Abstract, Urban Mobility and Politics in Mexico City The Case of the Frente Amplio contra la Supervía

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Urban Mobility and Politics in Mexico City
The Case of the Frente Amplio contra la Supervía
by Oscar Sosa López


Study of the struggle of a social movement, the Frente Amplio contra la Supervía, to stop the construction of an urban toll road in the southwestern end of Mexico City reveals that investments in transportation assumed to benefit the larger public are in fact creating new landscapes of infrastructural and democratic exclusion. Examination of the forms of citizen mobilization, alliances among diverse actors, and the role of accountability institutions as spaces for democratic experimentation suggests that struggles against large infrastructure projects allow citizens and the state to redraw the limits of authoritarianism and the meaning of sustainability and democracy in the city.

Introduction, Planning Latin American Cities Dependencies and “Best Practices”

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Planning Latin American Cities
Dependencies and “Best Practices”
by Tom Angotti and Clara Irazábal


Latin America is the most urbanized region in the world, with over 80 percent of the population living in cities (United Nations Human Settlements Program, 2012). Yet most of its cities lack the basic infrastructure and services enjoyed in the North, are sharply divided into luxury enclaves and sprawling peripheries, and reflect deep social and economic inequalities.1 Alongside the growth of urban industry and trade, there is widespread violence, congestion, and pollution. Despite some progressive urban reforms promoted by social movements aimed at improving the quality of life, powerful ruling oligarchies are fragmenting cities to build financial districts, shopping malls, stadiums, and gated luxury enclaves, neglecting the problems in the daily lives of the majority of the population. When the land they are living on is coveted for new development, the poor are pushed out by market forces or unceremoniously evicted, continuing the long history of displacement and accumulation by dispossession of capitalist urbanization. The majority of the urban population lives in peripheral areas that lack basic services and infrastructure until they are singled out as profitable real estate investment targets (Irazábal, 2009).