CENTRE for LATIN AMERICAN
RESEARCH and DOCUMENTATION

The edge of the law: Street vendors and the erosion of citizenship in São Paulo

SPEAKER:  Jacinto Cuvi, Université Libre de Bruxelles
DISCUSSANT: Kees Koonings, CEDLA-UvA
DATE: 18 September 2026
TIME: 15:30-17:00
​ACTIVITY: CEDLA LECTURE
VENUE:  VOX-POP, Binnengasthuisstraat 9, Amsterdam

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Paulo As in many other cities in Latin America, street vendors form a significant share of the workforce in São Paulo. But their ubiquity masks perpetual struggle. Some have the right to practice their trade; others do not. All of them strive to make it—or stay afloat. Jacinto Cuvi introduces us to the world of street vendors and teases out the relationship between the making of legality and the experience of citizenship. As São Paulo’s city government undertakes a large-scale eviction campaign, this lecture reveals how the lines can be redrawn between work that is legal and work that takes place running from the police. Alongside the mechanics of disenfranchisement, the presentation captures the lived experience of criminalization among vendors who continually reinvent strategies to eke out a living as informal citizens at the edge of the law.

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Picture information
Author: Darwin Boaventura / Unsplash
Location: Av. Paulista, Bela Vista, São Paulo, SP, Brazil
Licence: Free to use under the Unsplash License

Turning (Far) Right? Populism and Electoral Cycles in Latin America

SPEAKERS: Nayara Albrecht (Political Science - UvA), Kees Koonings (CEDLA - UvA & UU), Nicolás Rodríguez Idarraga (CEDLA - UvA), Diego Salazar Morales (Leiden University), Soledad Valdivia Rivera (Leiden University), Julienne Weegels (CEDLA - UvA)

MODERATORS: Gabriela Alberola (Political Science – UvA) and Barbara Hogenboom (CEDLA - UvA)

DATE: 9 October 2026

TIME: 15:00-17:00

ACTIVITY: Roundtable co-organised by CEDLA and Political Science - UvA

VENUE: VOX-POP, Binnengasthuisstraat 9, Amsterdam

REGISTRATION: Registration is encouraged, but walk-ins are welcome. Please register here if you want to receive an invite and a reminder.

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In 2026, Latin America has returned to the centre of global political debate, with far‑right and populist forces gaining ground across the region. This roundtable explores what the latest elections and outcomes mean for public policy, representation, democratic institutions and human rights. Drawing on recent developments in countries such as Colombia, Brazil, Peru, and Bolivia, speakers will discuss common trends and differences in populism and electoral cycles, and reflect on possible futures for democracy in Latin America.

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This year - which started with the US intervention in Venezuela - has seen presidential elections in Costa Rica, Bolivia, Peru and Colombia, and soon also in Brazil. Despite differences and often very tight margins, the latest results confirm the region’s political trend of the past few years: right-wing parties and far-right movements and politicians are on the rise. This raises questions about the nature, causes and effects of the latest regional political cycle. While Latin America has often seen alternating phases of left‑wing and right‑wing governments, and alternation in power can be healthy for democracies, the rise of the (far) right has often been followed by policies that reduce public services, by conservative discourses targeting women, indigenous, black and/or queer people, and by setbacks in civil rights. More recently, the expansion of far-right populism has been fuelled by social media, fake news and support from foreign powers.

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This roundtable will discuss electoral and political trends in Latin America, with particular attention to how recent elections reshape ideological conflicts, deepen political polarisation, and affect democracy. Each country expert will offer a brief presentation, followed by a general discussion with the audience on the region’s possible futures.

Other Possible Futures: Art, Memory, and Care in Exile

SPEAKERS: Open call – scholars, artists, community organisers and people with direct experience are invited to contribute

DATE: Saturday, 17 October 2026

TIME: 16:00–21:00

ACTIVITY: Roundtable – Other Possible Futures: Art, Memory, and Care in Exile

VENUE: Lola Lieven, Amsterdam

ORGANIZATION: This roundtable is organized by Nicaraguan and Colombian communities in exile in the Netherlands, together with dr. Julienne Weegels, Adrián Ortega Lobo and Mick Sarria, with the support of the University of Amsterdam Centre for Migration studies (ARC-M) and the ARTES Violence & Political Justice cluster.

REGISTRATION: Open call for presentations – deadline Monday, 14 September at 17:00. Submit here

Building on Nicaraguan and Colombian exiles’ artistic communal practices in the Netherlands, this roundtable invites the sharing of art initiatives and research by and/or with refugee communities. At once subject to political persecution in their countries and to various forms of othering in and through the Dutch asylum system, these communities seek ways to process their grief, remain culturally or politically active, and build transformative futures. With this roundtable, we aim to explore connections along the lines of care practices, art, memory, solidarity, communal organization, and future imaginaries with other exile communities and researchers in the Netherlands/Europe. It is a space to think together about memories of exile, while also holding space for the present and for imagining other possible futures in and beyond exile.

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This space intends to open discussions on:

1.      Methodological and theoretical ways to think about the political, social, and creative dimensions of refugee community and solidarity organizing

2.      Textual and non-textual narratives of exile that decenter the past as the only exile narrative

3.      The multiple ways of care among human and more-than-human bodies amid the political tensions in Europe around asylum seeking

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We invite scholars at any career stage, as well as anyone outside academia with direct experience, artistic practice, or reflection on these themes, to share a short presentation at this roundtable, which is envisioned for a broad public and will take place with exile participants. Presentations may take the form of a brief talk, a reading, or the sharing of a creative or community-based project. Below are some of the themes we hope to explore in conversation, along with guiding questions for those who wish to present:

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·         Art in exile. What role does art play in processing and expressing the experience of exile? How do these creative practices intertwine with political denunciation and memory preservation? What possibilities, and what limits, does communal art hold for building solidarity and dialogue across different exile communities?

·         Exilic memory. How is the memory of exile transmitted within exile communities living in the Netherlands/Europe? What justice-seeking and memory-preserving initiatives do exile communities build, and toward what ends?

·         Care practices in exile. How is care, individual and collective, sustained and practiced among exile communities? What forms of mutual support emerge in the face of the emotional toll of persecution, displacement, and the asylum system? How is this work of care recognized, or not, by institutions, academia, or the ‘host society’?

·         Other possible futures. What futures do exile communities already imagine and practice, in the present? How do restorative and future-making imaginaries take shape within communal and creative exile initiatives?

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Please submit your expression of interest in presenting by Monday 14 September, 17:00, here. We will then be in touch with you and compose the program, which will be shared with all participants and the public on 21 September. Much looking forward to hearing from you!

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South-South migration, urban informality and transnational care:
The migrant body and an embodied research approach    

SPEAKER:  Tanja Bastia, University of Manchester
DISCUSSANT: Paolo Boccagni, University of Trento
DATE: 6 November 2026
TIME: 15:30-17:00
​ACTIVITY: CEDLA LECTURE
VENUE:  VOX-POP, Binnengasthuisstraat 9, Amsterdam

​Tanja Bastia's lecture brings migration studies and urban informality into dialogue by showing how each has overlooked dimensions central to understanding contemporary urban life. It argues that migration research has often been constrained by methodological nationalism, while studies of urban informality have tended to treat migrants primarily as neighbours, overlooking how legal status, transnational ties, cultural practices, and mobility shape urban experiences. Drawing on recent research on transnational care, the lecture explores how migration reconfigures care for ageing parents across and beyond urban, rural, and peri-urban spaces. Finally, it proposes the migrant body as a unifying analytical lens to bridge disciplinary divides and illuminate the intersections of migration, care, embodiment, and urban transformation.    

Multispecies technical democracy: Earth observation and the rights of nature in Ecuador

SPEAKER:  Jorge Núñez Vega, UvA
DISCUSSANT: Karolien van Teijlingen, Radboud University
DATE: 4 December 2026
TIME: 15:30-17:00
​ACTIVITY: CEDLA LECTURE
VENUE:  VOX-POP, Binnengasthuisstraat 9, Amsterdam

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Since the 1970s, states and corporations have produced satellite images to map, manage, and exploit the environment. Earth observation, as this practice is called, has mostly been deployed in resource extraction, scanning the planet for minerals, petroleum, and natural gas. But in recent decades, this technology has been taken up by new hands for environmental justice and ecological reconstruction. In this talk, Jorge Núñez Vega analyzes the formation of a research collective concerned with the defense of the rights of nature in Ecuador, amid a government-declared internal armed conflict. The Earth Imagination Network brings together communities affected by contamination, remote sensing experts, environmental lawyers, and multimodal artists. Through collaborative satellite visualizations, this collective explores who can speak for nature in the realms of politics, economics, and ethics. Ultimatelly, what is at stake is the possibility of seeing Earth not only as a damaged environment in need of protection, but also as a living ecology with democratic voice.