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The opposition between the categories of shantytown and neighborhood has been crucial in the disciplinary analyses of popular habitat in Argentina. The urbanization of a shantytown in Great Buenos Aires enables us to refresh this discussion, setting the categories into motion. The ethnographic analysis of the category of neighborhood in the urbanization of Villa Torres (La Matanza) will help to explore how this shantytown is constructed as “emblem" for public policies, receiving various resources. In fact, this paper will analyze how the urbanization is legitimized through an image of the neighborhood, of the urbanization and of the people in charge of it as “gente del barrio" [people from the neighborhood] in order to show how local knowledge is implied in this public policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I consider how the category of fear is constructed in Buenos Aires-a category, as Hegel would say, that considers a unilateral recognition of the actors involved. It is interesting to examine whether the middle or upper class residents who "confine" themselves within walls or behind fences are the only ones who experience fear in our cities marked by social inequality, or on the contrary whether it is also possible to identify fear in the working class sectors. This last option would be in accordance with the contradictory policies of the local power, which I have called as "schizopolicies". Additionally, I am interested in analyzing how villages, settlements and illegal squatters are perceived by the rest of the society as "usinas". "Usina" refers to an emergence of elements that provoke feelings of fear, uncertainty and disorder. In this article, we will see how culture and nature are covertly constructed from certain political projects as an antithesis to fear. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the social and urban changes occurring in a neighborhood in the South Sector of Buenos Aires (Parque de los Patricios). The changes are connected to the construction of a housing complex by a cooperative established though a social political movement of unemployed workers. We explore the struggles for the control of the local urban space, between this political movement and the neighbors who were already living in the neighborhood. We describe the transformation of this urban space from empty space to a resource. We relate such changes to others that have been developing in the city of Buenos Aires during the last decade of the 20th century, such as increased segregation and fragmentation of the social space and the weakening of existing social ties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social anthropology alows us to have a good look at the most recent urban transformations which took place in the Metropolitan Area of Buenos Aires. More specifically, we concentrate our attention on the urban renewal process which takes place in the suburban areas of this city. This urban regeneration process is connected with the sub-urbanization or peri-urbanization of middle / upper class groups in residential neighborhoods with security systems. Focusing on the process of growing and development of these "gated communities", this paper explores one of the most recent urban changes which are clearly seen in contemporary cities. We elaborate some statements about the phenomena under discussion based on a fieldwork experience carried out among residents of these particular residential products. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]