Stolen Cars

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From the moment a car is stolen, many people start to make money. Where is this money circulated? What effects does it have on the legal and illegal economies? How does it impact social and political dynamics? Based on an ethnographical study spanning five years, Stolen Cars: A Journey Through São Paulo's Urban Conflict tracks the journeys of stolen cars, their owners, and their thieves to examine how the patterns and mechanisms of urban inequalities and violence are reproduced. This book follows the supply chain of stolen cars from the streets of São Paulo to the clubs of Berlin, highlighting the integration of global economies through consumption, money laundering, automobile auctions, and the strategies of insurance providers. The authors show that crime and illegal markets are inherent to the construction of cities--not separate criminal underworlds--and are a direct consequence of unequal and violent urban development. Organized around the journeys of five stolen cars, each chapter discusses a specific theme, such as the distinctions between violent robbery and the more commercial non-violent theft or the role of national borders interconnecting illegal and legal economies. Drawing upon empirical data and a combination of different methodologies to demonstrate mechanisms of urban inequalities and violence reproduction, Stolen Cars is essential reading and highlights how everyday life is entangled with structural urban transformations.