NCJ Number
225838
Journal
New Directions for Youth Development Issue: 119 Dated: Fall 2008 Pages: 93-109
Date Published
2008
Length
17 pages
Annotation
The purpose of this article is to analyze the relationship between the structural violence in Brazil, the armed violence in poor neighborhoods known as favelas, and the role of the police acting as a state agent.
Abstract
Brazil is a democratic state. However, a democracy cannot be fully implemented when the majority of its populations, especially young, poor Brazilians, have no access to fundamental rights and services. In Brazil, the city of Rio de Janeiro holds the reputation of being one of the most violent cities in the world. In addition, juvenile crime is part of the city’s reality and denotes the state’s failure to help young people in disadvantaged neighborhoods. Nearly 1 million people live in favelas, poor neighborhoods. Those that live in favelas suffer daily prejudice and discrimination from state agents as well as the general population. In addition, the association between living in favelas, criminality, and the drug trafficking is extended to all poor Brazilians, in effect criminalizing poverty. This association combines poverty with criminality, making poor Brazilians targets of inhumane treatment daily, whether as victims of drug traffickers or corrupt police agents. This article examines the relationship between structural violence (a form of violence that corresponds to the systematic ways in which a social structure or social institution kills people slowly by preventing them from meeting their basic needs, which inevitably produces conflict and often direct violence, including family violence, racial violence, hate crimes, genocide, terrorism, and war), the violence associated with poor neighborhoods, and the role of the police as a state agent and in reducing the violence. 24 notes