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Occupying Brazil
25 minute documentary "Viewfinder - Occupying Brazil" showing a glimpse of the vast and organized squatting movement.
In the canyons of Brazil's largest city there are tens of thousands being left in the wake of the country's economic riptide.
Sao Paulo has outstripped its capacity for affordable housing and yet there are hundreds of abandoned buildings that stand empty.
Facing the dire prospect of being forced into the streets by rising rents and living in the ever-expanding and hazardous favelas, there is an occupation movement taking responsibility for its own future. They seize abandoned buildings for the low-wage workers who have few options except to forcibly occupy them. They then have to live with the uncertainty that they could be removed either by the state or the building’s owner.
It is an uneasy solution to a vexing problem borne of the nation’s exploding growth. The pride with which Brazil is welcoming the 2014 World Cup and soon the Olympics is a source of pain for those who feel these events are further evidence of their being left behind.
From: http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/viewfinder/latinamerica2014/2014/04/occupying-brazil-201446121644533111.html
Sao Paulo has outstripped its capacity for affordable housing and yet there are hundreds of abandoned buildings that stand empty.
Facing the dire prospect of being forced into the streets by rising rents and living in the ever-expanding and hazardous favelas, there is an occupation movement taking responsibility for its own future. They seize abandoned buildings for the low-wage workers who have few options except to forcibly occupy them. They then have to live with the uncertainty that they could be removed either by the state or the building’s owner.
It is an uneasy solution to a vexing problem borne of the nation’s exploding growth. The pride with which Brazil is welcoming the 2014 World Cup and soon the Olympics is a source of pain for those who feel these events are further evidence of their being left behind.