Universidade Federal do ABC
Perfil: Professor of Sociology of the Federal University of ABC (UFABC), teaches Social Theory, Public Policies and Social Science Research Methodology. PhD in Sociology at University of Sao Paulo (USP). She is vice-coordinator of Post-Graduate Program in Human and Social Science at Federal University of ABC (UFABC). She is also a Researcher of the Center for the Study of Violence of the University of São Paulo a Center of Excellence in research, dissemination and education of FAPESP since 2000 (NEV/USP, www.nevusp.org). She is coordinator of Research Group about Safety, Violence and Justice – SEVIJU. She is also a member of the fiscal council of non-governmental organization Brazilian Forum of Public Safety. She published two books and dozens of articles and book chapters on organized crime in Brazil, especially in Brazilian prisons. Her main fields of research are violence, crime and social control, organized crime, criminal networks and punishment and prisons. In the past 15 years she has conducted a series of research studies on the expansion of the PCC in São Paulo prisons and its effects and on the role of this group in border regions, especially, on economy of illicit drugs. Prison-based criminal groups have emerged in all Brazilian states and have had diverse effects on the country's criminal dynamics and violence. Among these groups, the PCC is undoubtedly the most organized and structured, being a major player in South America's criminal economy. Her central argument is that the PCC's differential with other traditional criminal groups it is precisely to have prison as its base and to strengthen as the incarceration process in the country increases and intensifies. In this sense, the prison is constituted as a space for the production and reproduction of social and affective bonds, the construction of identities and identification, and as a locus for the articulation of criminal networks.