Police use of Deadly Force in Democracies: the Philippines and Brazil

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Jonas Wolff
• Subject Area: Political Science
• Term: since 2020
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 439281758

Research on the relationship between regime type and repression suggests that domestically democracies use less coercion and violence than other systems. This applies only to a limited extent to police use of deadly force. Democracies are among the front runners here: from the US, leading member of the club of consolidated democracies of the North, to the Philippines, South Africa, Brazil and Jamaica as more or less consolidated democracies of the South.This project analyzes the patterns and political determinants of high levels of police violence in the Philippines and Brazil. Both countries show not only a generally high level of police violence, but also striking subnational differences and significant changes over time. In 2016 and 2019, populist presidents came to power who explicitly advocated the killing of suspects by the police. This constellation allows for a sophisticated synchronous and diachronic comparison on several levels.Borrowing from criminological research into the “punitive turn” of crime control in the United States and other Northern democracies, this project investigates in how far police use of deadly force relate to political elites’ “penal populism” and the punitive interests of the electorate (popular punitivism). Such a populism of the hard hand can only be effective if politicians have the necessary influence on the police. In turn, the populism of political elites should be strongest in democracies with direct elections of incumbents at all levels.The analysis follows a mixed-method design. On the basis of original data sets, which measure the levels of deadly police violence in Brazil (2010-2020) and the Philippines (2007-2020) on the subnational level, a mapping of the changing patterns of violence provides new insights into its spatial and temporal dynamics for both countries. For the first time, a quantitative analysis allows to systematically assess the importance of structural factors such as crime, inequality and urbanization in such countries. Qualitative analyses (including field research) on selected regions serve to examine the suspected causal connection and expand our knowledge of the local dynamics that promote but also minimize the deadly use of police force.Thus, the project provides a theoretical and methodological framework for a broader view of the impact of the democratic politicization of internal security on police use of fatal force. It provides a first in-depth study of the susceptibility of specific variants of democratic order to penal populism. Finally, it establishes extensive data sets that can serve as building blocks for a comprehensive comparative research agenda on the "democratic practice" of police use of deadly force.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants