{"id":14769,"date":"2014-05-05T11:44:11","date_gmt":"2014-05-05T14:44:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/?p=14769"},"modified":"2014-06-21T14:30:17","modified_gmt":"2014-06-21T17:30:17","slug":"will-children-pay-the-highest-price-for-brazils-mega-events","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/?p=14769","title":{"rendered":"Will Children Pay the Highest Price for Brazil’s Mega-Events?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The children\u2019s charity Terre des Hommes<\/a>\u00a0has hosted a workshop looking at the effects of mega sporting events, starting with the imminent World Cup, on children in Brazil. The workshop, which took place in S\u00e3o Paulo, united various groups working with children across Brazil, and experts in social effects including human rights lawyer Carlos Nicodemos and the architect and urbanist Erminia Maricato.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>A key issue was distinguishing between the effects of the World Cup directly, and the impact of longer term urban development generally on Brazil\u2019s cities. Another challenge was to identify who the main actors are in this process, and who is responsible \u2013 should the blame for negative impacts be laid solely at FIFA\u2019s door, or can others such as federal, state or municipal authorities or those in the justice system play a role in mitigating the more negative effects?<\/p>\n

The workshop marked the launch of a project by Terre des Hommes, the ultimate aim of which is to increase awareness of both negative and positive effects on children before, during and after mega sporting events, and lobby for adequate child protection measures as standard in the realization of these events.<\/p>\n

Among those contributing to the workshop were representatives from the National Association of Centres in Defence of Children and Adolescents<\/a> (ANCED), children\u2019s NGO Forma\u00e7\u00e3o from Fortaleza in the Northeastern state of Cear\u00e1, the Popular Comittee for the World Cup and Olympics<\/a>, S\u00e3o Paulo project Meninos e Meninas da Rua<\/a>, representatives from Terre des Hommes across the country and Childhood Brazil<\/a>, which works with children who have been abused or sexually exploited, as well as representatives from other groups.<\/p>\n

When it comes to the impact on children specifically, a lack of tangible statistics makes it difficult to ascertain exactly how the World Cup affects them. Yet despite the emphasis FIFA gives on its own website<\/a> to \u201cthe importance of human rights and education for children around the globe,\u201d children are among the most vulnerable when it comes to issues including forced evictions<\/a>, police violence<\/a> and the diversion of public resources away from where they are most needed.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>There were a number of effects of the mega sporting events which the workshop identified as being felt especially by children. These included a disruption to family life due to evictions in many areas, disruption to education, the idea promoted by events such as the World Cup that children should aspire to be like rich footballers, and an exclusion from the events themselves due to the cost of tickets, but also in indirect ways such as the prohibition of traditional World Cup-related parties, and the economic impact on families who are banned from selling their own products outside football grounds in favour of FIFA\u2019s sponsors.<\/p>\n

Many participants identified the criminalization of young people as a current problem, with the number of under-18s arrested and imprisoned expected to increase during the World Cup period.<\/p>\n

Lawyer Carlos Nicodemos pointed out that the situation in Rio de Janeiro at the moment is explosive, with unrest in favelas including recent clashes in Pav\u00e3o-Pav\u00e3ozinho and Cantagalo<\/a> over actions of Pacifying Police Unit (UPP)<\/a> police, and a major security problem pervading throughout the city. \u201cI have no doubt that the UPP was developed with the concept of retaking territory for investors and for the economic growth of Rio, and it was not just developed because of the mega sporting events,\u201d he said. \u201cThe mega sporting events are just part of this economic development, but there is a link between real estate investment<\/a> and the mega sporting events.\u201d He called for a demilitarization of the police in order to reduce public complaints of violence, including against children.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Attendees took varying views of the likelihood of street protests<\/a> returning significantly during the tournament itself. The implementation of the recently passed laws of exception, restricting protests, along with armed troops on the streets, could impede the capacity of the public to vent their frustrations. This impact on the right of people to come and go as they please is itself an impact of the World Cup, affecting the many young people who have chosen to protest so far.<\/p>\n

Ana Flora Werneck of Childhood Brazil echoed the thoughts of many attendees that the World Cup and the Olympics might not be the sole causes of some of Brazil\u2019s problems, but the events have certainly intensified them while highlighting them to an international audience. She pointed out that there are an increasing number of campaigns designed to target sexual exploitation of children as the World Cup approaches, but what is needed is a more co-ordinated approach between different groups.<\/p>\n

Urbanist and architect Erminia Maricato gave some historical context to the current situation in cities such as Rio de Janeiro where evictions have now become commonplace. Students working with her at the University of S\u00e3o Paulo have created a map of those favelas in S\u00e3o Paulo<\/a>\u00a0which have been removed over time or are in the process of being removed, and identified clusters that relate to the World Cup.<\/p>\n

For Erminia, mega sporting\u00a0events have been used as an excuse to deepen the policies of exclusion and pushing of poorer families out to violent peripheries of the cities. \u201cAlong with the mega sporting events comes the renovation of districts, which means an increase in the real estate value,\u201d she said. Those favelas in Rio which have been allowed to stay tend to be those which are hidden by surrounding hills or buildings, she argues, meaning their presence does not affect real estate values.<\/p>\n

While the picture might seem bleak for children, the call for co-ordination between the disparate groups working to a common cause offered a note of hope. \u201cWe can win this with a big fight, as we did against the dictatorship,\u201d Erminia said. \u201cWe created a lot of good, democratic institutions since then, and we have a lot of experience.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The children\u2019s charity Terre des Hommes\u00a0has hosted a workshop looking at the effects of mega sporting events, starting with the imminent World Cup, on children in Brazil. The workshop, which took place in S\u00e3o Paulo, […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":2759,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1736,1333,1329],"tags":[189,11,354,254,1259,5,15,17,18,10,1017,167,259],"writer":[1185],"translator":[],"illustrator":[],"photographer":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-14769","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-1736","8":"category-event-reports","9":"category-by-international-observers","10":"tag-fifa","11":"tag-forced-evictions","12":"tag-law","13":"tag-mapping","14":"tag-mega-events","15":"tag-olympics","16":"tag-pacifying-police-unit","17":"tag-police-brutality","18":"tag-protest","19":"tag-real-estate-speculation","20":"tag-childrens-rights","21":"tag-world-cup","22":"tag-youth","23":"writer-beth-mcloughlin"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14769","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14769"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14769\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2759"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14769"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14769"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14769"},{"taxonomy":"writer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fwriter&post=14769"},{"taxonomy":"translator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftranslator&post=14769"},{"taxonomy":"illustrator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fillustrator&post=14769"},{"taxonomy":"photographer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fphotographer&post=14769"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}