Urbanização contemporânea: uma contribuição para o estudo das cidades

Abstract

Far from losing its importance in the times of globalization and electronic communication, the city has confirmed its central position in all dimensions of the social totality. Even in non-urban areas, one can see the influence of decisions taken inside the cities, especially in those that concentrate multinational companies headquarters. Thus, with the constant growing of the urbanization throughout the planet, the struggle for appropriate urban centers is indispensable for a satisfactory existence of the human being. Hence, this work tries to bring forward a general picture of the Contemporary Urbanization and the role that cities have being playing within the Informational Society, in order to offer to those who work with urban phenomena some basis to act satisfactorily in the present context. From a characterization of the main features of the Contemporary Urbanization, we pursuit showing the recent path of the west urbanization, emphasizing which processes and phenomena are unique to contemporary cities. We do this in order to achieve a correct perception of the present urban reality especially, the brazilian one.