"Ninguém vai sair!": ocupações, despejos e luta por moradia em Fortaleza (1979-1987)

Abstract

The research aims to analyze how poor residents of precarious communities organized themselves and reacted against the eradication of their housing areas, initiated by urban administrators of Fortaleza who persisted in creating measures to control the use of urban space by the less privileged people of the capital of Ceará, between the years 1979 and 1987. We do not intend to address all processes that occurred during this proposed period, but rather to understand the strategies used both by community leaders and by government officials in the struggle for the right to the city. Therefore, we question to what extent social movements managed to reverse political and judicial decisions of eviction and relocation of residents to housing complexes and achieved improvements in the housing conditions of the poorest. Thus, we use as sources, news from the newspapers O Povo and Diário do Nordeste, municipal reports about the Favela Assistance Program, minutes from the Federation of Neighborhoods, interviews with Lagamar residents, as well as two of the main representatives and organizers of the housing struggle, Father Manfredo de Araújo and politician Inácio Arruda. From the crossing and confrontation between the sources, this study showed that the achievement of remaining in their places of residence occurred due to the strength of the mediators and the lack of government plans for the disputed areas.