{"id":17660,"date":"2015-03-30T09:00:31","date_gmt":"2015-03-30T12:00:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rioonwatch.org\/?p=17660"},"modified":"2018-04-30T00:39:29","modified_gmt":"2018-04-30T03:39:29","slug":"the-death-of-upp-social-failing-to-make-participation-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/?p=17660","title":{"rendered":"The Death of UPP Social: Failing to Make Participation Work"},"content":{"rendered":"

Clique aqui para Por<\/strong>tugu\u00eas<\/strong><\/strong><\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

On July 23rd of last year, Eduarda La Rocque, president of the IPP–Instituto Pereira Passos<\/a>, Rio’s city planning agency–was invited by the NGO Move Rio to give a talk on “The social, economic and urban integration of the city of Rio de Janeiro.” In the elegant lounge of the Amsterdam Sauer jewelry store in Ipanema, La Rocque presented the UPP Social program coordinated by herself and the IPP. <\/em><\/p>\n

At the event, La Rocque insisted on the program’s importance as a catalyst for change and integration in a city marred by deep socio-spatial inequalities. The presentation depicted a successful, effective, international award-winning<\/a> program\u00a0bent on revolutionizing the way public policies are designed and carried out. <\/em><\/p>\n

The UPP Social program has since been rebranded<\/a> as the Rio+Social program<\/a>, however, in order to “supercede the stigma” associated with the program and due to the need to “disassociate\u00a0public policy actions from those related to security<\/a> in the favelas occupied by police forces.”<\/em><\/p>\n

Before allowing the original program to pass in our collective memory, however, it is important to stop and reflect. Did UPP Social\u00a0really represent a genuine attempt to modernize the policy-making process and erase the boundaries that divide the city<\/a> of Rio de Janeiro? Or more of the same<\/a>? This article’s purpose is to summarize La Rocque’s assertions and put the program in perspective, offering a post-mortem analysis of the UPP Social program, especially through the lens of community participation<\/a>,\u00a0in the hopes of securing better results from Rio+Social and the countless other present and future public programs constantly being announced for Rio’s favelas, unfortunately often\u00a0with similar results.<\/em><\/p>\n

Introduction to UPP Social<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Originally a program launched by the State of Rio de Janeiro in 2010 but transferred\u00a0to Rio de Janeiro’s city government in 2011, UPP Social<\/a> aimed to produce quality information about the needs of favelas where the State Military Police has brought security services via its Pacifying Police Units (UPP) program<\/a>, articulating improvements to missing or low quality public services\u00a0beyond security to reach these areas, including sanitation (sewerage and waste collection), education, health care, and more.<\/p>\n

Under the supervision of the Instituto Pereira Passos\u00a0(IPP), a city planning agency subordinated to the city\u2019s Casa Civil<\/a>, UPP Social sought, from 2011-2014, to liaise\u00a0between the government and pacified communities.\u00a0As IPP president Eduarda La Rocque explained during the July debate, it focused on knowledge management: \u201cthe use of information to promote transformation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reflecting a\u00a0shift that has occurred in the past couple of decades in Brazil where public security policies<\/a> and social policies have been increasingly inter-connected<\/a>,\u00a0the \u201cpacification\u201d policy was seen to closely link public safety with themes of citizenship, social programs and community actions. Once the community was \u201cpacified\u201d and a permanent police presence<\/a> installed, the UPP Social team would come in\u00a0and map the community\u2019s needs in an effort to \u201cmatch supply with demand,\u201d as La Rocque explained. Designed to\u00a0complement the UPP program, its primary objective was to \u201cstrengthen the territorial control and pacification of the areas with UPPs.\u201d<\/p>\n

“Integration” was the key word of UPP Social\u2019s mission as presented by La Rocque: favelas must be integrated to the asfalto<\/em> (“asphalt,” or “formal” city), which includes everything from defining street names and quite literally putting these communities on the map, to raising socio-economic indicators to those of the \u201cformal\u201d city, erasing the historic gap<\/a> between the two. To achieve that, actions would be\u00a0integrated: the various programs and projects carried out by the federal, state and municipal governments, NGOs and the private sector would need to be coordinated and articulated to achieve maximum efficiency and impact, and avoid overlaps and discontinuities.<\/p>\n

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Participation under tutelage in democratic Brazil, 1988-present<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Community participation<\/a>, though not particularly emphasized in La Rocque\u2019s discourse, was never absent from her rhetoric: \u201cNothing comes from the top-down, imposed… It has to be built\u00a0together,\u201d she said. Recognized as a fundamental bedrock for social integration, participation ranks high in the modern development discourse promoted by multilateral agencies such as the United Nations<\/a>: \u201cA society for all must be equipped with appropriate mechanisms that enable their citizens to participate in the decision-making processes that affect their lives, and ultimately shape their common future.\u201d In Brazil, governments at all levels\u2013federal, state, municipal and regional\u2013have established\u00a0rules for\u00a0engaging civil society in participating in policy-making processes<\/a>, especially at the local level.<\/p>\n

The key question then becomes: what kind of participation<\/a>\u00a0are we talking about? And: does said “participation” actually influence outcomes? Indeed, from \u201cmanipulation\u201d to \u201ccitizen control,\u201d from \u201cnonparticipation\u201d to \u201ccitizen power,\u201d the meaning and substance of participation varies greatly. As Sherry Arnstein wrote<\/a> in 1969: \u201cthere is a critical difference between going through the empty ritual of participation and having the real power needed to affect the outcome of the process.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite its unquestionable modernity, Rio’s\u00a0society remains uncompromisingly\u00a0vertical and hierarchical. The immense and seemingly eternal gap between the affluent and the \u201chave-nots\u201d and the associated fears of explosion of violence have historically encouraged the ruling sectors to establish mechanisms of controlled integration, if integration happens at all<\/a>, carefully avoiding anything that could affect the verticality of social relations<\/a>. Broad and effective popular participation is, more often than not, seen as a threat rather than a goal. Since at least the 1930s and the presidency of Getulio Vargas, the Brazilian state apparatus has a long tradition of organizing and supervising the lower classes (see ‘non-participation’<\/a>),\u00a0establishing what scholar Alain Rouqui\u00e9<\/a> calls \u201cmechanisms of non-coercive demobilization\u201d intended to prevent their spontaneous and autonomous organization and, subsequently, upward mobility.<\/p>\n

In the same vein, scholars Frederico Costa and Augusto Cunha<\/a> describe post-1988 Brazilian participatory institutions as a \u201cdirect democracy under tutelage”: \u201cThe State\u2026 is responsible for establishing which are the acceptable paths of civic participation, who should participate, how that participation must take place and which results this participation must bring about.\u201d<\/p>\n

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UPP Social and the discourse of civic participation<\/strong><\/h3>\n

So where did UPP Social stand within this\u00a0context? Elsewhere in Brazil, participatory institutions like councils, participatory budgeting, and collectively developed city plans\u00a0have multiplied since the democratization process resumed with\u00a0the 1988 Constitution, especially at the local level, reflecting a growing association between civic participation and public policy.<\/p>\n

In Rio the shift in discourse to contemplate participation\u00a0was reflected in the post-1988 favela upgrading program\u00a0Favela-Bairro<\/a> and more recently in the unfulfilled\u00a0Morar Carioca\u00a0program<\/a>. The UPP Social\u2019s goals, design and discourse, as presented by one of its main creators\u00a0Ricardo Henriques<\/a>, were set to\u00a0follow the same direction<\/a>. Starting from an observation by Henriques\u2014former head of the IPP and UPP Social prior to La Rocque, in his article “UPPs Social: Social Actions to Consolidate Pacification<\/a>“\u2014most favelas present a \u201cparadoxical situation of abundance of social projects and absence of effective public policies.\u201d Where a myriad of isolated, fragmented and uncoordinated projects coexist in a chaotic manner, the program\u2019s main objective is to integrate and coordinate the actions. For that, effective participation of residents and local actors was presented as one of the main conditions by both La Rocque and Henriques:<\/p>\n