Bicycles as resistance: the road paradigm and the role of cyclist activism in São Paulo/SP

Abstract

In this paper, we discuss the inclusion of cycling in the mobility agenda of the city of São Paulo as a resistance process in the configuration of the urban space, which is characterized by the road paradigm and the commodification of the territory, in a neoliberal context. Through a qualitative research, which articulates secondary and primary data, we argue that, in São Paulo, there are resistance movements against the private appropriation of the urban space in the field of mobility. We conclude that cyclist activism has played an important role in the circulation of resistance ideas and in tensioning the road paradigm, being one of the elements that explain the insertion of the bicycle in the city, besides the 2013 protests and the election of Fernando Haddad to the City Hall.

public policy; urban mobility; bicycle; resistance; urban activism