The Metropolitan Region of Rio de Janeiro goes through favorable situation including has been chosen to host global events in the coming years. The metropolis polarizes a region rich in natural resources (oil) and is also receiving substantial industrial investments and in urban infrastructure that will change her spatial logic. It is also added the security policies that is changing the paradigm of violent metropolis characterized in recent decades. This article - with character test - is trying to discuss this conjuncture. The premise is that, because of these factors, the image of the metropolis has been changing in a positive way. Methodologically, we first take the city into consideration like a macrosocial phenomena and after we reflect about its intraurban structural problems that interfere in the imaginary people have about it. Theoretically, we use historical, demographic, economic and social studies whose synthesis give us the support in the construction of interpretations about the metropolitan reality today and provide us the subsidies in the reflections presented here
Rio de Janeiro; Demographic trends; The urban economy; The urban policy; The urban culture