GENDER RELATIONS IN PRECARIOUS SETTLEMENTS FACING THE REALITY OF WATER INSECURITY: A FEMINIST ANALYSIS OF TERRITORIAL PLANNING
The objective of this dissertation is to analyze how the social construction of gender distributes responsibilities for water access practices in the context of precarious housing in urban spaces, taking as a case study the Mangueirinha community, located in the extreme east of the city of São Paulo, a precarious settlement that presents diverse experiences of access, use and management of water. The approach was based on a theoretical and practical perspective of Feminist Political Ecology and its contribution to territorial planning, delving into socio-environmental issues of the right to water at less visible scales, such as the home and the body, intertwined with the power relations of gender. With the application of a feminist methodology, the object of study of the work is the embodied experiences that residents of the Mangueirinha community undergo in the face of the reality of water insecurity and the various strategies they use daily to overcome it. Such embodied experiences are the materialization of gender-based violence, the unequal distribution of infrastructure in urban territory and the naturalization of water insecurity in everyday life. A critical view of access to water in precarious settlements is then adopted and space is opened for the debate on how social gender relations are produced in the context of precarious housing. Thus, the research contributes to the possibility of formulating public policies that are more coherent with the reality of the part of society that experiences water insecurity daily, as well as expanding gender studies in the area of Urban Political Ecology in dialogue with the field of Territorial Planning, providing a fertile ground for theoretical and practical change.