Dispossession and space control in the production of the conditions of centrality: Santo Amaro as the southern frontier of the Southwest Axis

Abstract

The research aims to contribute to the understanding of the current processes of centrality production in new areas of the metropolis of São Paulo. We intend to investigate transformations in the reproduction of space and in the territorial disputes that result in the alteration of the frontiers between central and non-central areas. Our conception of centrality involves a sense of domination, of determination of a space over the others and refers, more specifically, to the areas that concentrate corporate command activities in the metropolis of São Paulo. We understand that the processes of production of centralities of this type represent forms of accumulation by dispossession, involving economic strategies based on the use of force, through which occur the substitution of uses of space and the imposition of new forms of control and surveillance. Our hypothesis is that there is a movement of expansion of the consolidated corporate centrality of the Southwest Axis of São Paulo. Thus, the research proposes the analysis of the current dynamics of space production and space management on the southern border of this Axis, located in the district of Santo Amaro. The study area is located around the boundary between the territory affected by the Urban Operation Água Espraiada, in the early 2000s, and the one targeted by the Arco Jurubatuba Urban Intervention Project (PIU ACJ), a major urban restructuring project recently proposed. (AU)