with the consequences of poverty. If they are truly concerned about the dealing with the crime rate, they would implement social services to alleviate their poverty so people would not have to resort to crime to survive. Having proper education, food security and improved infrastructure would greatly improve the lives of those in the favelas. Furthermore, many residents make claims that police brutality is very present problem in Rio , especially in the favelas. Rio’s statistics of deaths from police brutality demonstrate that from January to November 2018 over 1,444 people died at the hand of the police. This number is the highest recorded since the government started keeping track in 1998. The high police brutality rate can be attributed to the recent militarization of the police. The Public Security Institute (ISP) which was in use for security measures during the 2016 Olympics, now has control over the city’s police force. The military in Brazil has not controlled the police force since 1988 when the country was run by a military dictatorship. Several residents in the favelas have expressed their disagreement with the government’s recent decision for their militarized police force. Joelma Milanes, a resident of the Salguiero
Favela, retells the story when she found her son lying dead with several others after a police operation. Milanes explains that “The people who should be protecting us are killing us. They do what they want.” The support of police militarization comes from the wealthy and middle class in Rio, who are scared by rising crime rates. A resident of the Maré favela, Vitor do Vale says “It did not improve security. It made it worse in Maré. Our security is very debilitated and the government does not understand that more violence will make it worse.” Vale echoes a statement made by many favela residents, that the attacks brought on by the police will only bring more brutality. Given these statistics, and the heavy crime rate in Rio, this demonstrates that the rich elite in Rio are more concerned with decreasing crime rates rather than decreasing poverty rates, which is the source of crime. If the Brazilian government were to introduce more long-term social programs, poverty alleviation would not seem so daunting. If the Brazilian government were to simply deal with the causes of poverty and not the consequences, the people of Brazil would thus benefit from true effective grass-root change.
8 ISSUE XV.III