The thesis investigates the significance and contemporary relevance of the SAAL (Serviço de Apoio Ambulatório Local) experience developed in Portugal in the 1970s, interpreting it as a moment in which architecture emerged as a tool for social emancipation and political experimentation. The initiatives born in the climate of openness following the Carnation Revolution are read as expressions of a city built from below, based on direct participation of inhabitants and on the possibility of making housing a concretely practiced right. Through a multidisciplinary approach — combining historical, social, and urban analysis, field interviews, photographic and documentary materials — the thesis reconstructs the historical, political, and social context that gave rise to SAAL, examining the end of the Estado Novo dictatorship, popular struggles, decolonization, and the return of populations from former Portuguese colonies, during a period marked by a profound housing crisis.