Private security and surveillance networks in the new centrality frontier: territorial differentiation of sociospatial control in the frontier of São Paulo's Southwest Vector

• Grant number: 25/04671-4
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research Internship - Doctorate (Direct)
• Start date: September 01, 2025
• End date: March 05, 2026
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Geography - Human Geography
• Principal Investigator: César Ricardo Simoni Santos
• Grantee: Gabriella Duarte Dantas de Biaggi
• Supervisor: David Murakami Wood
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Institution abroad: University of Ottawa (uOttawa), Canada
• Associated to the scholarship: 23/12689-5 - Dispossession and Sociospatial Control in the corporate centrality frontier: Santo Amaro as the southern frontier of São Paulos Southwest Vector, BP.DD

Abstract

Since the last decades of the 20th century, the dissemination of private security devices and services throughout Latin American metropolises has had profound impacts on the reworking of center-periphery relations and previous forms of segregation. The proposed research internship aims to provide a better understanding of the role of private security and private/public-private surveillance networks in the shifting centrality frontiers of these metropolises. As part of the doctoral research "Dispossession and Sociospatial Control in the corporate centrality frontier", it intends to contribute to the analysis of the links between reproduction of space and sociospatial control in contemporary urban frontiers. Drawing from empirical work in São Paulo, this PhD research examines the advance of a real estate front and the operation of territorially differentiated forms of sociospatial control in a frontier area adjacent to the business centralities of São Paulo's Southwest Vector. Beyond expanding and updating the references on private security and surveillance that inform the research, the internship under the supervision of Prof. David Murakami Wood seeks to enhance its theoretical basis regarding the articulation of Foucauldian and Marxist theories. Moreover, it aims to improve the dissertation's assessment of empirical data on the territorial differentiation of policing practices and of the security apparatus. The internship proposal is for a six-month period as a Visiting Research Student (VRS) at the University of Ottawa's Critical Surveillance and Security Lab (CSS/Lab). That position provides the conditions for extensive bibliographic research, a frequent contact with researchers dedicated to related subjects, and facilitates the participation in academic events and activities. (AU)