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Abstract
This article deals with the hazing carried out when new recruits enter the Military Police Academy of Bahia, Brazil, and questions the implications for police identity and education. Using data collected from 31 interviews and academic materials written by the recruits, it interprets the abuses, games and punishments inflicted on the rookie recruits by their seniors, showing evidence of a differentiated and complementary meaning of this ritual for themselves and the institution. The article reveals the existence of a pact between the directing team and seniors for carrying out the hazing, and confirms results from studies on the role of rites involving the stripping of identity and the integration of the institution's new members. Hazing is also analyzed as a component of an informal, alternative, academic curriculum that undermines the new, official teaching curriculum. Hazing is seen as an example of dualistic logic in new police training, pointing to prospects of democratization while maintaining authoritarian methods of socialization. Finally, the article proposes replacing hazing with forms of collective celebration in order to help bring about the proposed curricular changes.
Notes
Carlos Linhares de Albuquerque, Department of Human Sciences, UNIFACS (Salvador University), Brazil. Eduardo Paes‐Machado, Department of Sociology and Institute for Public Health, Federal University of Bahia, Brazil. Correspondence to: Eduardo Paes‐Machado, Instituto de Saude Coletiva, Rua Padre Feijo 29, 4 andar, 40.110.170, Salvador‐Bahia‐Brazil. E‐mail: [email protected]. Thanks to the Centre of Criminology of the University of Toronto, where we did one part of the theoretical research for this paper, in 2002, and to James Sheptycki for his valuable comments on this article, and H. Sabrina Gledhill for the English translation.
The Military Police, which is responsible for regular and preventive police work, is the largest police force in Brazil, employing 350,000 officers throughout the country. It has an ambiguous legal status, and is coordinated by state governments and the federal government through the Army, of which is it an auxiliary branch. Closely identified with the Army in its history, legislation, organization, accountability and repressive attitude towards social movements, the Military Police is well known for gross human rights violations like summary executions and torture (CitationChevigny, 1995; CitationLemos‐Nelson, 2001; CitationBisol, 2002; CitationPaes‐Machado et al., 1997; CitationHuggins, 2000; CitationSoares, 2000; Paes‐Machado & Noronha, Citation2002a).
The breadth and depth of police reform depended on its scope, whether extensive or sectoral, and the relationship between the political forces in Brazilian states. It has had a greater impact in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, where it was part of a broader democratic reform aimed at de‐privatization, or placing the state machine in the service of the public interest (Paes‐Machado & Noronha, Citation2002a).
A small but significant number of recruits are the children of military police officers. These recruits are bearers of subtle information about the ethos of the organizational culture and protégés of “godparents” or peixes (literally “fish”), who are important for negotiating the best training conditions and jobs in the Military Police.
Although this practice does not exist in many police academies, its principles (e.g., eliminating differences and disregard for the individual rights of the recruits) are still found in the day‐to‐day activities of those academies.
