Abstract
We examine the evolution of Latin American cities in the last two decades of the twentieth century and in the first years of the twenty-first on the basis of comparable data from six countries comprising over 80 percent of the region’s population. These years correspond to the shift in hegemonic models of development in the region, from import-substitution industrialization to neoliberal “open markets” adjustment. We examine how the application of the new policies correlates with change patterns in four areas: urban systems and urban primacy; urban unemployment and informal employment; poverty and inequality; and crime, victimization, and urban insecurity. We present detailed analyses of each of these topics based on the latest available data for the six countries. We conclude that significant changes in patterns of urbanization have taken place in the region, reflecting, in part, the expected and unexpected consequences of the application of the new model of development. Implications of our findings for each of the four areas examined and for the future of the region are discussed.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Altimir, Oscar, and Luis Beccaría. 2001. “El Persistente Deterioro de la Distribución del Ingreso en la Argentina.”Desarrollo Economico 40: 589–618.
Ariza, Marina. 2003. “La Urbanización en Mexico en el Ultimo Cuarto del Siglo XX.” Final report for the projectLatin American Urbanization in the Late Twentieth Century, delivered at the final project conference, Montevideo, Uruguay, August 2003.
Arriagada, Irma, and Lorena Godoy. 2000. “Prevention or Repression? The False Dilemma of Citizen Security.”CEPAL Review 70(April): 111–136.
Ayres, Robert. 1998. “Crime and Violence as Development Issues in Latin America and the Caribbean.” Viewpoints Series, World Bank Latin American and Caribbean Studies. The World Bank, Washington, D.C., 24 March 1998.
Balassa, Bela, Gerardo M. Bueno, Pedro-Pablo Kuczynshi, and Mario H. Simonsen. 1986.Toward Renewed Economic Growth in Latin America. Washington D.C.: Institute for International Economics.
Berry, Brian J. L. 1973.The Human Consequences of Urbanization. New York: St. Martin’s Press.
Berry, Brian J. L., and John D. Kasarda. 1977.Contemporary Urban, Ecology. New York: MacMillan.
Bourguignon, Francois. 1999. “Crime, Violence, and Inequitable Development.” Paper prepared for the Annual Conference on Development Economics. The World Bank.
Cerrutti, Marcela. 2003. “Report on Argentina.” Final report for the projectLatin American Urbanization in the Late Twentieth Century, delivered at the final project conference Montevideo, Uruguay, August 2003.
Cornelius, Wayne. 1975.Politics and the Migrant Poor in Mexico City. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Davies, James. 1971.When Men Revolt and Why. New York: The Free Press.
Diaz, Alvaro. 1996. “Chile: Hacia el Pos-Neoliberalismo?” Paper Presented at the Conference on Responses of Civil Society to Neo-Liberal Adjustment, Department of Sociology, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, April 1996.
Eckstein, Susan. 1977.The Poverty of Revolution, the State and the Urban Poor in Mexico. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean. 2000. “Social Panorama of Latin America, 1999–2000” Annual Report. Santiago, de Chile: ECLAC.
Fernandez-Kelly, M. Pattricia. 1995. “Social and Cultural Capital in the Urban Ghetto: Implications for the Economic Sociology of Immigration.” Pp. 213–47 in Alejandro Portes, ed.,The Economic Sociology of Immigration: Essays in Network, Ethnicity, and Entrepreneurship. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
—. 1983.For We Are Sold, I and My People: Women and Industry in Mexico’s Frontier. Albany, NY: SUNY Press.
Filgueira, Carlos. 1996. “Estado y Sociedad Civil: Politicas de Ajuste Estructural y Estabilizacion en America Latina.” Paper Presented at the Conference on Responses by Civil Society to Neoliberal Adjustment. University of Texas, Austin, April 1996.
Fundacion Paz Ciudadana. 1998. “Delincuencia y Opinion Publica.” Report, Santiago de Chile: Centro de Documentacion Paz Ciudadana.
Galbraith, James K. 2000. “A Perfect Crime: Global Inequality.”Daedalus 131 (Winter): 11–25.
Garza, Gustavo. 2000. “Tendencias de las Designaldades Urbanas y Regionales en Mexico, 1970–1996.”Estudios Demograficos y Urbanos 15: 489–532.
Goldrich, Daniel. 1970. “Political Organization and the Politicization of the Poblador.”Comparative Political Studies 3: 176–202.
Gordon, Derek, Patricia Anderson, and Don Robotham. 1997. “Jamaica: Urbanization During the Years of the Crisis.” Pp. 190–232 in A. Portes, C. Done-Cabral, and P. Landolt, eds.,The Urban Caribbean: Transition to the New Global Economy. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
Grimson, Alejandro. 2003. “La Vida Organizacional de Zonas Populares de Buenos Aires.” Final report for the projectLatin American Urbanization in the Late Twentieth Century, delivered at the final project conference, Montevideo, Uruguay August 2003.
Hardoy, Jorge E. 1969. “Two Thousand Years of Latin American Urbanization.” Pp. 3–55 in J. E. Hardoy, ed.,Urbanization in Latin America: Approaches and Issues. Garden City, NY: Anchor Books.
Kaztman, Ruben, Gabriel Corbo, Fernando Filgueira, Magdalena Furtado, Denise Gelber, Alejandro Retamoso, Federico Rodriguez. 2003. “La Ciudad Fragmentada: Mercado, Territorio y Marginalidad en Montevideo.” Final report for the projectLatin American Urbanization in the Late Twentieth Century, delivered at the final project conference, Montevideo, Uruguay. August 2003.
Klein, Emilio and Victor E. Tokman. 1988. “Sector Informal: Una Forma de Utilizar el Trabajo Como Consequencia de la Manera de Producir y No Viceversa.”Estudios Sociologicos 6 (Jan–Apr): 205–12.
Klein, Emilio and Victor Tokman. 2000. “La Estratification Social Bajo Tension en la Era de la Globalization.”Revista de la CEPAL 72 (December): 7–30.
Kornhauser, William. 1960.The Politics of Mass Society. New York: The Free Press.
Leeds, Anthony. 1969. “The Significant Variables Determining the Character of Squatter Settlements.”America Latina 12: 44–86.
Lomnitz, Larissa. 2002. Personal communication to first author. Mexico City, November 2002.
Londoño, Juan Luis. 1996. “Violence, Psyche, and Social Capital.” Paper prepared for the second annual World Bank Conference on Development in Latin American and the Caribbean, Bogotá, July 1996.
Lozano, Wilfredo. 1997. “Dominican Republic: Informal Economy, the State, and the Urban Poor.” Pp. 153–89 in A. Portes, C. Dore-Cabral, and P. Landolt, eds.,The Urban Caribbean: Transition to the New Global Economy Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
Lungo, Mario. 1997. “Costa Rica.” Pp. 57–81 in A. Portes, C. Dore-Cabral, and P. Landolt, eds.,The Urban Caribbean: Transition to the New Global Economy. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
Mendez, Christian, Helbert Gutierrez, Jose Loayza. 2003. “Grandes Tendencias Economicas del Peru y la Ciudad de Lima.” Lima: Centro Alternativa. Report prepared for presentation at the seminar on Latin American Urbanization in the Late Twentieth Century, Institute for Social and Economic Development (IDES), Buenos Aires, February 2003.
Merton, Robert K. 1968. “Social Structure and Anomie.” Pp. 175–214 in R. K. Merton, ed.,Social Theory and Social Structure. New York: The Free Press.
Pacheco, C. A. 1998.Fragmentação da Nação. Campinas, Brazil: Instituto de Economia/UNICAMP.
Pereyra, Omar. 2003. “De la Ciudad y el Crimen: Aproximaciones el Fenomeno de la Criminalidad en Lima.” Centro Alternativa, Lima. Final report for the projectLatin American Urbanization in the Late Twentieth Century, delivered at the final project conference, Montevideo, Uruguay. August 2003.
Perez-Sainz, Juan Pablo. 1997. “Guatemala: The Two Faces of the Metropolitan Area.” Pp. 124–152 in A. Portez, C. Dore-Cabral, and Patricia Landolt, eds.,The Urban Caribbean: Transition to the New Global Economy. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press.
Polanyi, Karl 1957.The Great Transformation. Boston: Beacon Press.
—. 1992. “The Economy as Instituted Process.” Pp. 29–51 in M. Granovetter and R. Swedberg, eds.,The Sociology of Economic Life. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
Portes, Alejandro. 1997. “Neoliberalism and the Sociology of Development: Emerging Trends and Unanticipated Facts.”Population and Development Review 23 (June): 229–59.
Portes, Alejandro, Carlos Dore-Cabral, and Patricia Landolt. 1997.The Urban Caribbean: Transition to the new Global Economy. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
Portes, Alejandro, and William Haller. 2005. “The Informal Economy.” Pp. 403–425 in N. J. Smelser and R. Swedberg, eds.,Handbook of Economic Sociology, 2nd Edition. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
Portes, Alejandro, and Kelly Hoffman. 2003. “Latin American Class Structures: Their Composition and Change during the Neoliberal Era.”Latin American Research Review 38: (February): 41–82.
Portes, Alejandro, Jose Itzigsohn and Carlos Dore-Cabral. 1994. “Urbanization in the Caribbean Basin: Social Change During the Years of the Crisis.”Latin American Research Review 29: 3–37.
Portes, Alejandro, and Michael Johns. 1989. “Class Structure and Spatial Polarization: An Assessment of Recent Urban Trends in Latin America.” Pp. 111–37 in W.L. Canak, ed.,Lost Promises: Debt. Austerity, and Development in Latin America. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
Portes, Alejandro, and John Walton. 1976.Urban Latin America. Austin, IX: University of California Press.
Pozas, Maria de los Angeles. 2002.Estrategia de la Gran Empresa Mexicana en la Decada de los Noventa. Mexico D. F.: El Colegio de Mexico.
Quijano, Anibal. 1998. “La Colonialidad del Poder y la Experiencia, Latinoamericana.” Pp. 27–38 in R. Briceno-Leon and H. R. Sonntag, eds.,Pueblo, Epocay Desarrollo: La Sociologia de America Latina. Caracas: Nueva Sociedad.
Roberts, Bryan R. 1978.Cities of Peasants: The Political Economy of Urbanization in the Third World. London: Edward Arnold.
Roberts, Bryan R. 2004. “Comparative Urban Systems: an Overview.” Paper for Conference on African Urbanization and Migration. Office of Population Studies, Princeton University.
Robinson, William. 1996.Promoting Polyarchy: Globalization. U.S. Intervention, and Hegemony. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Saavedra, Jaime and Eduardo Nakasone. 2003. “Una Nota sobre la Informalidad y el Autoempleo en Lima Metropolitana, 1985–2000.” Grupo de Analisis para el Desarrollo, Centro Alternativa, Lima.
Sabatini, Francisco. 2000. “Reforma de los Mercados de Suelo en Santiago, Chile: Efectos sobre los precios de la Tierra y la Segregación Residencial.”Revista Eure 26: 49–80.
Salinas, Viviana and Guillermo Wormald. 2003. “Informalidad en Chile durante la Decada de los Años 90.” Paper presented at the conference on Latin, American Urbanization in the Late Twentieth Century, Institute for Social and Economic Development (IDES), Buenos Aires, February 2003.
Shaiken, Harvey. 1990.Mexico in the Global Economy. Monograph Series #33, San Diego: University of California.
—. 1994. “Advanced Manufacturing and Mexico: A New International Division of Labor?”Latin American Research Review, 29: 39–72.
Sullivan, Mercer L. 1989.Getting Paid: Youth Crime and Work in the Inner City. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
Sunkel, Osvaldo. 2004. “The Unbearable Lightness of Neoliberalism.” In Charles Wood and Bryan Roberts, eds.,Rethinking Development in Latin America. University Park, PA: Pennsylvania University Press.
Toch, Hans. 1965.The Social Psychology of Social Movements. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill.
Unikel, Luis. 1972.La Dinamica del Crecimiento de la Ciudad de Mexico. Mexico, DF.: Fundacion para Estudios de Poblacion.
United Nations. 2002.World Urbanization Prospects 2001. New York: U. N. Publication ST/ESA/SER.A/216.
Valladares, Licia, and Edmond Preteceille. 2003. “Sistema Urbano, Mercado de Trabalho e Violencia no Brasil e no Rio.” Final report for the projectLatin American Urbanization in the Late Twentieth Century, delivered at the final project conference, Montevideo, Uruguay. August 2003.
Veiga, Danilo and Ana Laura Rivoir. 2001. “Desigualdades Sociales y Segregación en Montevideo.” Department of Sociology, University of the Republic.
Walton, John. 1998. “Urban Conflict and Social Movements in Poor Countries: Theory and Evidence of Collective Action.”International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 22(3): 460–81.
Wikie, James, and Adam Perkal. 1984.Statistical Abstract of Latin America, Vol. 23. Los Angeles, CA: UCLA Latin American Center Publications.
Williamson, John. 1994.The Political Economy of Reform. Washington, DC: Institute for International Economics.
Wilson, William J. 1987.The Truly Disadvantaged: The Inner City, the Underclass, and Public Policy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Wormald, Guillermo, Francisco Sabatini, Lucia Dammert, Viviana Salinas, Yasna Contreras. 2003. “El Impacto del Nuevo Modelo de Orientación Neoliberal sobre las Oportunidades de Integración Social del Ambito Urbano: Chile 1980–2000.” Final report for the projectLatin American Urbanization in the Late Twentieth Century, delivered at the final project conference, Montevideo, Uruguay. August 2003.
Additional information
Alejandro Portes is department chair and Howard Harrison and Gabrielle Snyder Beck Professor of sociology, and director of the Center for Migration and Development at Princeton University. His current research focuses on the adaptation process of second-generation immigrants and the rise of transnational immigrant communities in the United States.
Bryan R. Roberts is professor of sociology and C.B. Smith Chair in US-Mexico Relations at the University of Texas, Austin. His most recent work explores issues of develorment, globalization, immigration, and social policy in Latin America.
Data on which this paper is based were collected by theLatin American Urbanization at the End of the Twentieth Century project, sponsored by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. We thank our collaborators and directors of country teams, without whom this study would not have been possible: Marcele Cerruti and Alejandro Grimson in Argentina; Licia Valladares, Bianca Freire-Medeiros, and Filippina Chinelli in Brazil; Guillermo, Wormald, Francisco Sabatini, Yasna Contreras and their collaborators in Chile; Marina Ariza and Juan Manuel Ramirez in Mexico; Jaime Joseph and the Centro Alternativa research team in Peru; and Ruben Kaztman, Fernando Filgueira, Alejandro Retamoso and their collaborators in Uruguay. We would also like to thank Carolina Flores and Lissette Aliaga for their assistance in assembling and analyzing survey data-bases from the six countries. We also thank anonymous referees of this journal for their comments. Responsibility for the contents is exclusively ours.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Portes, A., Roberts, B.R. The free-market city: Latin American urbanization in the years of the neoliberal experiment. St Comp Int Dev 40, 43–82 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02686288
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02686288