Structural racism, violations of human rights and selectivity: determinants of the brazilian criminal system

Abstract

The reflections in this paper summarize the accumulation of theoretical studies and bibliographic review carried out in the context of the development of the research “Systems for the Protection of Human Rights for Children in Youth in Portugal, Angola, Mozambique and Brazil”, linked to the Department of Social Service from the State University of Londrina. Criticism is found in relation to the bourgeois and Eurocentric conception of human rights, which coexists with the permanence of structural racism and other mechanisms of oppression determined by the intersectionality of the racial, class and gender issue. It is problematized that even with regulations that have as a framework the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the persistence of violations is maintained due to the limits imposed by the production method itself and the liberal influence in the delineation of these rights. On the other hand, it is recognized that these regulations become instruments of claim and struggle, which become increasingly important in the context of the neo-liberal state of a criminal nature. Reflections on the Penal System are launched under the lens of critical criminology, situating it from its functionality in the field of capitalist relations, understanding structural racism as its potential component. At the end, some particularities of the racist criminal selectivity that delineates mass incarceration in Brazil are discussed, demonstrating how much human rights violations are shown in the radiography of the country's criminal system, demonstrating the importance of the struggle and collective resistance around the overcoming this bankrupt and inhumane order.