Social movements always sought political status. This article tells the story of one of those actors, the Movement for the Defense of Favelados (MDF), which since the late 1970’s operates in the eastern outskirts of the city of Sao Paulo. By telling this story of thirty years, twenty of which lived under the "new democracy", the text highlights the different forms of relationship between politics and popular sectors in the contemporary Brazil. On one side, there are some trends in direction of diluting the border that cut, during the authoritarian regime, the popular segments from the political representation. On the other side, there are new frontiers which even under a formal system based on the universality of rights, reappear today between the popular sectors and the political world.
Social movements; Poverty; São Paulo; Democracy; Representation