MUNICIPAL GUARDS AND THE RECONFIGURATION OF PUBLIC SECURITY IN BRAZIL

FEDERATIVE COORDINATION AND CONTESTED TERRITORIES

Abstract

This article analyzes the growing municipal prominence in Brazilian public security, particularly represented by the tendency to transform Municipal Guards into policing forces. Through theoretical analysis, legal-normative investigation, and the examination of empirical data, the study demonstrates how the actions of different state actors have authorized an institutional rearrangement that blurs the boundaries between policing models, often at odds with the original constitutional design. The investigation contrasts this expansion with the coordination efforts of the Unified Public Security System (SUSP), arguing that, unlike in health and education, the security sector has consolidated a repressive legacy that hinders the transposition of federative solutions from those areas. The results indicate that the municipalization of policing tends to reproduce the undemocratic practices of the traditional police model. It is concluded that relying exclusively on centralized bureaucratic coordination is insufficient to overcome the sector’s structural contradictions, pointing instead to the valorization of the territorial dimension as a space for democratic contestation and citizen legitimacy.