Eduardo Marandola

Natural hazards: o estudo geográfico dos riscos e perigos

The study of natural hazards, developed by geographers since the 1930s, continues to evolve in parallel with discussions of reflexive modernization and the Risk Society. There has not been, neither by geographers nor by sociologists, a systematic effort at dialog between these approaches. In this article, we intend to recuperate the ways geographers have employed the terms risk and danger, seeking to communicate with other theories of risk and the study of its implications for populations.

Em direção a uma demografia ambiental? Avaliação e tendências dos estudos de população e ambiente no Brasil

The social sciences were latecomers in the acceptance and incorporation of the environment into their respective research programs. Among them, Demography was perhaps the last to make this change, gradually incorporating population-environment questions. The debate has converged toward the growing incorporation of the spatial dimension, long present but not a defining issue of demographic studies, but which is central in the environmental discussion. The development of the field, though rapid and promising, has encountered difficulties inherent to interdisciplinary fields, occupying a place on the periphery of one science, at the interface with others. In Brazil, where these studies have also evolved over the last two decades, the work of the Working Group on Population and Environment of the Brazilian Association of Population Studies has been a key factor in disseminating this concern. In view of this, we seek to reflect on the production of this group to identify elements concerning the methods, themes and problematics treated over the years, in order to assess where this field is today, and what are its future perspectives and challenges.The social sciences were latecomers in the acceptance and incorporation of the environment into their respective research programs. Among them, Demography was perhaps the last to make this change, gradually incorporating population-environment questions. The debate has converged toward the growing incorporation of the spatial dimension, long present but not a defining issue of demographic studies, but which is central in the environmental discussion. The development of the field, though rapid and promising, has encountered difficulties inherent to interdisciplinary fields, occupying a place on the periphery of one science, at the interface with others. In Brazil, where these studies have also evolved over the last two decades, the work of the Working Group on Population and Environment of the Brazilian Association of Population Studies has been a key factor in disseminating this concern. In view of this, we seek to reflect on the production of this group to identify elements concerning the methods, themes and problematics treated over the years, in order to assess where this field is today, and what are its future perspectives and challenges.

Crescimento urbano e áreas de risco no litoral norte de São Paulo

Urban growth and sprawl bring with them hazards and risks that are expressed by the lack of adjustment and adherence of urban space production to the natural systems. This situation gets worse when the location itself is naturally vulnerable, as in the case of the North Coast of Sao Paulo state. This region experienced one of its decades of largest urban and economic growth, in the context of significant transformations associated to oil and gas exploration, the expansion of the port of Sao Sebastiao,changes in touristic activities and the consolidation of urbanization, especially in Caraguatatuba, the center where most of the transformation began. After learning the results of the 2010 Census, it is the appropriate time to measure the intensity and how this growth occurred in the last decade, which was empirically observed, and its relations with hazards and vulnerability. If there is a relation between urbanization and risk, the tendency is that the deep and intense changes may have intensified and created new risk areas, as the urban sprawl reached naturally fragile areas. We have tried to identify the people who live or work in these areas, focusing on the new areas, starting from understanding the process of urbanization in the humid tropics and its consequences in terms of risk and vulnerability, focusing on the 2000 and 2010 census data.

O estigma de morar longe da cidade: repensando o consenso sobre as “cidades-dormitório” no Brasil

In Brazil, the term “dormitory town” is often used pejoratively to refer to municipalities that present low social and economic development levels, poor settlement and life conditions for its population and clear economic dependency of a regional center. The main goal of this paper is to problematize the term dormitory town and the contexts related to its use in an attempt to demystify its generalized use in Brazil. In a theoretical view point, a national and international bibliographical review was performed seeking to comprehend some convergence points on the term as well as the discussion concerning the stigma and territorial stigma notion. Using the Brazilian census data and some research examples, we used a methodological approach that allow us to rethink the dimension of living in a dormitory town and its reflects on spatial interactions in Brazilian urbanized areas.

Ser migrante: implicações territoriais e existenciais da migração

Migration and mobility are determining phenomena of contemporary experience. Living in today’s world means having to deal with mobility and migration, with all the implications this process involves. From an existential point of view, migration is a disconcerting experience where spatial and sociocultural references must be reconstituted in a process that shakes up the core of an individual’s personal identity, namely, his or her existential security. We start off here with the question of “What is it to be a migrant?” From there, we discuss the existential and territorial implications of migration and look at it as a phenomenon that is experienced on different spatial and temporal scales. Phenomenologically, this experience has a single constitutive essence that leads to an ontological way of thinking about the strategies and consequences of the phenomenon of migration. This, in turn, leads to a reflection on the role of territorial identity and on involvement with places and social networks when a person leaves her or his place of origin and settles down somewhere else, that becomes their place of destination.

Percepção dos perigos ambientais urbanos e os efeitos de lugar na relação população-ambiente

Since their beginning, environmental studies have faced the threat of the ecological fallacy. Particularly within the human sciences domain, there has always been special attention to any form of geographical determinism or interpretation that could link society’s understanding to nature’s rationale. Regarding Population and Environment (P-E) studies, the concern has always been present, and not rarely with debate over the ecological fallacy, its risks and ways to eradicate it from the scope of analyses. However, in past decades, with the growing interest of human sciences on space, the importance of spatiality and the continuous amalgamation of its dimension in analyses have renewed this concern, now within a new sociocultural context. The effects of space have taken a new dimension, as we recognize, against the globalization trend, the strength of regional and local factors upon the determination and mediation of environmental issues that affect populations and places in a specific, but not in an indiscriminate way for space. Based on this, the methodological discussion has to consider how space influences the P-E equation, taking into consideration previous debates and the new contemporaneous sociospatial arrangements. These issues were relevant in the investigation over the perception of the dangers and vulnerability in the Metropolitan Regions of Campinas and Baixada Santista, in the State of Sao Paulo. Using data from a 2007 household survey (Vulnerability Project), we aimed to reach beyond the variables commonly used to assess living conditions (income, education, vital cycle), and we attempted to understand the variables according to differentiated spatial scales, considering the effects of space as critical for the perception of urban threats within the population-space-environment relationship.

Sobre a impossibilidade de se voltar para casa ou a escrita como o lugar possível voltado para o futuro/On the impossibility to back home or written as possible place back to the future

RESUMO Meditacao sobre o sentido do lugar possivel, a escrita, como pensamento voltado para o futuro, o texto se constitui como experiencia, composto por intersticios literarios de uma tessitura geografico-politica sobre as geometrias do pensamento. Palavras-chave: geometrias do pensamento; literatura; lugar possivel RESUMEN La meditacion sobre el significado de la posible lugar, la escritura y el pensamiento de vuelta al futuro, el texto se constituye como la experiencia, que consiste en intersticios literarias de un tejido geografico-politica de las geometrias de pensamiento. Palabras clave: la geometria del pensamiento; literatura; lugar posible ABSTRACT Meditation on the meaning of the possible place, writing, and thinking back to the future, the text is as experience, composted by literary interstices of the geographical-political compose of the geometries of thought. Keywords: thinking geometries; literature; possible place

Crecimiento urbano y áreas de riesgo en el litoral norte de São Paulo

Urban growth and sprawl bring with them hazards and risks that are expressed by the lack of adjustment and adherence of urban space production to the natural systems. This situation gets worse when the location itself is naturally vulnerable, as in the case of the North Coast of Sao Paulo state. This region experienced one of its decades of largest urban and economic growth, in the context of significant transformations associated to oil and gas exploration, the expansion of the port of Sao Sebastiao,changes in touristic activities and the consolidation of urbanization, especially in Caraguatatuba, the center where most of the transformation began. After learning the results of the 2010 Census, it is the appropriate time to measure the intensity and how this growth occurred in the last decade, which was empirically observed, and its relations with hazards and vulnerability. If there is a relation between urbanization and risk, the tendency is that the deep and intense changes may have intensified and created new risk areas, as the urban sprawl reached naturally fragile areas. We have tried to identify the people who live or work in these areas, focusing on the new areas, starting from understanding the process of urbanization in the humid tropics and its consequences in terms of risk and vulnerability, focusing on the 2000 and 2010 census data.

Urban growth and areas of risk in of the state São Paulo North Coast

Urban growth and sprawl bring with them hazards and risks that are expressed by the lack of adjustment and adherence of urban space production to the natural systems. This situation gets worse when the location itself is naturally vulnerable, as in the case of the North Coast of Sao Paulo state. This region experienced one of its decades of largest urban and economic growth, in the context of significant transformations associated to oil and gas exploration, the expansion of the port of Sao Sebastiao,changes in touristic activities and the consolidation of urbanization, especially in Caraguatatuba, the center where most of the transformation began. After learning the results of the 2010 Census, it is the appropriate time to measure the intensity and how this growth occurred in the last decade, which was empirically observed, and its relations with hazards and vulnerability. If there is a relation between urbanization and risk, the tendency is that the deep and intense changes may have intensified and created new risk areas, as the urban sprawl reached naturally fragile areas. We have tried to identify the people who live or work in these areas, focusing on the new areas, starting from understanding the process of urbanization in the humid tropics and its consequences in terms of risk and vulnerability, focusing on the 2000 and 2010 census data.

Perception of urban environmental threats and place effects on the population-environment relationship

Since their beginning, environmental studies have faced the threat of the ecological fallacy. Particularly within the human sciences domain, there has always been special attention to any form of geographical determinism or interpretation that could link society’s understanding to nature’s rationale. Regarding Population and Environment (P-E) studies, the concern has always been present, and not rarely with debate over the ecological fallacy, its risks and ways to eradicate it from the scope of analyses. However, in past decades, with the growing interest of human sciences on space, the importance of spatiality and the continuous amalgamation of its dimension in analyses have renewed this concern, now within a new sociocultural context. The effects of space have taken a new dimension, as we recognize, against the globalization trend, the strength of regional and local factors upon the determination and mediation of environmental issues that affect populations and places in a specific, but not in an indiscriminate way for space. Based on this, the methodological discussion has to consider how space influences the P-E equation, taking into consideration previous debates and the new contemporaneous sociospatial arrangements. These issues were relevant in the investigation over the perception of the dangers and vulnerability in the Metropolitan Regions of Campinas and Baixada Santista, in the State of Sao Paulo. Using data from a 2007 household survey (Vulnerability Project), we aimed to reach beyond the variables commonly used to assess living conditions (income, education, vital cycle), and we attempted to understand the variables according to differentiated spatial scales, considering the effects of space as critical for the perception of urban threats within the population-space-environment relationship.