Möge die Solidarität ansteckender sein als das Virus!: Erfahrungen aus einer Notfallaktion

In this article, we describe a campaign that was developed with a poorer community on the periphery of the city of Porto Alegre in Brazil during the COVID-19 pandemic. We analyze the actions taken, the reactions of the people involved in it, and some of the questions that have been raised during this period. For this purpose, the text has been organized as follows: We start with a short introduction on the Morro da Cruz community and then reconstruct some of its earlier experiences with public policies and the activities of nongovernmental organizations (NGO). We then present an emergency aid campaign that was carried out in the first months of the COVID-19 pandemic crisis in Brazil. On the initiative of the NGO Coletivo Autônomo Morro da Cruz, both the local community and external solidarity were mobilized to alleviate the most urgent needs, whereby community solidarity, forms of internal self-organization and budding familiarity with new technologies proved valuable in the crisis. Based on statements of residents during the campaign, we conclude by briefly addressing the question of the many faces of poverty that cannot be represented by economic indicators.