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272Towards safer and more secure citiesBox 11.8 Brazil’s City StatuteVery few localgovernments haveadopted policies thatexplicitly draw onhuman rights andnone, at present, useinternational humanrights to informtheir planning andprogrammingDespite … decentralizationpolicies… land managementstill tends to dependupon central orfederal governmentsThe City Statute, or the Brazilian Federal Law on UrbanDevelopment, was adopted in 2001. It defines the framework, principlesand instruments to regulate the use of land for social purposes,the recognition of informal settlements as part of the city and thesubject of rights, the democratic participation in urban management,and the empowerment of the municipalities as the main local agentsentitled to regulate land usage and occupation.One of the major components of the City Statute is that itincludes provisions to simplify the regularization of informal landoccupations. Before the adoption of this law, the regularizationprocess in São Paulo included 80 steps, making approval of informalsettlements virtually impossible, thus ensuring that the expansion ofsettlements could only occur in irregular ways. The City Statutethus allows for the decentralization of urban planning, thereby facilitatingthe work of municipal governments in developing local plans.The City Statute is particularly innovative by introducingclear regulations governing democratic participation of civil societyin urban planning and management. The municipalities must arrangetheir decision-making procedures in such a way that all theconcerned parties can participate directly in the process of designingpublic policy, as well as in the subsequent management ofprogrammes on housing, land and urban planning, which result fromsuch policies. In essence, the statute empowers local government,through laws, urban planning and management tools, to determinehow best to balance individual and collective interests in urban land.The statute seeks to deter speculation and non-use ofurban land (through taxation) so that land can be freed to providehousing space for the urban poor. Among many unique elements ofthe statute is the envisaged use of adverse possession rights (seeArticles 8 and 9 below) to establish secure tenure and to enforceSource: Estatuto das Cidades-Lei Federal no 10.257, 10 July 2001 (City Statute); Polis, 2002; Commission on Legal Empowerment of the Poor, 2006b, pp5–6SUPPORTING THE VITALROLE OF LOCALGOVERNMENTThe role of local government in diagnosing security of tenureconditions and then acting to provide security of tenure toall, within the shortest possible timeframe, is a vitally importantcomponent of any successful security of tenure policy.However, security of tenure is not the only concern of publicbodies at the municipal level; local government responsibilitiesthe world over are expanding, with many localgovernments effectively inundated with new powers andresponsibilities, including the provision of services related tohealth, education, housing, water supply, policing, taxationand other matters. Its relevance to political empowerment,citizen involvement and delivery of public services hasmeant that local government has become a major arena ofpolicy formulation. It is estimated that such processes areunder way in some 80 per cent of all developing and transitioncountries. 37However, while the localization of governance hasmany positive features, weak and under-resourced localthe social function of urban property.Yet, it should be noted thatdespite the City Statute, the poor remain excluded from officialentitlements such as identity cards and social services.Several articles of the City Statute provide the basis forperhaps the first legislative recognition in any country of the essential‘right to the city’ as a basic element of citizenship and humanrights:• Article 2 states that the purpose of the urban policy is tosupport development of the social functions of the city and ofurban property through a number of guidelines, includingguaranteeing the right to sustainable cities. This is understoodas the right to urban land, housing, environmental sanitation,urban infrastructure, transportation and public services, and towork and leisure for current and future generations.• Article 8 entitles local governments to expropriate unusedurban land after a period of five years if the obligation of theowner of the land to subdivide, build or use the property is notmet.• Article 9 entitles anyone who has possession of an urban areaor building of less than 250 square metres for five years ormore the right to title of dominion. The main provisions arethat the land or building has been in the possession uninterruptedlyand without contestation; that they use it for theirown or their family’s residence; and that the claimant is not theowner of any other real estate. The article also states that titlewill be conferred to men or women alike irrespective of theirmarital status; that the same possessor can only make use ofthis adverse possession entitlement once in their lives; and thatthe title can be transferred through inheritance.governments are far more common than those with the politicalwill and financial basis for remedying tenure insecurity.One of the major problems, from the perspective of urbansecurity and safety, is that very few local governments haveadopted policies that explicitly draw on human rights andnone, at present, use international human rights to informtheir planning and programming. There are, however, signsof positive developments in this regard as some local governmentshave joined up in the Cities for Human Rightsmovement, which is working towards the development of aCharter of Human Rights in the City. Other local governmentsare developing their own city charters. 38Yet, despite the fact that decentralization policies inmany countries have led to the transfer of responsibilities forurban management to local governments, land managementstill tends to depend upon central or federal governments. Ingeneral, national governments are still responsible for theregulation of land tenure, taxation systems and the registrationof property rights and transactions. Furthermore, theadministration of these tends to fall under the responsibilityof regional delegations of central government agencies,rather than that of local governments. The main problemwith this central government control over land management,