In auctions: an ethnography on the functioning of illegal and legal markets and the circulation of stolen vehicles

• Grant number: 19/05438-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Effective date (Start): April 01, 2019
• Effective date (End): March 31, 2020
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Political Science - Public Policies
• Principal Investigator: Gabriel de Santis Feltran
• Grantee: Luiz Gustavo Simão Pereira
• Host Institution: Centro Brasileiro de Análise e Planejamento (CEBRAP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Associated research grant: 13/07616-7 - CEM - Center for Metropolitan Studies, AP.CEPID

Abstract

The studies about inequality have been, for years, playing a prominent role in the literature and in the interest of the social sciences. The dimension of the interfaces between legal and illegal markets, the circulation of money, and the reproduction of inequalities and violence have been insufficiently researched. Inscribed in a project that maps the stolen vehicle markets from São Paulo, this IC focuses on the performance of vehicle auctions. The main hypothesis is that the auction, as a supposedly under-regulated activity, acts as a frontier of illegal and legal markets and, therefore, interpret this question is a form to understand how this system operates. On the subject, there is relevant literature, however, few in a Brazilian context. The general objective of this IC is to map the operation of auctions of stolen vehicles recovered by insurance companies in São Paulo, and also private auctions; their specific objective is to verify how they work and how much money the auctions studied mobilize. As a product, lists and tables with car values will be produced in order to produce quantitative data in a systematic way. In the first stage, virtual auction monitoring is planned and, secondly, an ethnography in the places where the events are executed, aiming at seeking questions of interest to the research itself - such as the regulation of the segment of auctioneering.