Three notes on the neoliberal city in Costa Rica (1980-2017)

Abstract

The essay explores the emergence of the neoliberal city in Costa Rica within the sociopolitical context that has made it possible during the last thirty-seven years. In doing so, the text has been worked on three ideas: i) the processes of deep neoliberalization in which the State has not been weakening but instead rescaling to economic opening to attract direct foreign investment ii) the socio-spatial restructuring processes of the Great Metropolitan Area that affect the polarization of the development of the city on an east-west axis; and iii) the intensification processes of the urban real estate market.
Keywords: neoliberal city; contextualism; Costa Rica; neoliberalization.