What can be learned from Brazil’s “pacification” police model?

After initial success, challenges remain
Elizabeth Leeds
Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA)
Friday, March 11, 2016

brasil-policia-vilao2When national and local public safety personnel in Latin America want to turn away from “mano dura” approaches to the problem of alarmingly high rates of crime and violence, they frequently look to examples of apparently successful violence reduction strategies from other countries in the region. A example of this process is the effort to expand the Police Pacification Units (Unidades de Polícia Pacificadora, UPPs), established in Rio de Janeiro in 2008 and inspired in part by violence reduction strategies in Medellín, to new communities.