Decentring the Lettered City: Exile, Transnational Networks, and Josué de Castro’s Centre International pour le Développement (1964–1973)

Abstract

This paper discusses the relevance of radical scholarship by exploring the case of the Centre International pour le D eveloppement (CID), founded by Brazilian geographer Josu e de Castro during his exile in Paris. Drawing upon Latin American works on the "Lettered City" and the evolving role of intellectuals in constructing critical knowledge, I explore new archives revealing the CID's daily (net)working. My argument is that this case suggests new interpretations of the notion of Lettered City, exposing slipperiness and potentialities of radical intellectuals' roles in influencing politics and proposing solutions for global problems. On the one hand, despite Castro's international renown, the CID failed in its mission of involving politicians and "enlightened" businessmen during the Cold War because its purposes clashed with the interests of most of its interlocutors. On the other, the CID's archives show that Castro performed a powerful global networking to circulate ideas that still inspire radical geographers. Resumo: Esse artigo discute a relevância da pesquisa radical explorando o caso do Centre International pour le D eveloppement (CID) fundado pelo ge ografo brasileiro Josu e de Castro durante seu ex ılio em Paris. Inspirado por trabalhos latino-americanos sobre a "Cidade das Letras" e a evoluc ßão do papel dos intelectuais na construc ßão de saberes cr ıticos, exploro novos arquivos que revelam as redes e o funcionamento quotidiano do CID. Defendo que esse caso sugere novas interpretac ßões do conceito de Cidade das Letras, demonstrando as ambiguidades e potencialidades do papel dos intelectuais radicais para influenciar a pol ıtica e propor soluc ßões para problemas globais. Apesar da fama internacional de Josu e, o CID falhou na sua missão de implicar pol ıticos e empres arios "iluminados" durante a Guerra Fria, porque os prop ositos dele contrastavam com os de seus interlocutores. Do outro lado, os arquivos do CID mostram como Josu e organizou uma poderosa rede global de comunicac ßão para difundir ideias que ainda inspiram as geografias radicais.

History and philosophy of geography III: Global histories of geography, statues that must fall and a radical and multilingual turn

“…In this vein, the use of multilingual archives to reconstruct places and contexts of geographers' works remains indispensable to deal with early critical geographies. It is again the case with Josué de Castro, who committed to the global endeavour of the CID (the Paris-based Centre International pour le Développement), a worldwide network involving exiled and persecuted scholars in the decades of Cold War and decolonisation (Ferretti, 2021b). Castro's works, and critical authors from North-eastern Brazil, remain key inspirations for geographical scholarship dealing with contributions from non-Anglophone regions of the Global South (Davies, 2021a(Davies, , 2021bDavies and Ferretti, 2021;Ferretti, 2021c) as I further detail below.…”