Rooting Out Injustices from the Top

Abstract

The article illustrates the reemergence of the Atlantic Forest biome in Morro da Babilônia, a favela in Rio de Janeiro, due to a reforestation project started in the 1980s conducted by institutional actors and the local community. The forest has played an important role in reinvigorating the sense of community, by legitimizing ownership claims that the community has made over the area, and by serving as a mitigation strategy in a context of increasing climatic-extreme events. In 2019 a team of researchers started an oral history project to document the social and environmental transformation of the favela. Interviews with members of the community and representatives of institutional partners opened up unexpected paths into people's memories and perspectives. In a frame of socioeconomic, political and environmental violence, injustice, and vulnerability, the making of a multispecies city and its related narratives turned out to be instrumental for the community's survival.