Vulnerable youth. Resolução 20 and Operação Verão: two security measures in Rio de Janeiro.

Abstract

This article aims to critically analyze two urban security measures carried out in Rio de Janeiro that target young people in vulnerable situations: the Resolução 20 (Resolution 20), regarding children and adolescents in street situations, and the Operação Verão (Operation Summer), implemented at the beaches and addressed mainly at young people living in favelas and outskirts, accused to commit thefts in the seaside area. Both provisions, in different forms, aim to remove from the urban space a type of youth considered a threat to society, as they are labeled as folk devils and they are often blamed for causing moral panic among the population. This category is represented in risk situations and the State justifies its safety measures to reduce youth vulnerability. However, the supposed risk situation seems to be a euphemism for keeping young people away from the urban space, since the threat they represent to the population is what seems to matter. Through the use of the sociocultural approach to risk perception, with data based on semi-structured interviews and ethnographic observations, this article seeks to demonstrate how this category is seen as a social contamination danger and thus is constantly monitored. To this end, the paper illustrates the strategies implemented in Rio de Janeiro, highlighting how both provisions act through a logic of stigmatization, further accentuating an exclusion and criminalization of urban suffering.