Socio-spatial Segregation and Climate Vulnerability in Urban Peripheries

Abstract

Objective – To critically analyze the relationship between socio-spatial segregation, urban policies, and climate vulnerability in Brazilian cities, demonstrating that unequal exposure to climate risks constitutes a direct expression of the capitalist production of urban space and of political choices that have historically marginalized specific territories and populations.

Methodology – The study adopts a qualitative, theoretical-critical approach, characterized as an analytical essay grounded in the review and interpretation of specialized literature on the production of urban space, socio-spatial segregation, urban public policies, and climate justice. The analysis articulates different scales—from the global urban context to the Brazilian reality—and draws on empirical studies and institutional documents as interpretative support.

Originality/Relevance – The originality of the study lies in articulating the critique of the unequal production of urban space with the contemporary debate on climate change, addressing a theoretical gap still insufficiently explored in urban studies: the understanding of climate vulnerability as a socially produced, territorially distributed, and politically conditioned phenomenon, rather than a natural or exclusively environmental outcome.

Results – The results demonstrate that the impacts of climate change follow the geography of urban inequality, affecting more intensely peripheral areas characterized by housing precariousness, infrastructure deficits, and the historical neglect of public policies. At the same time, they show that current urban policies tend to reinforce this pattern by concentrating investments and climate adaptation strategies in central and economically valued areas.

Theoretical/Methodological Contributions – The article contributes theoretically by reinforcing the centrality of climate justice as an analytical category for understanding contemporary urban inequalities, challenging technocratic and depoliticized approaches to urban planning. Methodologically, it offers an interpretative framework that integrates the analysis of the production of urban space with the climate issue, highlighting the territorial dimension of environmental injustice.

Social and Environmental Contributions – In the social and environmental fields, the study points to the need to reorient urban policies based on principles of territorial equity, risk prevention, and social participation, emphasizing that the construction of resilient cities depends on structurally addressing the socio-spatial inequalities that expose peripheral populations to the most severe impacts of the climate crisis.