM10 at an urban background site in a high–altitude Latin American megacity (Bogota, Colombia)

Bogota registers frequent episodes of poor air quality from high PM10 concentrations. It is one of the main Latin American megacities, located at 2600m in the tropical Andes, but there is insufficient data on PM10 source contribution. A characterization of the chemical composition and the source apportionment of PM10 at an urban background site in Bogota was carried out in this study. Daily samples were collected from June 2015 to May 2016 (a total of 311 samples). Organic carbon (OC), elemental carbon (EC), water soluble compounds (SO42-, Cl-, NO3-, NH4+), major elements (Al, Fe, Mg, Ca, Na, K, P) and trace metals (V, Cd, Pb, Sr, Ba, among others) were analyzed. The results were interpreted in terms of their variability during the rainy season (RS) and the dry season (DS). The data obtained revealed that the carbonaceous fraction (∼51%) and mineral dust (23%) were the main PM10 components, followed by others (15%), Secondary Inorganic Compounds (SIC) (11%) and sea salt (0.4%). The average concentrations of soil, SIC and OC were higher during RS than DS. However, peak values were observed during the DS due to photochemical activity and forest fires. Although trace metals represented <1% of PM10, high concentrations of toxic elements such as Pb and Sb on RS, and Cu on DS, were obtained. By using a PMF model, six factors were identified (∼96% PM10) including fugitive dust, road dust, metal processing, secondary PM, vehicles exhaust and industrial emissions. Traffic (exhaust emissions+road dust) was the major PM10 source, accounting for ∼50% of the PM10. The results provided novel data about PM10 chemical composition, its sources and its seasonal variability during the year, which can help the local government to define control strategies for the main emission sources during the most critical periods.

The city museum of São Paulo: a new design for city museums in the era of the megacity

The City Museum of São Paulo as subject of study and museological challenge tries explicitly to present a multidisciplinary methodology - already tested in 2003 and 2004 - that enunciates the conception of a new model of city museum, whose objective is the analysis of the great metropolis São Paulo, articulated upon the collection of contemporary items to be pursued by methods of social mobilization, maintaining a dialogue with the proper logic of a globalised world, but canonically erected over the founding precepts of sociomuseology. Focusing on territory museums, that model tries to stimulate an alternative new path that observes and interacts with the reality that is inherent to contemporaneity, to Latin American megacities, as it endeavors to understand the dynamics, as well as the problems that characterise human life in those vast and complex territories.

Sá, Lúcia. Life in the Megalopolis: Mexico City and São Paulo. London and New York: Routledge, 2007.

At the start of her latest book, Lúcia Sá explains the intellectual trajectory that led her to a study of the Latin American megacities of Mexico City and São Paulo by way of Mário de Andrade’s Macunaíma: “in order to recover his muiraquitã, the eponymous Mário de Andrade traveled from one end of Brazil to the other, the Amazon to São Paulo, and in a sense, having completed Rain Forest Literatures (2004), this is what I have attempted to do in this study” (x). Such a work, following one on the literatures of the Amazon, underscores Sá’s admirable commitment to exploring the literary and cultural extremes of her native Brazil, while at the same time incorporating other materials that make a more comparative discussion with internal indigenous cultural elements or other Latin American societies possible.

A Study on Urban Transportation Evolution in Latin American Mega-Cities

A Study on Urban Transportation Evolution in Latin American Mega-Cities

A Walk in the Invisible City

This essay discusses the performative interventions of the contemporary Belgian artist Francis Alys in Mexico City and how they create a critical focus on urban reality in the Latin American mega-cities, and outline ways of intervention and interaction in the modern disassociation of the city’s economical, social, and cultural levels, taking up the challenge to suggest their unity through imagination and art.

Globalization, regional development, and mega-city expansion in Latin America: Analyzing Mexico City’s peri-urban hinterland

This paper examines the transformation of urban space in the peri-urban areas of Latin American mega-cities, further exacerbating the multi-jurisdictional political divisions that cover a single urban entity. This is against the backcloth of a sharp decline in metropolitan growth rates, absolute population loss in the city center, and an alleged “polarization reversal” of national urban patterns. It argues that previous approaches have failed to recognize that globally and nationally-derived economic development processes are often vested in these meta-urban peripheries. Using Mexico City as an example, the authors propose a new generic methodology that will allow for a broader definition and analysis of mega-city and large metropolitan development. Data are presented within this new framework that help to unpack the demographic, economic and land-use changes that are taking place in Mexico City’s broader urban area. Much of the contemporary vibrancy and dynamics of Mexico City’s metropolitan development are occurring in “hot-spots” in the extended periphery, which, to date, have rarely been considered an integral part of the mega-city. Yet these areas are also some of the principal loci of contemporary globalization processes.

Gated Communities in Latin American Megacities: Case Studies in Brazil and Argentina

Within recent years, the expansion of gated communities has become an increasingly important element in the changing Latin American megacities and their suburban areas. In this paper, the internal ...

Gated communities in Latin American megacities: case studies in Brazil and Argentina

Gated communities in Latin American megacities: case studies in Brazil and Argentina

Contemporary issues in the government and administration of Latin American megacities

This paper is the first to systematically analyze and compare the structures of city governance and administration for seven major cities in Latin America, four of which are megacities (population of over 10 million), and three others are large national capitals. U.S. and U. K. models of city administration are reviewed as baseline models against which differences in Latin American may be explored. Structures of Government in Latin America show several important features and trends: 1) the lack of metropolitan (cross jurisdictional) authority; 2) the existence of strong mayors and weak councils"; 3) high levels of partisanship; 4) overlapping rather than interlocking bureaucracies; 5) pressures towards the privatization of city services, but continuing tension over the desirability of public versus private control; 6) greater fiscal responsibility and autonomy; and 7), a continuing marginalization of public participation in megacity governance.In spite of these features, many cities throughout the region (regardless of whether they are megacity size or national capitals), are actively intensifying their efforts to develop more effective, accountable and democratic governance structures.

The Violence of Public Art: "Do the Right Thing"

Previous articleNext article No AccessPublic ArtThe Violence of Public Art: "Do the Right Thing"W. J. T. MitchellW. J. T. Mitchell Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Critical Inquiry Volume 16, Number 4Summer, 1990 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/448565 Views: 189Total views on this site Citations: 26Citations are reported from Crossref Copyright 1990 The University of ChicagoPDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:Ana Mendes, Lisa Lau Wither the plurality of decolonising the curriculum? Safe spaces and identitarian politics in the arts and humanities classroom, Arts and Humanities in Higher Education 21, no.33 (May 2022): 223–239.https://doi.org/10.1177/14740222221100711Ana Cristina Mendes From “Crisis” to Imagination: Putting White Heroes Under Erasure Post-George Floyd, Cultural Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies 21, no.55 (Jun 2021): 394–400.https://doi.org/10.1177/15327086211028677Krzysztof Krzysztof When Modern Monuments are an Act of Autoplagiarism., The Journal of Public Space , no.Vol. 5 n. 4Vol. 5 n. 4 (Dec 2020): 155–176.https://doi.org/10.32891/jps.v5i4.1395Haiyan Lee Latour, Tiananmen, and Glass Slippers; or, What We Talk about When We Talk about Chinese Studies, Prism 17, no.22 (Oct 2020): 457–474.https://doi.org/10.1215/25783491-8690444Rike Sitas Creative Cities, Graffiti and Culture‐Led Development in South Africa: Dlala Indima (‘Play Your Part’), International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 27 (Aug 2020).https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-2427.12894Magda Szcześniak, Łukasz Zaremba Paranoid looking: on de-communization, Journal of Visual Culture 18, no.22 (Aug 2019): 209–233.https://doi.org/10.1177/1470412919861398Caitlin Frances Bruce Public art, affect, and radical negativity: the wall of daydreaming and man’s inhumanity to man, Subjectivity 10, no.22 (Mar 2017): 223–241.https://doi.org/10.1057/s41286-017-0023-0Ella Maria Diaz The Postmodern Mo(nu)ment: An Analysis of Citizenship, Representation, and Monuments in Three Acts, (Jan 2014): 191–210.https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137431080_9Arne De Boever Losing Face: Francis Bacon's 25th Hour, Film-Philosophy 16, no.11 (Dec 2012): 85–100.https://doi.org/10.3366/film.2012.0006Oona Myllyntaus Visual Arts Education Reasoning the Acquisition and Placement of Public Sculptures – Case of the Public Sculptures of the Jyväskylä City Art Collection in 1977-2007, Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 45 (Jan 2012): 605–614.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2012.06.598Sarah Kanouse Transmissions between Memory and Amnesia: The Radio Memorial in a New Media Age, Leonardo 44, no.33 (Jun 2011): 200–206.https://doi.org/10.1162/LEON_a_00163 Introduction, (Jan 2009): 1–34.https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822390732-001 What is a City?, (Jan 2009): 37–60.https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822390732-002 Buenos Aires is (Latin) America, Too, (Jan 2009): 61–84.https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822390732-003 The Spirit of Brasília, (Jan 2009): 85–111.https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822390732-004 City, Art, Politics, (Jan 2009): 115–126.https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822390732-005 The Writing on the Wall, (Jan 2009): 127–144.https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822390732-006 Miami Remake, (Jan 2009): 145–164.https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822390732-007 The Jew in the City, (Jan 2009): 165–182.https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822390732-008 On Maps and Malls, (Jan 2009): 185–209.https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822390732-009 Culture-Based Urban Development in Rio de Janeiro, (Jan 2009): 211–231.https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822390732-010 Latin American Megacities, (Jan 2009): 233–250.https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822390732-011 Bibliography, (Jan 2009): 251–265.https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822390732-012Michael Simpson Hyped text: The rhetoric of virtual space in critical prose, Prose Studies 20, no.33 (Dec 1997): 79–105.https://doi.org/10.1080/01440359708586624Robert C. Rowland, Robert Strain Social function, polysemy and narrative‐dramatic form: A case study of do the right thing, Communication Quarterly 42, no.33 (Jun 1994): 213–228.https://doi.org/10.1080/01463379409369930ELIZABETH DELMONT The Voortrekker Monument: Monolith to Myth, South African Historical Journal 29, no.11 (Nov 1993): 76–101.https://doi.org/10.1080/02582479308671763

Innovative technologies for Latin American megacities: State and community involvement

This paper explores the relationships between innovative technologies and habitat in Latin American megacities. A survey of the present situation shows a virtually total divorce between the technology used in urban infrastructures and services, and the needs of the inhabitants. Proposals are made in order to generate an explicit urban technological policy with a view to optimizing the use of innovative technologies, and producing a more lively interaction between the state and different community sectors.