A new perspective on public security in Brazil under multiple paradigms, in light of human dignity

Abstract

This article discusses the evolution of public security paradigms in Brazil, analyzing the doctrines that grounded constitutional texts and the operational practices of social control agencies (especially the police) throughout recent republican history. Through documentary research and narrative analysis, it investigates the hypothesis that Brazilian public security management operates in a symbiosis of advances and setbacks, oscillating between the National Security Doctrine (DSN), inherited from the military regime, and the Citizen Security paradigm. The study highlights that, although the 1988 Federal Constitution introduced a Public Security Doctrine focused on societal protection and human dignity, authoritarian remnants persist, redefining the "internal enemy" as peripheral "dangerous classes," while operational practices and bellicose biases from that era endure. It further discusses the emergence of Citizen Security in the 1990s, focused on the multicausality of violence, local leadership (municipal participation), and social participation. The study concludes that the full implementation of democratic security, moving toward a new concept of "Human Security," faces institutional and bureaucratic resistance, as well as the rise of penal populism, requiring an effective break with bellicose logic in favor of intersectoral and emancipatory public policies.