State violence in the production of territories, informality, and protection networks

Abstract Based on violence originated by the State, this article describes and analyzes evictions to put the production of urban space and conflict into perspective. The text’s empirical basis is an ethnographic study carried out in the central area of São Paulo, where the State’s strength is revealed through evictions, displacements, destruction of territories and long-established social fabrics, and production of informality and informal markets; it also approaches the articulation of networks and protection arrangements (including housing) as responses to this violence. Another objective is to observe, in these disputes, a tactical and situational mobilization and instrumentalization of institutional webs, analyzing the process of creation of repertoires and practices in this movement marked by conflict.