Socio-spatial segregation, water insecurity and sanitation: an intersectional view at São Paulo city

Abstract

The article analyzes the relationship between gender, race, and class intersectionality and basic sanitation, focusing on water insecurity and highlighting socio-spatial and environmental segregation in the city of São Paulo. The justification lies in the fact that socio-spatial inequalities, the fragmentation of care, and the privatization of public services have been making access to basic environmental sanitation increasingly precarious, thus rendering it an urgent matter for discussion. In this article, historical-dialectical materialism was adopted as the theoretical-methodological framework. A qualitative-quantitative analysis was conducted using statistical techniques and geoprocessing. As women are held responsible for reproductive and care work in the family routine, they are more directly and indirectly affected by the illness of family members caused by the lack of sanitation. They are also more affected by water insecurity, as household tasks require water usage. Therefore, socio-spatial segregation and the absence of basic sanitation, determined by ethnic-racial and class markers, predominantly impact Black women, revealing the racist, classist, and patriarchal nature of the socio-environmental inequalities present in urban space in São Paulo