The distinct and indistinct ways to implement private terminals in the Port of Santos

Abstract

In Brazil, the State has always created good conditions to guarantee the private sector’s participation in the transformations of the urban space, especially in transport and logistics infrastructure works. In this article, we seek to discuss the disputes over public land and, also, over the port management model, in the context of the economic expansion at the beginning of the 21st century. By delimiting the Port of Santos as our territory of analysis, we aim to investigate the elements, players, agents and conflicts of interest present in the dispute, and how they articulate in different scales. The trans-scale approach adopted here as a methodological strategy was grounded on relations of continuous approximations between theoretical framework and empirical immersion. In this debate, the social function of public land, with oscillations in its environmental and economic role, gains centrality.