FRAGMENTATION OF TERRITORIAL ADMINISTRATION

NOTES TO CONTRIBUTE TO A DEBATE ON THE CREATION OF MUNICIPALITIES

Abstract

The background of this article stems from reflections concerning the debates which have taken place arising from the demands of representations from the Assocation of Brazilian Geographers to the National Council for the Cities concerning the elaboration of criteria for the creation of municipalities, following a process of intense fragmentation within the political administration. The core of the problem is to identify the fundamentals, and the implications of this process for the national territory, based on the hypothesis that fragmentation became a political strategy for the insertion of “portions of space” in the production chain, promoting reproduction of power relations thereby enabling the production and maintenance of conditions aimed at promoting specific ventures in certain areas of the economy. The implications of this movement, occurring principally in the 1990s, relate to segregated spatial configurations with the formation of some municipalities as hubs of wealth while others bear the burden of being pushed into the mercantile chain. Nowadays, the debate focuses on the elaboration of the legal apparatus which presents criteria for the creation of new municipalities and inhibits the consequences of the process of fragmentation in the national territory.