Distance to citizenship in Bahia

access to certifying documents from Christaller's perspective

Abstract

The objective of this study is, based on the Theory of the Central Place of Christaller (1966), to understand the spatial reach of the offer of services for three documents certifying citizenship (Civil Registration of Birth, Identity Card and National Driver's License) in the state from Bahia. Complementarily and, based on the concept of service threshold, the aim is to assess the distances that are covered by a good part of the Bahian population in order to have access to the mentioned documents. In order to achieve the purpose of this study, documentary research, the databases of the Court of Justice of the State of Bahia (TJBA), the State Secretariat of Public Security (SSP) and the State Department of Traffic (DETRAN) were used. ) that provided information on the issue of, respectively, Civil Birth Registration, Identity Card and National Driver's License, in 2016. The information contained in the 2010 Demographic Census, made available by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics, was also consulted. (IBGE), notably those that reveal the quantitative of the resident population of each municipality in Bahia. It was concluded that the location of the certifying bodies obeys the logic foreseen by the Theory of the Central Place, having, however, a significant contingent of inhabitants without access to the service, notably in the municipalities with less economic importance and with a low index of social development.

Key words: Certifying Documents. Citizenship. Central Place Theory.