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This article critically examines reasons for the persistent use of states of emergency (SOEs) as a tool of crime control in Jamaica and risks associated with normalising these measures in small, low-capacity, competitive democracies in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). We attend to the question of permanent SOEs as an issue of law and certain policing methods becoming normalised. This differs from scholars who think about the use of permanent SOEs as suspension of law or executive rule and make a clear distinction between law and violence and normalcy and emergency. Our findings show that persistent usage of SOEs in Jamaica reflects the incapacity of the state to control violent crime as well as its effort to strengthen its coercive capabilities and compensate for the ineffectiveness of the police. It is also a response to public demand for SOE policing. State strengthening is a necessary condition for a more peaceful and law-abiding society but is also a carrier of risks of democratic degeneration via rights-disregarding policing. Nonetheless, we have seen authoritarian management of crime without descent into authoritarianism, in general, and strong boundary-marking and patrolling by some state-oversight institutions that enjoy the support of civil society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nicaragua is often held up as an exception within the Central American panorama of criminal violence, widely presented as the safest country in the region due to its particular revolutionary legacies, the (supposed) absence of transnational gangs and drug-trafficking organisations, and the National Police's representation as an efficient and professional force. This commentary proposes an alternative reading of Nicaragua's contemporary political economy of violence in order to reveal the profoundly misleading nature of this prevalent view. In particular, it highlights how Nicaragua is governed through a particular political 'settlement' underpinned by drug trafficking, police and judicial corruption, as well as 'mafia state' governance. These factors have coalesced to establish a highly efficient and engrained 'narco-state' whose undoing is unlikely in the short term. A Nicarágua é muitas vezes considerada uma exceção no panorama da violência criminal centro-americana, frequentemente apresentada como o país mais seguro da região devido a seus legados revolucionários particulares; à (suposta) ausência de gangues transnacionais e organizações de narcotráfico; e à representação da Polícia Nacional como força eficiente e profissional. Este comentário propõe uma leitura alternativa da economia política da violência na Nicarágua contemporânea para revelar a natureza profundamente enganosa dessa visão predominante. Em particular, destaca como a Nicarágua é governada por meio de um 'assentamento' político particular sustentado pelo tráfico de drogas, pela corrupção policial e judicial e por uma governança de 'estado mafioso'. Esses fatores se uniram para estabelecer um 'narcoestado' altamente eficiente e enraizado, cuja ruína é improvável no curto prazo. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Economic crises during Chile's civic–military dictatorship (1973–90) forced a growing number of people onto the streets, including women who commuted from peripheral neighbourhoods to beg in downtown Santiago. Under military rule, impoverished women in public spaces became a police problem. Despite their constant presence on the streets throughout the twentieth century, Chile's begging laws were rarely applied to women, except for a brief period under Pinochet, when begging emerged as a female crime in Santiago. This paper examines female begging and the policing of female begging, revealing both to be framed as a defence of the family. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Homicide statistics are a widely accepted metric of security and democracy. This article argues for a focus on how bodies come or do not come to be counted – of what happens before states enumerate. The experience of São Paulo relates that how many people die and how many do not is connected to the governance of an organised crime group known as the PCC. The punishment practices of the PCC and groups like it throughout Latin America reshape the lived paradigm of governance over life and death, albeit in concealed ways. Statistics are produced by and are productive of a de jure state, different from the state de facto. The acceptance of state-made homicide figures, whether for analysis, visualisation or political claims, is consequential for the future of lived security and social science knowledge production. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article examines black criminal agency in the context of drug trafficking and territorial control by the Primeiro Comando da Capital (First Capital Command, PCC), a self-identified criminal organisation in São Paulo's favelas. It argues that black youth's racialised encounters with the police shape their political praxis in the city. Since in the racial imaginary, they are constantly linked to crime and violence, and since their criminalised status justifies mass incarceration and death by the police, criminality appears as a valid category to better understand not only their fate but also their agency. Ethnographic fieldwork carried out in 2009 and 2010 in a hyper-impoverished, predominately black slum community, along with weekly visits to a local detention centre in São Paulo, informs the author's analysis of the PCC's controversial languages of resistance and the gendered and racialised outcomes that emerge from their attempts to fend off the state in such topographies of domination. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

What is the political impact of police corruption and abuse? From the literature, we know that police misconduct destroys people's confidence in police forces and hampers public collaboration with the criminal-justice system; but, what about the political regime, especially in countries striving for democratic governance? Does police wrongdoing affect the legitimacy of the overall regime? Focusing on Central America, this article provides empirical evidence showing that corruption and abuse perpetrated by police officers erode public support for the political order. Results indicate that, under some circumstances, police transgressions can have a greater impact on the legitimacy of the political system than crime or insecurity. They also show that police misconduct not only affects democratising regimes, such as El Salvador and Guatemala, but also consolidated democracies, such as Costa Rica. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The Carabineros de Chile played an active role in the repression and leadership of the Pinochet regime, yet today, the police force is one of the most respected institutions in Chile. Few post-authoritarian democracies have been able to restore such esteem for their police as quickly. But what does respect mean? This study analyses the narratives of approximately 50 police experts in Chile. It finds that police experts regard the positive image of the Carabineros as having more to do with fear and an effective communications strategy than police reform. It is important to understand how those Chileans most involved in policy discussions on policing interpret the reasons for respect, as their interpretations can shape the types of policing advocated or practised. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In comparison to some illegal enterprises whose operations generate decisive moral rejection on the part of the public, vehicle theft remains an illicit underground activity that citizens largely tolerate or even exploit. In the province of Buenos Aires, the persistence, depth and breadth of transactions related to this black market cannot be explained without referring to the role of the state police. This article uses a theoretical approach to illegal police protection in order to understand the complicity between the police and criminals as fundamental to the market for stolen cars in the province. Using data from in-depth interviews and official documents, the article examines how exactly the police protect thieves, dismantlers and distributors of cars and/or auto parts. It analyses three elements that condition the sale of illegal protection to criminals by the police: threats and selective implementation of penalties; control of consequences; and bureaucratic falsification. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article analyses citizen–police relations in the marginalised Mexico City borough of Iztapalapa. It demonstrates that despite predominantly negative perceptions about and experiences with the police, local residents do not abandon state institutions as security providers. The article claims that as formal and informal access to the legal and coercive powers of the police provides an important resource for local residents needing to resolve individual or collective security problems and conflicts in their favour, local police forces continue to be addressed and imagined by residents as relevant security actors. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article contributes to recent analyses of gendered violence in Latin America by highlighting the relative neglect of women's experiences of violence in the discussion of ‘new violence’. In Latin America, women are consistently missing from mainstream debates about violence, which concentrate on urban crime, youth gangs and the police. With a focus on urban Brazil, this article argues for a gendered approach to the range of different forms of violence in order to render visible the variety of roles that women play in the context and in specific incidents of urban violence. It also explores the gendered impacts of various forms of violence and the gendered socialisation of violence. The article challenges the un-gendered concept of new violence, questioning its ability to capture the full gamut of violences that men and women experience, and the connections between these various forms. By adjusting the parameters of the debate, this article highlights the complexity of the gendered social relations and processes that reproduce violence, and adds a further dimension to the discussion of violence and security. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]