{"id":1786,"date":"2026-05-05T11:00:19","date_gmt":"2026-05-05T14:00:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/humanas.blog.scielo.org\/en\/?p=1786"},"modified":"2026-05-05T11:04:39","modified_gmt":"2026-05-05T14:04:39","slug":"reflecting-on-urbanism-in-latin-america-between-empirical-and-epistemological-contributions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/humanas.blog.scielo.org\/en\/2026\/05\/05\/reflecting-on-urbanism-in-latin-america-between-empirical-and-epistemological-contributions\/","title":{"rendered":"Reflecting on Urbanism in Latin America Between Empirical and Epistemological Contributions"},"content":{"rendered":"

Alessandro Lunelli, Ph.D. candidate in the Graduate Program in Urban Management (PPGTU\/PUCPR) and member of the editorial board of journal urbe, Curitiba, Paran\u00e1, Brazil.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Ana Caroline dos Santos Ferreira, Ph.D. candidate in the Graduate Program in Urban Management (PPGTU\/PUCPR) and member of the editorial staff of journal urbe, Curitiba, Paran\u00e1, Brazil.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Geisa Bugs, Associate Editor of journal urbe, Curitiba, Paran\u00e1, Brazil.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Logo<\/a>For much of the 20th<\/sup> century, urban studies in Social Sciences and Applied Social Sciences were structured around perspectives derived from metropolitan experiences in the Global North. Processes such as industrialization, modernization, and controlled urban expansion became the primary explanatory framework for urban studies. This framework produced, as a side effect, the dissemination of analytical and normative models that often fail to incorporate the historical, social, and political specificities of cities in the Global South\u2014an issue that remains at the center of contemporary debate and guides the editorial stance of journal urbe<\/strong>, as exemplified by the articles published in volumes 16 (2024) and 17 (2025). In the Latin American context, this means addressing urban formations deeply marked by persistent inequalities, informality, colonial legacies, and particular patterns of spatial production, which demand analytical frameworks sensitive to these realities.<\/p>\n

The point, however, is not merely about the origins of these theories, but also about the way in which the city itself has come to be conceived. Often viewed as a setting, infrastructure, or administrative unit, it may appear as a neutral given, when in fact it constitutes an empirical manifestation of social contradictions and structural heterogeneity. The Latin American city is not merely the place where broad processes manifest themselves: it is, in itself, the material condensation of power relations, forms of regulation, everyday practices, racial hierarchies, and disputes surrounding the production and appropriation of space.<\/p>\n

In recent decades, a growing body of authors has, precisely, critically revisited this tradition. Inspired by decolonial debates and situated readings of urbanization, these approaches propose shifting the focus from Northern cities to the urban experiences of the South, recognizing that processes such as segregation, informality, the financialization of housing, or disputes over public space take on distinct forms in peripheral contexts. The challenge now is to produce interpretations capable of engaging with these realities, considering the institutional arrangements, social practices and historical trajectories that shape Latin American cities.<\/p>\n

This trend also has repercussions within the field of urban management itself. It is recognized that the debate has been structured around different interpretive frameworks, ranging from technical-administrative approaches\u2014focused on tools and governance\u2014to critical perspectives that emphasize urban conflicts, socio-spatial inequalities, and political disputes in the shaping of the city. In this context, beyond a unified theoretical body, what we observe is epistemological plurality, in which different analytical traditions compete over ways of naming, interpreting, and explaining contemporary urban problems.<\/p>\n

If the epistemological debate delineates the contours of the field of urban studies, what a journal actually publishes allows us to observe how this debate unfolds within the realm of academic and scientific knowledge production. The recent output of urbe<\/strong>, Revista Brasileira de Gest\u00e3o Urbana<\/em>, thus offers an interesting lens through which to understand this movement. More recently, a systematic reading of the articles published in 2024 and 2025 (volumes 16 and 17, respectively) allows us to identify the thematic variety that characterizes urban studies in Latin America, as well as regional diversity, the presence of Latin American authors, and the analytical perspectives and methodological strategies employed by the authors in urbe<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

As for the authors\u2019 origins, the collection of articles published by the journal in 2024 and 2025 suggests a Brazilian base engaged in dialogue with Latin America. Of the 65 articles from that two-year period, compiled in two issues, 89.2% are set in the Latin American context, and 72.3% are authored exclusively by Brazilians. Among the 27.7% of articles with at least one foreign affiliation, 61.1% are linked to Latin America. This, however, should not be interpreted as a sign of insularity. Rather, it represents an internationalization effort editorially guided by urbe<\/strong>, which prioritizes regional dialogue as a strategy to enhance and broaden the Latin American circulation of urban discourse.<\/p>\n

This trend is also evident in the journal\u2019s thematic calls for papers. The special issue on Urban Inequalities and Segregation (vol. 17, 2025) brought together eleven accepted articles from among the more than one hundred submitted specifically for this call, all linked to Latin America, with one-third of them having affiliations exclusively outside Brazil. In turn, the call currently in production, dedicated to Accessibility and Intersectionality in Latin America, received 85 manuscripts, with over 35% authored by foreign contributors, 93% of whom are from other Latin American countries. Thus, regional dialogue also emerges as a defining feature of the agendas addressed by the journal.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Photograph<\/a>

Image: Patrick Tomasso via Unsplash <\/a><\/em><\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

Regarding open science with IDEIA, the gender dimension is evident in the collection recently published by the journal. In the analyzed corpus, 47.4% of the articles have women as first authors. This figure is consistent with the composition of the journal\u2019s editorial board itself, which maintains gender parity among its members. The dialogue with the continent\u2019s audience is also reflected in the journal\u2019s multilingual editorial policy, which publishes articles in Portuguese, Spanish, and English\u201451, 14, and 11 texts, respectively, during the two-year period analyzed. This represents, therefore, an openness aimed at greater circulation of knowledge, diversity of voices, and expansion of the participants in the Latin American urban debate.<\/p>\n

In terms of themes, the published articles highlight the centrality of issues such as socio-spatial segregation, urban mobility, metropolitan governance, waste management, urban infrastructure, and the financialization of space. At the same time, more inclusive agendas are gaining ground, such as gender inequalities in mobility, environmental and land-based racism, Afro-Brazilian religious territorialities, and alternative forms of appropriation of public space. This body of work indicates a field strongly anchored in the empirical problems of Latin American cities, but also in dialogue with contemporary debates on urban justice, sustainability, and the right to the city.<\/p>\n

An examination of the methods employed in the articles helps deepen our understanding of how urbe<\/strong> has maintained its editorial stance in Latin America. It is noteworthy that a significant number of articles utilize quantitative analyses based on secondary databases, often involving statistical or spatial processing. Nevertheless, the case study (single or multiple) is the dominant methodological strategy, featuring specific territorial focuses and in-depth analyses of urban phenomena in cities such as S\u00e3o Paulo, Fortaleza, Bogot\u00e1, Recife, and Curitiba. There is also a strong presence of interpretive qualitative approaches, especially in critical urban studies, encompassing ethnographies, participant observation, and interviews and focus groups, for example.<\/p>\n

This overview allows us to draw some interesting conclusions. First, it confirms the thematic diversity and epistemological plurality that characterize urban studies on the continent, while still making it possible to identify some important theoretical and conceptual convergences, particularly around the debate on the production of urban space and socio-spatial inequalities, with contributions from critical social theory.<\/p>\n

A second area focuses on approaches to urban governance and public policy, drawing on frameworks such as policy diffusion theory, institutional collective action theory, and institutional capacity. Within this group, studies tend to analyze the implementation of urban public policies, regulatory instruments, and institutional arrangements related to issues such as sanitation, waste management, urban mobility, territorial planning, and the regionalization of services. This strand is closer to the analysis of public policy and urban management, often linked to debates on sustainability, institutional efficiency, and state capacity.<\/p>\n

A third set of works adopts sociocultural and interpretive approaches to the urban, emphasizing the symbolic, cultural, and everyday dimensions of the city. This group includes discussions on social movements, networked activism, street art, the symbolic dimensions of the landscape, migrants, queer theory, everyday practices, and micro-resistances. These studies engage with perspectives from urban sociology, cultural geography, and critical urban studies and tend to draw more frequently on Brazilian and Latin American authors. Similarly, studies with anti-hegemonic stances that discuss feminism, racism, the perspective of the coloniality of power, and the various logics surrounding capital do the same.<\/p>\n

Besides these, there is a body of work focused on environmental and urban infrastructure issues, which addresses concepts such as nature-based solutions, urban drainage, the circular economy, ecological degradation, and waste management. These studies point to a growing incorporation of socio-environmental debates into the field of urban studies, often linked to public management and urban sustainability.<\/p>\n

The reflections presented, based on recent publications in urbe<\/strong>, reinforce the notion that urban studies in Latin America are characterized by a wide thematic variety and epistemological breadth, constituting a significant feature insofar as different theoretical traditions engage in dialogue to understand the multiple dynamics that shape the region\u2019s cities. By valuing the plurality of epistemological perspectives and empirical experiences, space is opened to consolidate research agendas that not only analyze Latin American cities but also produce knowledge from them. After all, contrary to the dichotomous perspective that surrounds modern thought, we are multiple!<\/p>\n

To read the complete volumes, access<\/h3>\n

URBE, Desigualdades Urbanas e Segrega\u00e7\u00e3o (vol. 17, 2025)<\/a><\/p>\n

URBE, Desigualdades Urbanas e Segrega\u00e7\u00e3o (vol. 16, 2024)<\/a><\/p>\n

External links<\/h3>\n

urbe. Revista Brasileira de Gest\u00e3o Urbana \u2013 SciELO<\/a><\/p>\n

urbe. Revista Brasileira de Gest\u00e3o Urbana \u2013 Social media:\u00a0Facebook<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0X<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0Instagram<\/a><\/p>\n

Pontif\u00edcia Universidade Cat\u00f3lica do Paran\u00e1 (PUCPR) \u2013 Social media:\u00a0Facebook<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0X<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0Instagram<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Latin American urban studies challenge models from the Global North, calling for approaches that are sensitive to their specific characteristics. The journal urbe\u2019s output highlights epistemological plurality, thematic diversity and a focus on the region, reflecting a field grounded in critical and contextually situated research agendas. …<\/span> Read More →<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":810,"featured_media":1787,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[7,8,175,180],"tags":[179,177],"class_list":["post-1786","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-press-release","category-special-weeks","category-urbe","category-urbe-week-special-weeks","tag-urban-and-regional-planning","tag-urbe-revista-brasileira-de-gestao-urbana"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/humanas.blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1786","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/humanas.blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/humanas.blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/humanas.blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/810"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/humanas.blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1786"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/humanas.blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1786\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1788,"href":"https:\/\/humanas.blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1786\/revisions\/1788"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/humanas.blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1787"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/humanas.blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1786"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/humanas.blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1786"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/humanas.blog.scielo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1786"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}