Struggles over city-making: The community program for neighborhood improvement in Mexico City

Abstract

This article traces the trajectory of the making and unmaking of the Community Program for Neighborhood Improvement (PCMB), a participatory program for upgrading social infrastructure and public spaces in marginalized neighborhoods of Mexico City. The PCMB is an example of the range of upgrading programs supported by progressive local governments throughout Latin America over the past 20 years. Proposed by the city’s urban popular movement as part of their longstanding commitment to “city-making from below,” the PCMB was launched in 2007. At its inception, the PCMB was designed to co-produce neighborhood improvements through providing state support for resident-led planning and governance of community spaces. In 2019, the Mexico City government unexpectedly dismantled key participatory elements of the PCMB and folded it into other city priorities, including safe pathways and its surveillance-oriented security strategy. Based on fieldwork involving site visits and interviews with residents, community leaders, and city officials, we narrate the transformation of the PCMB (2007–2021) as state-society struggles over city-making. We argue that these tensions pivot around different spatial and political logics pertaining to territory, agency, and citizenship in city-making. The analysis also brings into focus how local governments attempt to diffuse, co-opt, or contain more radical city-making initiatives.