Ways of Giving. Police Interventions in Segregated Urban Areas of Buenos Aires or How to Protect Without Stigmatizing?

FREDERIC, SABINA

Viena

Congreso; 54 INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF AMERICANISTS; 2012

As the government emphasizes, a new paradigm of policing was designed and applied during the last months in Argentina, one which could mainly be seen in Buenos Aires city. It was announced as Plan Cinturón Sur and justified was as a means of providing for the security of the most segregated people of the city. This plan is supposed to radically change the way security forces operate in the southern area of Buenos Aires, relieving the police force (Argentine Federal Police) from street patrol, after traditionally being in charge of security there and having to hand its control to military forces in charge of internal security (Gendarmeria Nacional Argentina and Prefectura Naval Argentina). The southern area was identified by the government as the place where the most crowded shantytowns of Buenos Aires are settled. These are also seen in public opinion as the most dangerous places and the source of violent crime that also spreads to other neighbourhoods. This paper is going to analyze the main policing strategies that this Plan displays to protect the rights and give security to the more segregated people and how police forces afford those social tendencies to stigmatize and to reproduce inequality in the field of security. The research it is based on follows an ethnographic approach to police practice and knowledge for action.