‘No Pain, No Pity’, a proposition by Vera Malaguti Batista

Vera Malaguti Batista is Associate Professor of Criminology at the State University of Rio de Janeiro and Secretary-General of the Rio Criminology Institute, speaks about criminology and penal social policies in the context of the Oficina de Imaginação Política. ‘Punitive power wielded by the penal system is a sort of second nature to contemporary capitalism. In Brazil, prisons emerged in the 19th Century as a way of protecting the white elite from grassroots resistance. Freed or enslaved Africans comprised the vast majority of inmates at Casa de Correção [Correction Facilities]. But neither the indigenous peoples nor the African peoples brought over here (by force) needed the police, courts or prisons to sort their problems out.’