March 24, 2026

Governance, Knowledge and Innovation

José Reis e José António Bandeirinha

The rapid urbanization in Brazilian cities has generated transformations, challenges, and social, economic, and political opportunities. Urban planning has become participatory, guaranteed by the 1988 Federal Constitution and by the City Statute, which promote democratic management and social control. This study focused on the participation of vulnerable communities in the Brasília Metropolitan Area in the revision of master plans, with an emphasis on urban peripheries, noting their low participation, even with favorable institutional conditions. The research, based on critical urban theory and the right to the city, analyzed cases in Sol Nascente/DF, Valparaíso, and Planaltina/GO, highlighting the need to increase citizen engagement and create mechanisms to strengthen the participation of these communities, ensuring inclusive and collaborative urban public policies, such as social urbanism. The goal of the thesis was to discuss participatory processes in peripheral urban planning with mechanisms to enhance and encourage broad, continuous, and diversified citizen engagement. The work analyzes the content structured in pedagogical, institutional, and symbolic categories, proposing collective actions for the construction of identities and the utilization of urban opportunities in order to achieve a satisfactory standard of living for the peripheries. In conclusion, it is essential to ensure real rights for vulnerable populations, expand fundamental guarantees, and broaden spaces for collective decision-making in participatory urban governmental processes.

Keywords: Right to the city, representative democracy, institutional policy, popular participation, peripheral urban public policies, social urbanism