From heavy rains to radical pedagogies: contesting housing injustice and environmental risk in Mauá, Brazil

In the peripheries of southern metropolises, vulnerable households living in precarious housing often suffer from climatic events such as heavy rains. This oppressive reality has been tackled by grassroots groups through radical pedagogies, as has been the case in Mauá, a municipality in São Paulo’s metropolitan area. Drawing on eleven months of engaged research with the Movement for Fight in Neighbourhoods, Vilas, and Favelas (MLB - Movimento de Luta nos Bairros, Vilas e Favelas). I explore the unfolding of radical pedagogies amid contestations of housing injustice and environmental risk. MLB’s actions in Maua have included a support system for residents affected by floods and landslides, an occupation for households unsheltered by rainstorms, and weekly assemblies in vulnerable neighbourhoods. Combining Paulo Freire’s ideas on popular education with Latin American theorizations on territory, I describe how radical pedagogies manifest throughout MLB’s multiple activities. Specifically, I explain how pedagogical practice evolves as the movement de/re-territorializes and forges new territorialities. I argue that radical pedagogies play a fundamental role in MLB’s territorial contestations for three reasons. First, urgent needs and oppressive realities are politicized, serving as an entry point towards ‘conscientisation’. Second, radical pedagogies occur continuously, allowing the movement to keep unity and momentum. Third, pedagogical practices combine action and reflection, shaping ‘territories of r-existence’. The case of MLB in Mauá exemplifies that radical pedagogies offer fundamental pathways for emancipation in a context of housing injustice and environmental risk.