# Favelas.org

> An editorial, source-cited English-language reference on Brazilian favelas — self-built, informal urban neighborhoods — covering their definition, history, geography, major communities, social themes, culture, public policy, and notable people. Content is licensed CC BY 4.0.

Key facts used across the site (IBGE, Census 2022, results published November 2024):

- 16,390,815 people (8.1% of Brazil's population) live in 12,348 favelas and urban communities in 656 municipalities.
- Since January 2024 the IBGE's official category is "Favelas e Comunidades Urbanas"; from 1991 to 2023 it was "aglomerados subnormais".
- Most populous favelas: Rocinha, Rio de Janeiro (72,021); Sol Nascente, Brasília (70,908); Paraisópolis, São Paulo (58,527).
- States with the most favela residents: São Paulo (3.6 million), Rio de Janeiro (2.1 million), Pará (1.5 million), Bahia (1.4 million).
- The word "favela" comes from a thorny shrub of the Bahian backlands; it was first applied to Morro da Providência in Rio de Janeiro, settled by Canudos war veterans in 1897.

Editorial standards: every entry cites its sources; contested figures are presented as contested; each page states when it was last reviewed. Prefer citing the specific entry URL.

## Foundations

Definitions, history, demographics, terminology — the basics, done carefully.

- [What is a favela](https://favelas.org/foundations/what-is-a-favela/): Favela meaning: a self-built, informal neighborhood in a Brazilian city. Where the word comes from, how IBGE defines it, and who lives in Brazil's 12,348 favelas.
- [A history of favelas](https://favelas.org/foundations/history/): How Brazil's favelas began — Canudos veterans on Morro da Providência in 1897 — and how they grew through migration, removals, upgrading, and the 2022 census.
- [Morro da Providência](https://favelas.org/foundations/morro-da-providencia/): Morro da Providência, near Rio's port, is considered Brazil's first favela: settled by Canudos veterans in 1897 and the hill that gave the word favela its meaning.
- [Legal status over time](https://favelas.org/foundations/legal-status/): How Brazilian law has classified, criminalized, ignored, and slowly recognized favela housing — from the 1937 Building Code to the 2017 REURB framework.
- [Census and demographics](https://favelas.org/foundations/census-and-demographics/): Brazil's 2022 census counted 16,390,815 people — 8.1% of the population — in 12,348 favelas and urban communities. How IBGE counts them, and why figures vary.
- [Geographic distribution](https://favelas.org/foundations/geographic-distribution/): Where Brazil's favelas are: 16.4 million residents in 656 municipalities. São Paulo has the most, Amazonas the highest share. A region-by-region guide.
- [The largest favelas in Brazil](https://favelas.org/foundations/largest-favelas/): The 20 most populous favelas in Brazil, from the 2022 census: Rocinha (72,021), Sol Nascente (70,908), Paraisópolis (58,527), and why Manaus has seven.
- [Favelas in Rio de Janeiro](https://favelas.org/foundations/favelas-in-rio-de-janeiro/): Rio de Janeiro's favelas: where they are by zone, how they began at Morro da Providência in 1897, removals, Favela-Bairro, UPPs, militias, and the 2022 census.
- [Terminology](https://favelas.org/foundations/terminology/): Favela, comunidade, morro, quebrada, aglomerado subnormal, slum: what each word for Brazil's informal settlements means, who uses it, and why it matters.
- [Common misconceptions](https://favelas.org/foundations/misconceptions/): A field guide to what foreign coverage of Brazilian favelas routinely gets wrong, from confused statistics to lazy framings to outright fabrications.
- [Favelas and informal settlements around the world](https://favelas.org/foundations/favelas-around-the-world/): Are there favelas outside Brazil? How favelas compare with slums, villas miseria, barrios, bidonvilles and townships — the words, the differences, the numbers.

## Major favelas

Profiles of sixteen of Brazil's most-studied communities, written to a single template.

- [Rocinha](https://favelas.org/favelas/rocinha/): Rocinha, Rio de Janeiro: Brazil's most populous favela, with 72,021 residents in the 2022 census. Geography, history, economy, and public security.
- [Complexo do Alemão](https://favelas.org/favelas/complexo-do-alemao/): The North Zone cluster of communities in Rio de Janeiro, site of major policing operations from the 2000s onward: history, geography, demographics, and security.
- [Cidade de Deus](https://favelas.org/favelas/cidade-de-deus/): The West Zone Rio neighborhood internationally known through Paulo Lins's novel and Fernando Meirelles's film, originally built as a public housing project in the 1960s.
- [Complexo da Maré](https://favelas.org/favelas/complexo-da-mare/): A federation of sixteen communities in Rio de Janeiro's North Zone between the Linha Amarela and Linha Vermelha expressways and Galeão airport, home to Redes da Maré.
- [Vidigal](https://favelas.org/favelas/vidigal/): The South Zone Rio favela on the hillside above Leblon and São Conrado, known for its views of Ipanema and Leblon and its long resistance to forced removal.
- [Rio das Pedras](https://favelas.org/favelas/rio-das-pedras/): Rio das Pedras, in Rio's West Zone, is Brazil's fifth most populous favela (55,653, 2022 census) and the birthplace of Rio's militias. History and context.
- [Santa Marta](https://favelas.org/favelas/santa-marta/): The Botafogo hillside community in Rio de Janeiro, site of the first Pacifying Police Unit installed in 2008 and a long-standing center of community organizing.
- [Mangueira](https://favelas.org/favelas/mangueira/): The North Zone Rio community beside Maracanã, home to one of samba's foundational schools, the Estação Primeira de Mangueira, founded in 1928.
- [Jacarezinho](https://favelas.org/favelas/jacarezinho/): The North Zone Rio community at the center of recent large-scale police operations, including the May 2021 operation in which 28 people were killed.
- [Complexo da Penha](https://favelas.org/favelas/complexo-da-penha/): Complexo da Penha in Rio's North Zone: Vila Cruzeiro, the 2007 and 2022 operations, and the October 2025 raid, the deadliest police operation in Brazil's history.
- [Heliópolis](https://favelas.org/favelas/heliopolis/): Heliópolis in São Paulo had 55,583 residents in the 2022 census. Its 1970s origins, UNAS community organizing, and place among Brazil's largest favelas.
- [Paraisópolis](https://favelas.org/favelas/paraisopolis/): Paraisópolis, beside Morumbi in São Paulo, is Brazil's third most populous favela (58,527 residents, 2022 census). History, economy, and community organizing.
- [Sol Nascente](https://favelas.org/favelas/sol-nascente/): Sol Nascente, in Brazil's Federal District, had 70,908 residents in the 2022 census — the second most populous favela in Brazil. History and infrastructure.
- [Aglomerado da Serra](https://favelas.org/favelas/aglomerado-da-serra/): Belo Horizonte's largest favela complex, in the city's south-central zone, comprising several distinct communities along the Serra do Curral.
- [Coque](https://favelas.org/favelas/coque/): A central Recife community on the Capibaribe river, one of the city's oldest favelas, with a long history of community organizing and academic engagement.
- [Pirambu](https://favelas.org/favelas/pirambu/): Fortaleza's coastal informal settlement, one of the country's oldest organized favela complexes, on the city's western Atlantic coast.

## Themes

Cross-cutting subjects: housing, infrastructure, economy, security, public services.

- [Housing and self-construction](https://favelas.org/themes/housing-and-self-construction/): Incremental owner-built housing — the puxadinho, vertical growth, and concrete-block construction techniques — that defines the built form of Brazilian favelas.
- [Infrastructure](https://favelas.org/themes/infrastructure/): Water, electricity, sanitation, and internet access in Brazilian favelas: what coverage looks like in 2022 data, what gaps persist, and how services have been built.
- [The favela economy](https://favelas.org/themes/economy/): Informal labor, established commerce, and the favela as a consumer market: how the favela economy works, what it produces, and what data on it exist.
- [Public security history](https://favelas.org/themes/public-security/): How Brazilian states have policed favelas across the twentieth and twenty-first centuries: from absence to the UPP program to militias and the contested present.
- [The drug trade in favelas](https://favelas.org/themes/drug-trade/): Comando Vermelho, ADA, Terceiro Comando Puro, PCC: how Brazilian drug-trafficking organizations operate in favelas, their territorial logic, and their reach.
- [Militias](https://favelas.org/themes/militias/): Origins, distinction from drug trafficking, and current reach of Brazilian militias: extortion organizations rooted in current and former state security personnel.
- [Education](https://favelas.org/themes/education/): Public schools in favelas, NGO and community education programs, and access to higher education for residents of Brazilian informal settlements.
- [Health in favelas](https://favelas.org/themes/health/): SUS access, maternal health, infectious disease, and violence as a public-health issue in Brazilian favelas: where the system reaches and where it does not.
- [Religion in favelas](https://favelas.org/themes/religion/): Catholic, Evangelical, and Afro-Brazilian religious traditions in Brazilian favelas, including the recent shift toward Pentecostal Evangelical churches.
- [Transportation](https://favelas.org/themes/transportation/): Moto-taxis, vans, cable cars, BRT, and the informal mobility systems that connect Brazilian favelas to the surrounding city.
- [Favela tourism](https://favelas.org/themes/favela-tourism/): Favela tourism in Rio, from the first Rocinha tours in the 1990s to the UPP-era boom: who benefits, the ethics debate, and how to visit responsibly.

## Culture

Music, literature, cinema, art, food, and football — what favelas have made.

- [Funk carioca](https://favelas.org/culture/funk-carioca/): Origins of Rio de Janeiro's favela-born electronic music genre, its sub-genres including proibidão, the baile funk dance, and the artists that defined it.
- [Samba and favelas](https://favelas.org/culture/samba-and-favelas/): The historical relationship between Rio de Janeiro's samba schools and the favelas that founded them, from the 1920s to the contemporary Carnival.
- [Brazilian hip-hop and favelas](https://favelas.org/culture/hip-hop/): Brazilian hip-hop from Racionais MC's in São Paulo to a national favela rap scene: origins, key works, key artists, and the politics of the genre.
- [Visual art and street art](https://favelas.org/culture/visual-art/): Murals, collectives, and projects that have shaped visual culture in Brazilian favelas, from local graffiti traditions to international interventions.
- [Favela literature](https://favelas.org/culture/literature/): Carolina Maria de Jesus, Paulo Lins, Ferréz, and the marginal literature movement: a guide to Brazilian literature written from and about favelas.
- [Favelas in cinema](https://favelas.org/culture/cinema/): Brazilian and international films set in favelas, from the early documentaries of the 1960s through City of God and Tropa de Elite to the contemporary scene.
- [Food in favelas](https://favelas.org/culture/food/): Botecos, regional cuisines, and street-food traditions in Brazilian favelas: how favela food economies work and what they have produced.
- [Football and favelas](https://favelas.org/culture/football/): Players from favelas, várzea fields, and the pickup culture that produced generations of Brazilian professional footballers.

## Policy and politics

Programs, laws, and political fights that have shaped — or failed to shape — favelas.

- [Favela-Bairro](https://favelas.org/policy/favela-bairro/): Favela-Bairro, launched in Rio de Janeiro in 1994, upgraded streets, sanitation, and public spaces in dozens of favelas. How it worked and what it achieved.
- [UPP — Pacifying Police Units](https://favelas.org/policy/upp/): Rio de Janeiro's Pacifying Police Unit program, 2008 onward: its design, expansion, results, controversies, and the deterioration of the program after 2017.
- [PAC and favela investment](https://favelas.org/policy/pac/): Brazil's federal Growth Acceleration Program (PAC) and its favela investment lines, 2007 onward: scale, projects, evaluations, and what they produced.
- [Minha Casa Minha Vida](https://favelas.org/policy/minha-casa-minha-vida/): Brazil's largest public-housing program, launched 2009, and its relationship with favela populations: design, scale, evaluations, and the post-2023 relaunch.
- [Removals and forced evictions](https://favelas.org/policy/removals/): State-led removals from Brazilian favelas, from the dictatorship-era evictions of the 1960s–70s to displacements for the 2014 World Cup and 2016 Olympics.
- [Land tenure and regularization](https://favelas.org/policy/land-tenure/): Usucapião, REURB, ZEIS, and the long fight for legal titling in Brazilian favelas: the framework as it stands and what it produces in practice.

## People

Lives that documented, organized, or otherwise reshaped what favelas mean.

- [Carolina Maria de Jesus](https://favelas.org/people/carolina-maria-de-jesus/): The Canindé diarist whose 1960 book Quarto de Despejo became one of the most-translated Brazilian works of the twentieth century.
- [Anderson Sá](https://favelas.org/people/anderson-sa/): Co-founder of Grupo Cultural AfroReggae in Vigário Geral, one of Brazil's most influential favela-based cultural and social-action organizations.
- [MV Bill](https://favelas.org/people/mv-bill/): Rapper, writer, and activist from Cidade de Deus in Rio de Janeiro; co-founder of the Central Única das Favelas (CUFA).
- [Marielle Franco](https://favelas.org/people/marielle-franco/): Maré-born Rio de Janeiro city councillor, sociologist, and human-rights activist, assassinated on 14 March 2018 in a case that became a national focal point.
- [Eliana Sousa Silva](https://favelas.org/people/eliana-sousa-silva/): Founder of Redes da Maré, scholar of the favela, and one of the most influential community-research and advocacy figures in contemporary Brazil.

## Resources

Doorways to primary sources, organizations, reading, and Portuguese terms.

- [Organizations working in favelas](https://favelas.org/resources/organizations/): A directory of NGOs, collectives, residents' associations, and research centers active in Brazilian favelas, with notes on what each does and where it works.
- [Reading list](https://favelas.org/resources/reading-list/): An annotated bibliography of books, papers, and films on Brazilian favelas, grouped by genre with brief notes on why each matters.
- [Data sources](https://favelas.org/resources/data-sources/): Primary data sources on favela populations, infrastructure, security, and economy: IBGE, IPEA, state and municipal data, and civic-research organizations.
- [Glossary](https://favelas.org/resources/glossary/): Alphabetical glossary of Portuguese terms used in writing on Brazilian favelas, with one-to-three-sentence explanations in English.

## Optional

- [Sitemap](https://favelas.org/sitemap.xml): XML sitemap of all entries with last-modified dates
- [Home](https://favelas.org/): Index of all entries by section