The law of God, the law of the State and the law of Crime: an anthropological account of the consolidation of multiple normative regimes in Brazilian urban margins

Abstract

In Brazil’s poor urban areas, the state is not the sole producer of ‘law and order’ or monopoliser of the legitimate use of force. A multiplicity of authorities coexist and interact, and much of the dynamics of violence and urban order emerge from this tense interplay. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in Brazilian urban peripheries, this article proposes a theoretical reflection on normative multiplicities and their relations to the dynamics of violence in contexts of sharp conflict. Two main arguments are presented: 1 - that the processes of Brazil’s recent history have culminated in a specific social configuration of normative pluralism in the country’s urban peripheries, where the state, religion and crime act as coexisting authorities; and 2 - that this plurality is sustained by a triple paradigm: respectability, material bases and the capacity and will to use violence. Theoretically, therefore, we have sought to develop the concept of ‘normative regimes’ and the triple paradigm that underpins their formation. In doing so, we hope to contribute to the social science debate on plural governance.

Keywords:

• Governance
• plural orders
• violence
• ethnography
• Brazil

Acknowledgements

The authors thank the editors of this dossier for their careful reading and discussion of the arguments presented here. They also thank Marta Ill Raga, Gabriel Feltran, the reviewers and the doctoral students of the Graduate School "Democratising Security in Turbulent Times" for their comments on the first version of this text. Maldonado is particularly thankful to the German Institute of Global and Area Studies (GIGA) for the financial and intellectual support of this research. Beraldo is especially grateful to the CNPQ and CAPES for the financial support of this research.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 João was interviewed in São Paulo by Maldonado in 2022, in the context of her doctoral research.

2 Brazilian criminal world changed radically in the 2000s with the expansion of groups such as the PCC (hegemonic in São Paulo) and the Comando Vermelho (Rio de Janeiro) to other regions of the country. At the same time, there are regions, such as Minas Gerais, where local criminal groups continue to operate on a small scale, with internal disputes that do not lead to hegemony. For more on the differences, see Hirata and Grillo 2019; Rodrigues 2020; Feltran et al. 2022; Motta et al 2022; Lessing 2022; Rodrigues, Feltran, Zambon 2023.

3 Until the 1960s, 90% of the Latin American population was Catholic. Today, it is 69% (Center Pew Research, 2014).

4 Jessica is an interlocutor from Maldonado since 2018. Du is an interlocutor of Beraldo since 2017.

5 To see the historical series: DIEESE - Departamento Intersindical de Estatística e Estudos Socioeconômicos.