Violence in the Rural Global South

• Published date: 01 September 2017
• DOI: 10.1177/0734016817724504
• Date: 01 September 2017
• Subject Matter: Articles

Article

Violence in the Rural Global

South: Trends, Patterns, and

Tales From the Brazilian

Countryside

Vania Ceccato

1,2

and Heloise Ceccato

3

Abstract

The aim of this article is to discuss the trends and nature of rural violence in Brazil. Assuming the

hypothesis of an increase in violence rates, urban–rural violence rates are compared at three geo-

graphical levels: national (Brazil), state (Sa

˜o Paulo), and municipal (Rio Claro). The study combines the

analyses of official statistics with newspaper reports, videos, and articles published by the national

media. Findings indicate an increase in violence in rural areas in recent decades but such a rise is far

from homogenous across the country; it shows links to patterns of population change, economic

expansion, and organized crime. Although violence has long being an inherent characteristic of rural

Brazil—a place of conflicts and struggles—it is argued here that the more recent rise in violence is

distinct fromthe past, at least in its portrayalby the media. The article finalizes by suggestinga research

agenda to improve the understanding of the dynamics of violence in the Brazilian context.

Keywords

rural crime, homicides, police statistics, countryside, urban–rural relationships, media coverage

Introduction

Although causes of violence vary worldwide, there is little doubt that those living in rural areas are

not immune to acts of violence. This is particularly true in countries of Latin and Central America,

Africa, and most of Asia, which collectively are known as the “Global South” (e.g., Collins, 2016;

Dell’Angelo, D’Odorico, Rulli, & Marchand, 2017; Hogg & Carrington, 2016; Holmes, 2016; Ide,

2015; Waiselfisz, 1998, 2008, 2016; Wendt, 2016; White, 2016). In Brazil, for instance, violence has

historically been an inherent feature of its colonization by forced occupation and slavery (Langfur,

1

Department of Urban Planning and Environment, School of Architecture and the Built Environment (ABE), Royal Institute of

Technology (KTH), Stockholm, Sweden

2

UNESP - Sao Paulo State University, Botucatu Campus, Brazil

3

UNESP - Sao Paulo State University, Campus Rio Claro, Brazil

Corresponding Author:

Vania Ceccato, Department of Urban Planning and Environment, School of Architecture and the Built Environment (ABE),

Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Drottning Kristinasva

¨g 30, 100 44 Stockholm, Sweden.

Email: vania.ceccato@abe.kth.se

Criminal Justice Review

2017, Vol. 42(3) 270-290

ª2017 Georgia State University

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DOI: 10.1177/0734016817724504

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2006). More recently, rural areas and places outside traditional large Brazilian metropolitan areas

are said to be showing signs of an increase in violence (Andrade & Diniz, 2013; Scorzafave, Justus,

& Shikida, 2015; Waiselfisz, 2011, 2016). The nature of these violent events is not yet well

understood, but media reports (e.g., Globo, 2014, 2016a; Terra, 2013) provide hints of its complex-

ity: fights between spouses and neighbors, armed robbery, organized cargo theft, child labor, pros-

titution, slavery, and homicides in land and environmental conflicts.

This article attempts to make a contribution to the international literature of the rural Global

South by discussing the trends and nature of rural violence in Brazil in recent decades. In order to

achieve this goal, the analysis combines official statistics with newspape rs reports, videos, and

articles published by the national media at three geographical levels: national, state, and municipal;

focus is given to the period 2010–2015.

Far from being a homogeneous entity, rural is defined in the Brazilian context as a diverse set of

places with distinct characteristics and needs that share a number of qualities and challenges in terms

of natural amenities, population, economic structure, and, not least, crime and safety. They are

composed of municipalities outside large metropolitan areas, scattered settlements, and villages

outside of the main urban cores in municipalities of varied sizes. This loose definition of ‘rural’

is used as reference for this analysis.

In this article, we also suggest that there is an urgent need for a better understanding of violence in

rural areas and in contexts beyond those reported in North American and Western European studies.

Little is documented about the nature of this violence and the potential geographical differences in

crime levels between urban and rural areas in the international literature (but see, e.g., Scorzafave

et al., 2015). Most of the current literature on rural crime is heavily dominated by North American

and European studies (see, e.g., the special issue “Rural Crime and Communit y Safety” in the

Journal of Rural Studies, edited by Ceccato, 2015, and The Routledge International Handbook of

Rural Criminology, edited by Donnermeyer, 2016).

The novelty of this article is 2-fold. First, it provides an overview of violence in rural Brazil in the

recent past, summarizing many new pieces of research in Portuguese that are not documented in the

international literature. Second, in order to better unravel the nature of this violence, some key

coverage examples by national media are discussed.

Rio Claro may not be a typical Brazilian municipality, and neither is Sao Paulo “an average” state

(for details, see The Case Study section). They have been selected for this study since both state and

municipality represent interesting case studies: They combine communities that despite being

located in relatively economically dynamic areas of the country (Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia

e Estatı´stica [IBGE], 2016), they have recently witnessed drastic but not homogenous increases in

reported crimes in rural areas (e.g., Globo, 2016a).

This article is organized as follows: The second section presents a brief discussion of theories

linking crime increases and changes in a country’s socioeconomic, political, and cultural structural

conditions. The case study, including data and methods are presented in the third section. In the

fourth section, trends in urban–rural violence are discussed based on official statistics for Brazil and

in particular Sa

˜o Paulo State and Rio Claro municipality. Also in this section, the nature of violence

in rural areas are presented using examples from written media and internet accounts. In the fifth

section, the article ends with concluding remarks and a brief research agenda addressing the need of

in-depth knowledge of the nature of urban–rural violence in the Brazilian context.

Theoretical Background

The international literature has a long tradition of seeking associations between crime and changes

in countries’ socioeconomic, political, and cultural structural conditions. Much of the research in

thisareaisbasedonworkcarriedoutinWestern Europe and North America, and the following

Ceccato and Ceccato 271