State Integration and Violence at the Margins: The Logic of Police Raids in Rio de Janeiro’s Favelas

State Integration and Violence at the Margins: The Logic of Police Raids in Rio de Janeiro’s Favelas

ABSTRACT

This paper investigates police raids in Rio de Janeiro’s favelas through a property rights framework, exploring their organisational structure, motivations and implications. Using data from police reports, academic studies, NGOs and news sources, it examines why and how the state intervenes in these contested spaces. The study contends that favelas challenge the state’s monopoly on violence, democratic stability and ability to enforce property rights, prompting militarised interventions. While these raids aim to integrate favelas into state control, they often perpetuate cycles of violence and systemic inequality, disproportionately targeting the underprivileged. By contextualising police actions within the broader logic of state expansion and property rights, this paper highlights the contradictions and biases underpinning state interventions. It contributes to the limited English-language literature on urban governance and state violence in Latin America, offering insights into the limitations of applying a formal-legalistic lens to security realities in marginalised urban spaces.