On any day in Caracas, Venezuela, there are a number of landscapes that one might see. These landscapes vary in physical geography, architecture, economic standing, and the despair or hope of the people. Pictures A and B illustrate a “better” side of Caracas—the ground is level and skyscrapers flourish. These skyscrapers vary in nature. Some of the more modern-looking buildings are global business centers like Credit-Suisse’s offices in “Milla De Oro,” Caracas’s central business district. Some are extravagant apartment complexes for the rich. Some are beautiful, European-influenced architecture in the center of the city, like the National Pantheon, a beautiful church of Spanish influence from Venezuela’s past.
However, The rich center of the city is surrounded by both economic and personal despair. Picture D illustrates a mature squatter settlement on the hills surrounding the city. The poor have settled here informally and illegally, forming their own economic and support system, on the less-desired land in the hills surrounding the city. These squatter settlements are so dangerous that they have resulted in Caracas’s standing as the murder capital of the world, with the highest per capita murder rate globally. Most of these crimes go unsolved. The poor are separated by the rich both informally and formally; social divides and inequalities block the two groups, and actual fences and police force do too. Picture C illustrates an extravagant apartment complex for the rich, with tennis courts and private pools, separated from the squatter settlements by electric fences. Even if one of the poor were to surpass a social divide, formal barriers block any hope of social integration for Caracas.