Speaker: Telmo Marcon. 26 March 2025 - 2 p.m. (BR) / 6 p.m. (PT)

Discourse on modernisation and progress has always attracted the attention of investors, i.e. those with capital. There is a tendency for public (municipal) managers to leverage these discourses as a way to attract investment and also draw the attention of the local population, as well as tourists. This issue raises a basic question: do the existing city models around the world, especially educating cities, live up to this name and point to projects for a good life and long-term sustainability? There is a consensus among progressive intellectuals that neoliberal discourse has gained hegemony in defence of the market as the great regulator of subjectivities, social organisation and, generically, the destinies of humanity (of cities). This discourse, which has failed in terms of results, persists in the minds of millions of people (many of them extremely poor) and in the practices of many investors and public managers. It seems that we have not learned that we need to plan our actions beyond immediate results. When the goal is solely profit, there is no way to think of a city that is supportive, that is, educational. This is the fundamental contradiction. Other contradictions and paradoxes derive from it.

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