**4. Territoriality and urban pressures**

The immense socio-cultural diversity of Brazil has been accompanied by an extraordinary land diversity that includes different forms of territoriality maintained by traditional communities and populations [60]. Thus, the term "territoriality" is defined as a collective effort of a social group to occupy, use, control and identify itself with a specific portion of its biophysical environment, converting it into the group's "territory" or homeland [61]. However, a threedimensional concept of space is found in the cultural tradition of artisanal fishermen, which encompasses distinct domains of life (ocean, land and sky) imbued with meaning [62], giving such populations a broader notion of territory.

Although artisanal fisheries involve extractist activities conducted in a family economy regimen with specific means of production and striking characteristics in the profile of the laborers, urban growth has been affecting these traditional communities and transforming their forms and functions, which requires new models for understanding the changes imposed by urbanization [57], such as real estate speculation, a reduction in living and working space, disorderly tourism practices, pollution and social exclusion. Rapid urbanization along coastal areas also results in the emission of effluents. The implementation of industrial centers has led to a breakdown of the natural productivity of ecosystems and fishing practices [63], with consequent environmental degradation and the loss of quality of life in traditional commun‐ ities [64].

The tendency toward occupying coastal areas in Brazil has substantially aggravated the impact on artisanal fishery activities. Such areas hold a strategic position in commercial exchanges, concentrating port activities, favoring the establishment of cities and industries and offering numerous recreational attractions to large urban masses [65]. This process has led to the shrinking of fishing areas and territories, with the loss of launching and landing locations as well as fishing grounds.

Northeastern Brazil accounts for 18% of the national territory and has nine coastal states, the most evident characteristic of which is the large concentration of the population along the coast, resulting from centuries-long occupation related to commercial relations with other countries [66–67]. Prior to Brazil's incorporation into the process of globalization, native populations disputed their territorial spaces with real estate developers. Fishermen were forced to form small communities with no basic infrastructure or urban services or began to The urbanization process may not initially affect the traditional nature of fishing communities, but exerts an influence on ways of thinking as well as the very characteristics of fishery activities, compromising the maintenance and continuity of such activities by impeding the transmission of knowledge. As the perpetuation of fishery knowledge occurs orally, with no records to ensure the practice of operations, catch techniques, knowledge regarding fishing grounds and fish species, the maintenance and sustainability of marine artisanal fisheries in urban areas as well as the communities themselves are seriously affected due to the pressures

The immense socio-cultural diversity of Brazil has been accompanied by an extraordinary land diversity that includes different forms of territoriality maintained by traditional communities and populations [60]. Thus, the term "territoriality" is defined as a collective effort of a social group to occupy, use, control and identify itself with a specific portion of its biophysical environment, converting it into the group's "territory" or homeland [61]. However, a threedimensional concept of space is found in the cultural tradition of artisanal fishermen, which encompasses distinct domains of life (ocean, land and sky) imbued with meaning [62], giving

Although artisanal fisheries involve extractist activities conducted in a family economy regimen with specific means of production and striking characteristics in the profile of the laborers, urban growth has been affecting these traditional communities and transforming their forms and functions, which requires new models for understanding the changes imposed by urbanization [57], such as real estate speculation, a reduction in living and working space, disorderly tourism practices, pollution and social exclusion. Rapid urbanization along coastal areas also results in the emission of effluents. The implementation of industrial centers has led to a breakdown of the natural productivity of ecosystems and fishing practices [63], with consequent environmental degradation and the loss of quality of life in traditional commun‐

The tendency toward occupying coastal areas in Brazil has substantially aggravated the impact on artisanal fishery activities. Such areas hold a strategic position in commercial exchanges, concentrating port activities, favoring the establishment of cities and industries and offering numerous recreational attractions to large urban masses [65]. This process has led to the shrinking of fishing areas and territories, with the loss of launching and landing locations as

Northeastern Brazil accounts for 18% of the national territory and has nine coastal states, the most evident characteristic of which is the large concentration of the population along the coast, resulting from centuries-long occupation related to commercial relations with other countries [66–67]. Prior to Brazil's incorporation into the process of globalization, native populations disputed their territorial spaces with real estate developers. Fishermen were forced to form small communities with no basic infrastructure or urban services or began to

imposed by the new developmentalism.

98 Sustainable Urbanization

**4. Territoriality and urban pressures**

such populations a broader notion of territory.

ities [64].

well as fishing grounds.

reside in the periphery of nearby urban centers, also without infrastructure or services [67]. One such example is the real estate pressure that occurred in the 1970s on the urban beaches of Tambaú and Lucena in the city of João Pessoa (state of Paraíba) and currently occurs on Penha Beach in the same city. This is due to the peripheralization process of richer classes of society, who have exchanged residences in the center of town, which has since become more directed toward commerce, for spaces occupied by fishing communities, which are currently highly prized by the real estate industry, thereby compromising the ability of fishing com‐ munities to remain in coastal areas [57]. In the neighborhood of Brasília Teimosa in the city of Recife (state of Pernambuco), where the main office of the Z-01 Fishers' Colony is found and most artisanal fishermen of the city reside, there are longstanding reports of pressure to remove the fishing community from the area. This struggle for the right to use the land, defined as "stubbornness", coincided with the construction of the federal capital (Brasilia) in the center of the country and gave rise to the name of the community: Brasília Teimosa (Stubborn Brasilia) [68–69]. This community continues to face real estate pressure and other social pressures stemming from the economic growth of the state of Pernambuco [43].

Tourism and real estate speculation also exert significant pressures on fishermen in rural areas of northeastern Brazil. Rural communities, such as Prainha do Canto Verde on the coast of the state of Ceará, exhibit much greater strength and organization. Thirty years ago, a Brazilian Court granted this community the recognition of its right to land against a real estate company that declared itself the proprietor of the land. To remain, the inhabitants combined fishing with community tourism managed by the social group itself, which established operational rules, such as the prohibition of sales of land to individuals who were not part of the community [67]. This demonstrates community ties with the location and a feeling of belonging.

Besides the pressure regarding territory due to real estate speculation and tourism, the expansion of capital due to enterprises such as shrimp farming also results in a change in the land structure of rural fishing communities. In Canto do Mangue in the state of Rio Grande do Norte, lands located on the banks of the estuary, which were previously leased to fishermen for family agricultural purposes, began to be the target of private initiatives for the shrimp farming industry with the raising of the exotic species *Litopenaeus vanammei*, which besides occupying areas used by artisanal fishermen, has contributed to the reduction in fish stocks as well as the accelerated degradation of mangroves [30]. This type of activity also leads to the discharge of toxic effluents in bodies of water, the expulsion of the families of fishermen from their places of residence and the restriction of their access to traditional fishing grounds [63], thereby imposing the loss of territories.

Artisanal fisheries are also affected by offshore oil exploration, which brings serious risks to the coast of the states of Sergipe and Bahia, the severe pollution from alcohol production plants, which is released directly into estuaries, especially in the states of Pernambuco and Alagoas, and the discharge of toxic waste into lagoons and bays of high natural productivity, such as Manguaba lagoon in the rural area of Marechal Deodoro (state of Alagoas), Mandaú lagoon in the urban area of the city of Maceió (state of Alagoas) and Todos os Santos Bay in the city of Salvador (state of Bahia) [63]. Todos os Santos Bay is an environmental protection area surrounded by a metropolitan area with port and industrial activities, including an oil refinery [70], where an important fishing community is being negatively affected by the new develop‐ mentalism.

Even with the social changes occurring in fishing communities in recent decades due to the expansion of urbanization, tourism and real estate speculation, artisanal fishermen constitute social subjects that have a form of spatiotemporal ordination that is dissonant with the urbanindustrial context and have a heritage stemming from their centuries-long interaction with nature, which modernity cannot disregard [62]. Through material and immaterial cultural manifestations of fisheries, the activity may still last, as many individuals, especially tourists, enthusiasts of nautical trips and amateur fishers may pay to experience the work and way of life of traditional fishermen. Moreover, the traditional community in the urban setting may also be considered an obligatory part of social reports for environmental licenses granted to large enterprises [57], especially those that affect fishing territories.

The environmental impact report (denominated RIMA) by Brazilian environmental agencies for enterprises of the Marine Waterfront Recovery Project in the cities of Jaboatão dos Guar‐ arapes, Recife, Olinda and Paulista (state of Pernambuco) is an example of the participation of urban fishing communities in reports for environmental licenses. This report involved the participation of 50 leaders who answered questionnaires and 203 fishermen who participated in meetings and workshops to report on the impact of enterprises [71]. The fishermen were only considered in the final phase of the project, but should have been consulted during its design, as the numerous negative impacts are generally not mitigatable for artisanal fisheries.

The meaning of the surrounding environment is fundamental to artisanal fisheries, as fishermen maintain interactions with natural resources and their territory, even if the activity is threatened by different forms of pressure as well as environmental and social changes. Thus, understanding sustainability in this situation requires a new look at social practices, in which fishers should have greater participation, as these men and women struggle to maintain their identities, ways of life, territories and social visibility.
