“Back to the market”: How salvage vehicles classifications shape economies and value in Brazil

The Metropolitan Region of São Paulo, Brazil's urban and economic centre is a national hub for the automotive market. This includes (in)formal and (il)legal economies for second-hand vehicles and auto parts, as well as a large circuit of auctions for salvage vehicles. This paper aims to analyse how state classifications on such vehicles produce different regimes of value, operating as a mechanism for requalification (and revaluation) of these assets and guiding the ways in which they can “return to the market”. By reconstituting their journeys, we aim to recompose the genealogy of the state devices that classify them, as well as the dynamics of the markets that they will foster. This paper is based on collective multi-sited ethnographic research, which has been underway since 2018.