“I Want to Be a Police Officer When I Grow Up": The Ambivalent Relationship of Young Children with the Police in Urban Margins

• In Event: POLWG Panel 11. Police and Young People: Relationships and perceptions of legitimacy

Abstract

Research on policing practices in urban margins reveals that law enforcement in these areas is often characterised by the excessive use of force, police withdrawal, neglect, and hyper-surveillance, particularly through military-style techniques. These practices, instead of addressing community issues, result in social suffering, police brutality, deaths, physical harm, and racialised discrimination, especially targeting the youngest members of the community. The use of force escalates during police operations, including raids and arrests, where both suspected criminals and innocent residents, including children, are subjected to violence. These encounters often involve mistreatment, hyper-control, and harassment. A less explored aspect of this research is the ambivalent relationship that residents, particularly those in highly segregated and impoverished urban areas, maintain with the police. In many Latin American cities, the police often take on roles traditionally associated with social assistance, compensating for the socio-economic deficits of the neoliberal state.
This paper presents an ethnographic study conducted in 2023 and 2024 in a segregated neighbourhood in Santiago, Chile, focusing on the everyday lives of young children and their families. The findings show that despite experiencing police harassment, abuse, and neglect, some children in these communities aspire to become police officers. The figure of the "police hero" emerges in their imaginations as a symbol of hope, offering a potential way out of poverty and structural violence, and allowing them to differentiate themselves from their incarcerated parents.
In this context, the study highlights the complex and contradictory ways in which urban poor populations in Latin American cities interact with the police, shaped by both repressive practices and the police’s role in social assistance.

Author

• Graciela Alejandra Luneke, Universidad Mayor