State and urban public policies: main policies aimed at rural migrants and residents of peripheral settlements in the urban space, period 2018-2021

Abstract

The city in recent decades is a relevant theme in Latin America, as it becomes a center of economic and political power and also a confluence of large populations and numerous migrations (Álvarez & Delgado, 2014). One of the biggest concerns of poor migrants arriving in cities is economic insecurity. This insecurity is caused by a variety of factors and by a weak institutional capacity that reduces the efficiency and coverage of public policies that seek to meet the needs of the population living in poverty (Maldonado et al., 2011). This situation of weakness and/or lack of public policies that causes the population to flee from rural areas also occurs in the city, producing an increase in precarious urban settlements where the living conditions of the population show poverty and marginalization. The objective of the research is to survey and analyze the urban public policies aimed at rural migrants to the city and the inhabitants of the settlements in the period 2018-2021 in four settlements of two municipalities of the metropolitan area of Asunción. The research is descriptive and analytical with a qualitative approach. In the selected settlements it was found that the scope of public and social policies is limited. First, because social investments are subject to the regularization of the occupation and second, because of the ineffectiveness of public institutions and the patronage practices of politicians. This situation generates self-management initiatives to partially mitigate the basic needs of families.