Since the 1990s, economic flexibility has transformed the central region of the city of São Paulo in an area of conflict. On one side there is low-income residents' desire for permanence, on the other side there are real estate market interests in a new valorization frontier. Setbacks experienced by organized social movements and the recent influx of international capital in the housing market seem to deny any possibility of action for political subjects. These factors also seem to consolidate the hegemony of neoliberal thinking as subjects are left with "no alternative" to the order already in place. Marked by an industrial view, current and increasing urban social analysis on the social mobilization processes of the 1980s allow us a clear understanding of the social production of the city. Nevertheless, these accounts do not contribute to overcoming the increasing social fragmentation perceived in the city. Despite these factors, the contradictions of the social production of this urban space enable collectors of recyclable materials the permanent use of the urban centrality of the Glicério area. This use seems to exist only as a mere residual social product. Nevertheless, in Lefebvre's account on the production of space as part of the reproduction of social relations of production, the use of Glicério by collectors shows up as an experience that has reshaped the central representations of the commodity fetish. This perspective on the use of this urban space allows us to view beyond industrial relations and the production of surplus value, as well as the determinants of state institutionalization. Through this urban point of view, a differential social cohesion shows up as a possible urban praxis, reopening the horizon of the possible, in practice and theory.

A crise sanitária e de saúde pública evidenciada pela pandemia da covid-19 se expressa também como esgotamento do modelo de desenvolvimento e de produção do espaço vigente. Repensar esse modelo de produção apresenta-se como condição para conter o surgimento de novas epidemias globais. Neste ensaio, apoiados em teses desenvolvidas por Lefebvre, Harvey, entre outros, observamos a crise presente no urbano sob a pandemia e a movimentação dos agentes da produção do espaço, para vislumbrar cenários hipotéticos sobre o futuro do urbano. Prospectamos, neste exercício teórico, que a distopia do e no urbano resultará da associação de transformações recentes do capitalismo com contradições intensificadas trazidas pela pandemia. Por outro lado, a luta social organizada pode assumir um papel de resistência a este cenário.

Doutoranda da FAU-USP. *** Advogada pesquisadora do Laboratório Espaço Público e Direito à Cidade (FAU-USP). **** Arquiteta pesquisadora do Laboratório Espaço Público e Direito à Cidade da FAU-USP.