Slum Neighborhoods in Latin America

In: Journal of Inter-American Studies, Volume 9, Issue 4, p. 507-528

Abstract

In the life of Latin American cities the rapid expansion of slum neighborhoods has emerged as a compelling problem. The inability of city authorities to provide adequate and inexpensive housing for rural-to-urban migrants, as well as for those economically poor persons born and raised in the city, has clashed with the tremendous growth of the population and its drive toward urbanization. The impoverished families must settle wherever they can. Scattered throughout Mexico City, for instance, on vacant lots adjoining factories or on the periphery of the metropolitan area are shack homes built of miscellaneous materials, known as jacales, or the rows of single-story concrete, brick, or adobe dwellings called vecindades. Beyond Mexico City, there are the villas miserias of Buenos Aires, the favelas on the rocky promontories of Rio de Janeiro, the barrios clandestinos of Bogotá, the barriadasmarginales of Lima, the ranchos of Caracas, and the callampas (mushrooms) of Santiago.