LIST OF PANELS

The problem of inequality in Latin America is closely linked to habitat and access to sustainable and livable urban spaces. Traditionally vulnerable communities are relocated by national and local authorities, within the Latin American capitals, or because refugees are migrants from rural areas in conflict. The Latin American urban habitat has gained interest and the growing process of urbanization in the region, which makes it subject to intervention by the national, regional and local governments and multilateral organizations that attempt to mitigate the complex social problems generated by the inequality and the concentration of land and wealth. The dwindling social housing policies related to welfare programs provide some minimum units of built housing, linked more to market interests than the needs, rights and interests of citizens who are living communities. The proposed panel invites to scholars interested in exploring and proposing local governance mechanisms that promote joint construction of habitat solutions between authorities and citizens, in which living spaces meet the imaginary of the communities involved, favor the basics local governance and lead to the implementation of effective, legitimate and equitable decisions on urban habitat. Paper proposals  investigate the concepts of collaborative governance, policy networks, policy communities, urban environment, popular habitat and citizen self-management.

In recent 10 years, the Latin American region faces reforms prescribed by their elites and some multilateral institutions. Migration from the countryside to urban centers, possibly sponsored by governments under the criteria of efficiency and productivity, has meant a shift in the decision taken by the local authorities. Local communities demand a reordering of urban space consistent with the needs of their families and communities, the formation of differentiated citizenship, strengthening their organizations and empower leaders can reach consolidate the actions of local governance in which the joint construction of spaces for public life in hand with municipal authorities, appears as a feasible alternative to redesign the urban territory, resettlement junctures, redefining public spaces and alternative spaces to accommodate migrants from the countryside to the cities . This panel proposal focuses on the analysis of cases in which the authorities and citizens turn to forums for consultation and joint construction of spaces to locate their family, school or work habitat, through alternative mechanisms of consensus and joint work in the urban space, such as infrastructure development, resettlement for natural risks, changes in land use, the adequacy of natural areas for public use, migration to cities, and social innovation and institutional development in post-conflict times. In the second decade of the new millennium, some urban centers of Latin America face pressures of population growth, migration, armed conflict, natural phenomena, market and land tenure, involving the need for new social practices innovative in the context of local governance, to ensure collaboration, at all levels between rulers and ruled. Paper proposals for this panel should refer to the relationship between the urban problems arising from the need or interest in resettlement of some communities, and the development of processes to strengthen organized communities that explore methods of relating to the decision-making promote territorial authorities in the urban space. It seeks to investigate the nature of these mechanisms, its relationships and suitability as a tool for land management consensus and potential replication clearly offering the successful cases. The proposal to suggest tools, based on the rules of the political system, to support the formation and organization of various citizenships around shared common spaces, to build together friendly and sustainable community inhabiting at these urban spaces.