Juliana Barbassa is a Brazilian journalist and author of Dancing with the Devil in the City of God: Rio de Janeiro on the Brink.
When Rio de Janeiro bid for the 2016 Olympic Games against Madrid, Tokyo and Chicago, its proposal was the most geographically spread out, and the most expensive of the lot at more than $11-billion (U.S.). Rio was also the candidate with the greatest urban challenges, even without the Games. Despite all this, when International Olympic Committee president Jacque Rogge reached into the envelope decorated with five rings in October, 2009, to reveal the winning city, the name he pulled out was Rio. The city exploded in a celebration that lasted all night.
The choice was a gamble – for Brazil and for the IOC. There was reason for optimism. The country was going through a period of great prosperity and stability; it was even shrinking the inequality gap that had historically defined it and hampered its growth. Brazil had already been chosen to host the 2014 World Cup and its final match would be in Rio. On the other hand, the city's challenges loomed large: Security was an issue, as were transportation and pollution. But the chance to make a big impact was tempting to the organization, which had grown since the 1970s from a low-key, low-budget organization into the powerful, wealthy institution we know today, in part by raising the profile of the Olympics from a sporting competition into a expensive extravaganza whose cost was justified by the impetus it created for positive urban renewal. Rio would be the ultimate example of this type of Olympics-plus.
In the years following the IOC vote, Rio authorities implemented several programs that, if successful, would have indeed changed for the better millions of lives. (These were both state and city programs; the city of Rio has more than six million residents; the greater Rio metropolitan area has more than 12 million residents, comprising the majority of the state of Rio's 16 million residents.)
The targets of two of the most promising programs – Morar Carioca, a housing improvement program, and the UPP, or Units of Pacification Police, a policing program – were Rio's favelas. These are communities built by poor or low-income workers without other options in a city that has historically lacked affordable housing. Many lack access to basic services and are underserved by public education, health and transportation.
Set against this context, the programs proposed in the years leading up to the 2016 Olympics represented an important break with the past. In the mayor's words, Morar Carioca would be the main social legacy of the games.
It was a participative, progressive project that polled favela residents about their needs, and aimed to bring basic services – everything from sewage systems to street lighting and green recreational spaces – to all of Rio's favelas. The UPP project would bring community policing into areas long abandoned to criminal organizations, reducing violence and also helping to fold these communities into the urban fabric. Together, they could radically improve the quality of life for the nearly one in four Rio residents who live in favelas.
Now that the Games are nearing the end, it's time to re-examine those promises, not just for the sake of Rio, but because they go to the core of the urban transformation on which these bigger, more expensive Olympic Games are predicated.
The Olympics have indeed reshaped Rio, at a cost of $4.6-billion for sporting venues and of nearly $20-billion total. This is particularly true of the wealthy west side, which is the geographic heart of the Games and Mayor Eduardo Paes's political base (he started his political career as submayor of the sprawling suburban region in 1993.)
The neighbourhood has new transportation infrastructure – a Bus Rapid Transit system and an extension of the metro – and is home to the new world-class golf course, the Olympic Park and the athletes' village, among other interventions. All this has been a boon to long-term real estate values and to growth in this high-rent region that, with its highways, malls and gated communities, often draws comparisons to Miami.
The other side of Rio did not fare as well. Instead of improvements to favelas, what Rio saw in these last seven years was a renewal of the favela demolitions that had scarred the city decades ago. The process started with a list of 119 communities that were designated for removal less than three months after the IOC vote, and ended with more than 67,000 people losing their homes in various redevelopment projects.
One of them, Vila Autodromo, is a short walk from the Olympic Park. It became a symbol of resistance when its residents fought off efforts to destroy their homes for years.
Now, visitors streaming toward Olympic venues can see what remains: the 20 homes of remaining residents surrounded by a vast, and nearly empty, parking lot.
The policing program, known as UPP in its Portuguese acronym, had a promising start. Its goal, unlike other police actions in the past, was not to end drug trade, but to reclaim the territory from the control of drug-dealing gangs, reducing violence and crime. Research showed that violent deaths and other crimes plummeted in the wake of the program.
But the pressure to expand it in time for the World Cup and Olympics strained the program. There were not enough trained officers or funds to keep pace; communities such as Complexo do Alemao and the Complexo da Mare were under military occupation for more than a year, leading to serious conflict with residents and allegations of human-rights abuses. The program began deteriorating in 2013, with crimes – including murders by police officers, and of police officers – starting to go back up.
By 2016, it was stalled; no new UPPs are planned for this year, and the future of the program is in question.
Much has changed, and for the worse, in Brazil since that bright, optimistic moment when thousands crowded along Copacabana beach to commemorate the IOC vote. Many of those changes – economic and political, domestic and international – have nothing to do with Rio hosting the Olympics.
But it is possible to identify how hosting and the related obligations captured local priorities, funding and schedules, to the detriment of the majority of the population. As we remember the amazing feats of Olympic athletes, it's also time to remember that the focus of the Olympics is sports, not city planning. Let Rio be an expensive lesson for other cities who hope to host in the future.
Juliana Barbassa is a Brazilian journalist and author of Dancing with the Devil in the City of God: Rio de Janeiro on the Brink.