TEDGlobal 2014
Alessandra Orofino: It’s our city. Let’s fix it
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Too often, people feel checked out of politics — even at the level of their own city. But urban activist Alessandra Orofino thinks that can change, using a mix of tech and old-fashioned human connection. Sharing examples from her hometown of Rio, she says: "It is up to us to decide whether we want schools or parking lots, recycling projects or construction sites, cars or buses, loneliness or solidarity."
Alessandra Orofino - Political mobilization activist
Alessandra Orofino founded Meu Rio, Rio de Janeiro’s largest mobilization network. Full bio
Alessandra Orofino founded Meu Rio, Rio de Janeiro’s largest mobilization network. Full bio
Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.
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Fifty-four percent of the world's population
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lives in our cities.
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In developing countries,
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one third of that population
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is living in slums.
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Seventy-five percent of global energy consumption
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occurs in our cities,
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and 80 percent of gas emissions
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that cause global warming
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come from our cities.
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So things that you and I might think about
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as global problems,
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like climate change, the energy crisis
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or poverty,
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are really, in many ways, city problems.
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They will not be solved
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unless people who live in cities,
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like most of us,
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actually start doing a better job,
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because right now, we are
not doing a very good one.
not doing a very good one.
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And that becomes very clear
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when we look into three aspects of city life:
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first, our citizens' willingness to engage
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with democratic institutions;
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second, our cities' ability to really include
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all of their residents;
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and lastly, our own ability
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to live fulfilling and happy lives.
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When it comes to engagement,
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the data is very clear.
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Voter turnout around the world
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peaked in the late '80s,
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and it has been declining at a pace
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that we have never seen before,
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and if those numbers are bad at the national level,
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at the level of our cities,
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they are just dismal.
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In the last two years,
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two of the world's most consolidated,
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oldest democracies, the U.S. and France,
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held nationwide municipal elections.
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In France, voter turnout hit a record low.
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Almost 40 percent of voters decided
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not to show up.
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In the U.S., the numbers were even scarier.
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In some American cities,
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voter turnout was close to five percent.
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I'll let that sink in for a second.
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We're talking about democratic cities
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in which 95 percent of people
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decided that it was not important
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to elect their leaders.
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The city of L.A., a city of four million people,
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elected its mayor with just a bit over 200,000 votes.
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That was the lowest turnout the city had seen
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in 100 years.
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Right here, in my city of Rio,
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in spite of mandatory voting,
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almost 30 percent of the voting population
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chose to either annul their votes
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or stay home and pay a fine
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in the last mayoral elections.
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When it comes to inclusiveness,
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our cities are not the best cases of success either,
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and again, you don't need to look very far
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in order to find proof of that.
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The city of Rio is incredibly unequal.
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This is Leblon.
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Leblon is the city's richest neighborhood.
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And this is Complexo do Alemão.
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This is where over 70,000
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of the city's poorest residents live.
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Leblon has an HDI, a Human Development Index,
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of .967.
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That is higher than Norway, Switzerland
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or Sweden.
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Complexo do Alemão has an HDI of .711.
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It sits somewhere in between the HDI
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of Algeria and Gabon.
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So Rio, like so many cities across the global South,
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is a place where you can go from northern Europe
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to sub-Saharan Africa
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in the space of 30 minutes.
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If you drive, that is.
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If you take public transit, it's about two hours.
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And lastly, perhaps most importantly,
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cities, with the incredible wealth
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of relations that they enable,
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could be the ideal places for human happiness
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to flourish.
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We like being around people.
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We are social animals.
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Instead, countries where urbanization
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has already peaked seem to be the very countries
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in which cities have stopped making us happy.
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The United States population has suffered
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from a general decrease in happiness
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for the past three decades,
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and the main reason is this.
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The American way of building cities
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has caused good quality public spaces
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to virtually disappear in many,
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many American cities,
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and as a result, they have seen
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a decline of relations,
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of the things that make us happy.
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Many studies show an increase
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in solitude and a decrease in solidarity,
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honesty, and social and civic participation.
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So how do we start building cities
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that make us care?
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Cities that value their most important asset:
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the incredible diversity
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of the people who live in them?
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Cities that make us happy?
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Well, I believe that if we want to change
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what our cities look like,
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then we really have to change
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the decision-making processes
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that have given us the results
that we have right now.
that we have right now.
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We need a participation revolution,
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and we need it fast.
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The idea of voting as our
only exercise in citizenship
only exercise in citizenship
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does not make sense anymore.
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People are tired of only being treated
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as empowered individuals every few years
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when it's time to delegate that power
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to someone else.
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If the protests that swept Brazil
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in June 2013 have taught us anything,
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it's that every time we try
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to exercise our power
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outside of an electoral context,
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we are beaten up, humiliated or arrested.
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And this needs to change,
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because when it does,
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not only will people re-engage
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with the structures of representation,
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but also complement these structures
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with direct, effective, and
collective decision making,
collective decision making,
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decision making of the kind
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that attacks inequality
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by its very inclusive nature,
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decision making of the kind
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that can change our cities
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into better places for us to live.
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But there is a catch, obviously:
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Enabling widespread participation
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and redistributing power
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can be a logistical nightmare,
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and there's where technology can play
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an incredibly helpful role,
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by making it easier for people to organize,
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communicate and make decisions
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without having to be in the same room
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at the same time.
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Unfortunately for us,
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when it comes to fostering democratic processes,
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our city governments have not used technology
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to its full potential.
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So far, most city governments have been effective
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at using tech to turn citizens into human sensors
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who serve authorities with data on the city:
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potholes, fallen trees or broken lamps.
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They have also, to a lesser extent,
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invited people to participate in improving
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the outcome of decisions
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that were already made for them,
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just like my mom when I was eight
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and she told me that I had a choice:
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I had to be in bed by 8 p.m.,
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but I could choose my pink
pajamas or my blue pajamas.
pajamas or my blue pajamas.
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That's not participation,
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and in fact, governments have not been very good
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at using technology to enable participation
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on what matters —
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the way we allocate our budget,
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the way we occupy our land,
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and the way we manage our natural resources.
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Those are the kinds of decisions
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that can actually impact global problems
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that manifest themselves in our cities.
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The good news is,
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and I do have good news to share with you,
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we don't need to wait for governments to do this.
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I have reason to believe
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that it's possible for citizens to build
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their own structures of participation.
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Three years ago, I cofounded an organization
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called Meu Rio,
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and we make it easier for people in the city of Rio
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to organize around causes and places
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that they care about in their own city,
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and have an impact on those causes and places
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every day.
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In these past three years, Meu Rio grew
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to a network of 160,000 citizens of Rio.
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About 40 percent of those
members are young people
members are young people
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aged 20 to 29.
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That is one in every 15 young people
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of that age in Rio today.
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Amongst our members is this adorable little girl,
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Bia, to your right,
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and Bia was just 11 years old
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when she started a campaign using one of our tools
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to save her model public school from demolition.
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Her school actually ranks among the best
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public schools in the country,
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and it was going to be demolished
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by the Rio de Janeiro state government
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to build, I kid you not,
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a parking lot for the World Cup
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right before the event happened.
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Bia started a campaign, and we even watched
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her school 24/7 through webcam monitoring,
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and many months afterwards,
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the government changed their minds.
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Bia's school stayed in place.
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There's also Jovita.
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She's an amazing woman whose daughter
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went missing about 10 years ago,
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and since then, she has been looking
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for her daughter.
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In that process, she found out
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that first, she was not alone.
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In the last year alone, 2013,
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6,000 people disappeared
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in the state of Rio.
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But she also found out that in spite of that,
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Rio had no centralized intelligence system
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for solving missing persons cases.
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In other Brazilian cities, those systems
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have helped solve up to 80 percent
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of missing persons cases.
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She started a campaign,
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and after the secretary of
security got 16,000 emails
security got 16,000 emails
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from people asking him to do this,
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he responded, and started to build a police unit
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specializing in those cases.
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It was open to the public at the end of last month,
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and Jovita was there
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giving interviews and being very fancy.
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And then, there is Leandro.
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Leandro is an amazing guy
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in a slum in Rio,
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and he created a recycling project in the slum.
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At the end of last year, December 16,
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he received an eviction order
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by the Rio de Janeiro state government
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giving him two weeks to leave the space
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that he had been using for two years.
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The plan was to hand it over to a developer,
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who planned to turn it into a construction site.
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Leandro started a campaign using one of our tools,
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the Pressure Cooker,
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the same one that Bia and Jovita used,
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and the state government changed their minds
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before Christmas Eve.
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These stories make me happy,
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but not just because they have happy endings.
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They make me happy because they are
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happy beginnings.
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The teacher and parent community at Bia's school
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is looking for other ways they could improve
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that space even further.
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Leandro has ambitious plans
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to take his model to other
low-income communities in Rio,
low-income communities in Rio,
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and Jovita is volunteering at the police unit
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that she helped created.
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Bia, Jovita and Leandro
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are living examples of something
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that citizens and city
governments around the world
governments around the world
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need to know:
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We are ready.
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As citizens, we are ready
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to decide on our common destinies,
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because we know that the way we distribute power
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says a lot about how we actually value everyone,
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and because we know
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that enabling and participating in local politics
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is a sign that we truly care
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about our relations to one another,
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and we are ready to do this
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in cities around the world right now.
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With the Our Cities network,
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the Meu Rio team
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hopes to share what we have learned
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with other people who want to create
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similar initiatives in their own cities.
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We have already started doing it in São Paulo
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with incredible results,
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and want to take it to cities around the world
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through a network of citizen-centric,
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citizen-led organizations
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that can inspire us,
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challenge us, and remind us to demand
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real participation in our city lives.
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It is up to us
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to decide whether we want schools
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or parking lots,
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community-driven recycling projects
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or construction sites,
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loneliness or solidarity, cars or buses,
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and it is our responsibility to do that now,
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for ourselves, for our families,
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for the people who make our lives worth living,
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and for the incredible creativity,
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beauty, and wonder that make our cities,
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in spite of all of their problems,
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the greatest invention of our time.
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Obrigado. Thank you.
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(Applause)
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ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Alessandra Orofino - Political mobilization activistAlessandra Orofino founded Meu Rio, Rio de Janeiro’s largest mobilization network.
Why you should listen
After working as a field researcher in Brazil and India, interviewing young girls who had been victims of domestic violence, Alessandra Orofino founded Meu Rio in 2011. The organization has fueled bottom-up local politics using a combination of on-the-ground actions and custom-designed online and mobile platforms and apps.
Orofino, who's 25 years old with a degree in economics and human rights from Columbia, is a believer in participatory politics and in cities as the ideal locus for reinventing representative democracy, and with her team she has designed Meu Rio as a catalyst for youth activism. Among its 140,000 members are tens of thousands of millennials, identifying common issues, pooling ideas for solutions, and pressuring decision-makers to adopt new policies and practices.
Alessandra Orofino | Speaker | TED.com