by DIEGO FERRARI
(trannslation by ALFIE LAKE)
The city of Rio de Janeiro’s public safety policy figures prominently among the Brazilian government’s public agenda. It involves flooding specific areas with military police to the point of occupying state schools if necessary. This is the context in which a dispute on the premises of the favelas’ public schools is taking place, between the controlling police paradigm and that of education as a right and opportunity.
The city of Rio de Janeiro, by assuming its status as a global city, positions itself on the world stage as Latin America’s shop window. The “marvelous city,” chosen as the host of numerous mega-events, has consolidated corporate management of the city. From the memorable Rolling Stones concert in Copacabana in 2006, via the 2013 World Youth Day that brought with it the visit of Pope Francis, to the 2014 World Cup and 2016 Olympic Games sporting mega-events, these events have served as justification for a devastating intervention of the public-private initiative in the reshaping of the city’s urban spaces.
The implementation of a “pacification” policy is the spearhead to begin a process of gentrification in particular favelas of the city, consolidating a tourist corridor in the south of the city. It takes the experience of the system applied in Bogotá and New York, philosophically based on the broken windows theory and with specific military training actions from Israel. The devising, organization and intelligence work of the pacification policy are carried out by the Security Secretariat of Rio de Janeiro State. Two departments of the Military Police are primarily responsible for its completion: the BOPE Special Operations Battalion and the UPP Police Pacification Units. Under some circumstances the police force also receives the support of the Armed Forces, something that occurred during the occupation of Complexo do Alemão or in the Rocinha favela in 2011.
According to data from Brazil’s Institute of Geography and Statistics, more than 14% of the marvelous city’s inhabitants live in favelas. There are more than 1.5 million people living across 43km2 of informal settlements and the number of favelas reaches almost a thousand, but the eight biggest bring together 40% of all the residents of this type of neighborhood.
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