2008 Sandra Regina Baptista ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Forest Recovery and Just Sustainability in the Florianópolis City-Region By SANDRA REGINA BAPTISTA Dissertation Director: Professor Thomas K. Rudel This dissertation examines human-environment interactions in the Florianópolis city- region, Santa Catarina State, Brazil from a just sustainability perspective. I construct an in-depth historical narrative of social and landscape transformations and offer an account of the diverse origins of this expanding metropolis. This historical narrative provides the context for understanding contemporary demographic change, metropolitan land-use, forest-transition dynamics, sociospatial inequalities, legal-institutional reforms, and democratic practice. Employing a multiscalar methodological approach, I integrate documentary research, aerial photos, interviews, participant observation, and site visits. I analyze social and ecological data at nested spatial and organizational scales ranging from neighborhoods to national and global arenas. Results suggest that the Florianópolis city-region has experienced a forest transition from a period of net deforestation caused by extractive and agricultural activities to a period of net forest recovery. Forest recovery has resulted from tree planting with exotic species and the ‘spontaneous’ regeneration of secondary forests. Exotic tree monocultures have been planted since the 1960s. Much of the forest regeneration has occurred since the 1980s during a period characterized by ii decline in agricultural land use, real estate speculation, and the establishment of conservation units and other types of land-use restrictions. The environmental services and amenities associated with the protected-area network have contributed to the ongoing viability of local tourism development and rising real estate prices in well-located neighborhoods. Middle- and upper-income housing construction has accelerated since the 1990s, converting parcels to residential or commercial subdivisions in suburban and peri- urban landscapes. Low-income, self-provisioned, informal settlements have emerged and expanded on ‘marginal,’ ‘peripheral,’ and ‘precarious’ lands, often in locations legally defined as environmentally protected areas and that lack sanitation services. This process of urban dualization has resulted in socioenvironmental injustices by reinforcing and exacerbating differential access to life opportunities and environmental services as well as differential exposure to environmental hazards. I conclude with a discussion of land quality, uneven development, uneven valuation of ecosystems, participatory democracy, possible future scenarios, policy implications, unresolved issues, and suggestions for future research. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I am grateful for the support of many people and institutions over the years. First and foremost, I thank the four members of my dissertation committee for their guidance, patience, encouragement, and inspiring example. My advisor, Tom Rudel has been a steady source of tremendously helpful suggestions and critical feedback. Robin Leichenko, Laura Schneider, and Diane Bates each bring a unique perspective and enormously valuable expertise to this project. I hope to have many more opportunities to work with them in the future. Fellowships from the Graduate School of Rutgers University during three early years as a graduate student (1997–98, 1998–99, and 2000–01) allowed me the necessary time, space, and relationships to study a variety of subjects, to practice necessary skills, to explore ideas, and to refine my research interests. Among the many people at Rutgers who have been my teachers and mentors in one way or another are: Tev Airola (in memoriam), Roger Balm, George Clark, David Ehrenfeld, Joan Ehrenfeld, Peter Guarnaccia, Briavel Holcomb, Bob Lake, Rick Lathrop, Bonnie McCay, Ann Mische, Karen O’Neill, Jasbir Puar, Joanna Regulska, David Robinson, Rick Schroeder, Mike Siegel, Neil Smith, and Elvin Wyly. Thanks to Betty Ann Abbatemarco, Camille Bevere, Geraldine Brustowicz, Elaine Gordon, Theresa Kirby, and Michelle Martel for their assistance over the years. The semesters I spent teaching courses in the Departments of Geography and Human Ecology were also important learning experiences; I thank the many students who participated wholeheartedly in our group efforts. My extended research stay in Florianópolis from 2003 to 2004 was made possible by a fellowship awarded from the International Dissertation Field Research Fellowship iv Program of the Social Science Research Council and the American Council of Learned Societies with funds provided by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Thanks to the IDRF staff for their assistance during and after the fellowship. I am grateful to the many people in Santa Catarina who contributed to this project. Special thanks to Aderbal and Lúcia Coelho (for their kindness and hospitality back in the early 1980s when my fascination with catarinense human and environmental geography began), Maike Hering de Queiroz (in memoriam), Erasmo Tiepo, Ademir Reis, Silvanio Guilherme da Costa, Mônica Godoy, Dora Orth, Emiliana Debetir, Naro Ramos, Isabel Cristina Albuquerque, Masato Kobiyama, Emerson Marcelino, Nazareno Campos, Joel Pellerin, Ewerton Vieira Machado, and Bárbara Lucas Pacheco. Ricardo and Beth Cyrne at the Pousada Jardim dos Colibris were very kind and helpful. I thank my many dear friends and their families who each in their unique ways contributed to my understanding of the history, contemporary dynamics, and possible futures of metropolitan Florianópolis; this list includes Joel, Adriana, Ricardo P., Fabiana A., Ricardo B., Rafaela, Roberto, Karina, Sérgio, Rosinete, Vanuzia, Cristiano, Luciano, Mônica, Gio, Zé Edu, Márcio, Emaldo, Juliana, Fabiana C., Nando, Fabi, Felipe, Floriano, Karin, Gustavo, Gastão, Gian, Peri, Lorene, Carlos, and many others who I may not have gotten to know as well as those named here, but who I had the pleasure of meeting and talking to on at least one occasion. Saudades! Many other good friends have been sources of support, laughter, intellectual growth, and inspiration in various ways along the way: Kate Albert, Carlos Alicea, Bridget Anderson, Jeremy Colangelo-Bryan, Ana Baptista, Anni Bellows, Bob Torres, Jaquetta Bustion, Stan Byers, Bryan Carlson, Chin-fan Chang, Rafael de la Dehesa, v Renaud DePlaen, Salvatore Engel-DiMauro, Galo Estrella, Juliana Farinaci (thank you so much for your help with translating my abstract), Verônica Foerster do Monte França, Abosede George, Banu Ilal, Noriko Ishiyama, Jun Kamata, Aziz Jeng, Ingrid Anderson, Lalitha Kamath, Jessica Kelly, Usma Khan (thanks to you and Asra for the visiting me in Florianópolis), Nicole Konstantinakos, Srini Maloor, Aaron Manire, Carlos Martin, Rayssa Martinez, Ronan McCoy, Susana, Ossie, and Maia Melo-Shepherd, Nandana Mewada and Jagat, Zia Mian, Sharon Weiner, Grace Mitchell, Junko Noguchi, Flávia Nogueira, Sheri Seminski, Julie Silva, Renato da Silva, Nina Siulc, Satsuki Takahashi and Phil, Bansuri Taneja, Michael Tennis, Claudia Villegas, Hong-Ling Wee, and Ronaldo Weigand Jr. Many thanks to the coordinators, instructors, staff, and fellow students of the 1998 Ecology of Amazonian Forests field course (INPA/Smithsonian Institution) for an outstanding learning experience; in particular, thanks to Drs. Eduardo Vintecinque and Aldicir Scariot. Thank you to the wonderful team of instructors and to my fellow participants at the 1999 Center for the Study of Institutions, Population and Environmental Change (CIPEC) Summer Institute on “Environmental Monitoring and Assessment: Applications in the Americas” at Indiana University in Bloomington, co- directed by Drs. Elinor Ostrom and Emilio Moran. I thank Drs. T. Mitchell Aide and H. Ricardo Grau for the opportunity to participate in the symposium on “The Influence of Human Demography and Agriculture on Natural Systems in the Neotropics” held at the 2007 Association of Tropical Biology and Conservation annual meeting in Morelia, Michoacán, Mexico. The Special Feature they organized for the journal Ecology and Society allowed me to publish part of my vi research while I was in the midst of writing my dissertation. Thus sections of Chapter 5 of this dissertation appeared in my 2008 article “Metropolitanization and forest recovery in southern Brazil: a multiscale analysis of the Florianópolis city-region, Santa Catarina State, 1970 to 2005,” Ecology and Society 13(2): 5. Thank you to Tom Rudel, Laura Schneider, and Alexis Buckley (Rutgers) and to Maria Uriarte (Columbia University) for their efforts in organizing the March 2008 MaGrann workshop on “Land-Use Transitions in the Tropics.” Thanks also to the sponsors of the workshop and all the participants for an excellent meeting. Finally, I thank my dear and loving family: my deepest gratitude goes to my partner Michael Brown for his steadfast support, encouragement, and love and for his sense of humor; to his parents, Caridad and Michael; to my parents Renato and Maria Inês, the first ones to cultivate my curiosity about the world and society; to Mark, Shirley, Christine, Ron, Janet, Marquinhos, Nicole, Briannah, Michelle, and Joy; to my extended family of aunts, uncles, and cousins in Brazil. vii DEDICATION I dedicate this dissertation with love to my parents Maria Inês and Renato and to my grandparents Vó Espéria, Vô Monteiro, Vó Prazeres, and Vô Antônio. viii TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION…………………………………………….......ii