Brazil: violence in (merged thread)

[Gringo Malandro]

Bill & others,

From a recently retired US police colleague, from upstate New York State:

'In my experiences, officers living in patrol neighborhoods works if there is a general respect for authority. In neighborhoods where this respect is absent, the officer’s presence (and, in turn, that of his/her family) is seen and acted towards as a threat. In the few cases where officers have ventured to live within their jurisdiction, even fewer have done so with children and less while children attended the public schools. (Note: Rochester PD has offered ownership incentives to officers to do this.) In theory, the idea is sound… in practice, impractical. I lived in my patrol area for the first five years of marriage but moved out at first arrival of offspring'.

Hope that helps and firsthand knowledge,

davidbfpo

David, the issue here is not "respect for authority." The cops can't even enter the favelas without being engaged, and they generally go in pretty heavy (armored vehicles, automatic weapons). The idea of renting a room or a house would not be possible, they would be killed. Though the tourist areas are relatively safe, even the police stations there are more like FOBs.

These places are totally off the grid and totally independent from the state. These tactics might not be new everywhere, but they are new here. I suspect that part of that is because it would not have been possible before. A few years ago they had coordinated attacks on bus and police stations, 115 people died in 5 days. I'd say the ability to do this showshow much the city has improved, congrats to the Brazilians for that.

On the article, keep in mind that it's from the NYT and thus meant for mass-consumption. This may not be true textbook COIN, but the "big blue arrow" parallels to the US pushing off the FOBs and engaging the populace are a close enough illustration for the casual reader, the NYT could have done worse, and has.

By the way, sorry Bill wasn't discounting the article, I was trying to address a couple posts.

[bourbon]

I saw the Brazilian film Elite Squad last week after several strong recommendations, The COIN Graduate Seminar among them:

Brazil, a hotbed of corruption, crime, and vicious urban warfare between heavily armed special operations police and AK-toting gangsters, is a preview of a possible future for American urban centers. Tropa De Elite (The Elite Squad) is about BOPE, a Brazilian military police special operations unit confronting gangsters and their well-bred sympathizers. The film leaves no one in Brazilian society unscathed, attacking the corrupt municipal government, the fashionably left-leaning university students whose addictions finance the gangs; the horrific gangs themselves, and BOPE itself—depicted as a brutal instrument of repression against the residents of the favelas.

It is an excellent film. If the film is an accurate depiction then, and it is congruent with what I've read and been told by people who have been, then Gringo Malandro's above post sounds accurate.

Letter from São Paulo: City of Fear, by William Langewiesche. Vanity Fair, April 2007.

Operating by cell phone, a highly organized prison gang launched an attack that shut down Brazil’s largest city last May, with the authorities powerless to stop it. For many in São Paulo, this vast, amorphous criminal network is the only government they have.

[Bill Moore]

Excellent post Bourbon, the article/letter you attached addresses a lot of topics we surfaced over the years in the SWJ council, and it probably is a prediction of what urbanization throughout the developing world will look like in the very near future.

The attack sounded very familiar to the Mumbai attack in some respects, but involved more of a swarming approach, than an infiltration of one team.

I'll have to read it in depth later, but a couple of quotes caught my eye,

We frequently approach the ideology of insurgent and insurgent like groups with a degree of western naiveity where we assume (population centric approach) that everyone simply wants democracy and our economic system. If we can give them that, they'll turn their guns into plows, etc. That is B.S., many of them are as loyal to their cause as we are to our country.

Prisoners were attracted to the group because it brought order to their lives and gave them purpose, protection, and power. There were obligations. P.C.C. followers lived by its laws under penalty of death. Those who formally joined became “Brothers” for life. They were initiated with a baptism involving water, and had to sign a 16-point manifesto that still serves as the P.C.C.’s constitution.

In this case it is somewhat difficult to attack their strategy.

“So the Command is a revolutionary movement?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, so jump ahead and tell me what you are fighting toward. Let’s say you win your revolution and take power. What kind of Brazil do you want to build then?”

A smile flickered across his lips. He said, “We do not think about winning. We rebel against the government more to give a response now than with a vision of the future in mind.”

A government official,

The lack of control is much larger than that. It extends to the favelas and, more important, to the office towers where global money flows. People see this, or they should. São Paulo is not alone. Consider all the other Third World cities, consider Moscow, consider L.A. The P.C.C. is just another inhabitant of the growing feral zones. I said, “But isn’t it possible that this is a level of chaos that São Paulo can continue to live with? With all its fortifications and armored cars? Doing business with the world?”

[davidbfpo]

From an academic friend who has studied policing around the world, who has also read the thread:

This is an interesting debate though, as pointed out, bit chalk and cheese in places. Mike McConville and Dan Shepherd (1992) Watching Police, Watching Communities, Routledge was an interesting study that, from memory, drew sharp distinction between 'urban' and 'rural' policing in UK in this respect. In latter, police tend to live in areas they police whereas in former they do not because, even if they come from those areas, they are aspirational, well-paid etc and move to the suburbs.

The other point from history that comes to mind is that the powers-that-be actually don't want cops policing their own area sometimes because of problem that they may have mixed loyalties - the other side of the 'community policing' coin can be 'corruption'!

Re. the broader debate on the blog, we might imagine a spectrum of 'policing' with rural communities in UK forty years ago at one end and the favelas at the other. The point is that in the latter, as made by one contributor, it is not an issue of policing but of governance where gangs provide a whole range of services, one of which is enforcement (just like that state!) Shifting policing in any particular place along this spectrum is an issue on which there has been much work (but not a special issue he has pursued).

Like others I have seen TV documentaries on policing in Brazil, hardly a place to learn from. Others threads have touched upon the issues of policing urban areas where the government's authority is minimal, e.g. Republican areas in Northern Ireland.

davidbfpo

[davidbfpo]

The new policing is now reported on the BBC News website, after a comment by the President: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7870395.stm
Short film clip attached.

davidbfpo

[bourbon]

Brazil police occupy Sao Paulo slum after clashes, The Associated Press, February 3, 2009.

Paraisopolis and the PCC - history and symbology, by Samuel Logan. Security in Latin America, February 04, 2009.

Video - The Vice Guide to Travel: The Slums of Rio.
The High City - Shopping in Brazil's favelas.

[Mike Burgoyne]

I will be in Rio shortly looking at the security situation with the favelas.

Any advice, contacts, and/or questions I should ask would be great.

Thanks

Mike