Anjuli Fahlberg is Assistant Professor of Sociology at Tufts University. Her research focuses on social movements and urban violence in Latin America and employs a participatory action research approach.

• Introduction: Conflict Activism in Rio de Janeiro's Gang Territories


• 1. Cidade de Deus: A Contested Territory


• 2. Milking the Resource Matrix: Democracy, Development, and Digital Devices


• 3. Violent Clientelism and Gendered Governance


• 4. Political Upcycling: Anti-Violence Protest through Education, Culture, and Racial Solidarity


• 5. Ties that Strengthen, Ties that Bind: Favela Actors in Urban Politics and Transnational Movements


• Conclusion: Seek and Ye Shall Find: Looking for Non- Violence in Conflict Zones


• Appendix: Ethnographic Reflections: Participatory Action Research in Areas of Violence


• Notes


• Bibliography


• Index

Rio de Janeiro's favelas have become well-known sites of gang and police violence. In Activism under Fire, Anjuli Fahlberg provides an original account of how conflict activism operates in Cidade de Deus, one of Rio's most dangerous and famous favelas. Based on fieldwork, virtual ethnography, and participatory action research, Fahlberg documents how activists strategically navigate local constraints and opportunities--including gendered governing dynamics and racialized practices of solidarity--to create space for non-violent governance amid armed repression.