The Right to the City and the public sphere: between political participation and the renewal of the legal urbanistic order

Abstract

This article proposes an analysis of the political and legal aspects of the Right to the City from the perspective of the concept of public sphere. The Right to the City is interpreted as a dynamic link between political mobilization, democratization of social relations and of the State’s institutional apparatus, and the guarantee of better material conditions of existence in the urban space. Based on a bibliographical research about the theme of urban social struggles in Brazil and in the city of São Paulo, the article intends to demonstrate that the Right to the City is exercised by the population through clashes in the public sphere, which are responsible for stimulating the renewal of the legal order and for attributing new meanings to the existing Law.