Policing in the Americas

Organizers

Sebastian Sclofsky, Luis Daniel Gascon

The goal of this IRC is to establish a more concrete dialogue, and develop collaborative and cross-national research projects throughout the American region. We will bring together a group of scholars working in different geographical regions of the Americas who share the theoretical and methodological sensibilities of critical police scholarship. Our prospective members work in universities in the US, Canada, Mexico, Chile, and Brazil. Our group members, for instance, are developing critical criminological research analyzing the relation between state violence, forced disappearances in the prison system, and police violence. This shows the importance of understanding the deep connections between police violence and forced disappearances as part of a larger structure of state violence. The IRC would help develop further these theoretical and empirical connections. Once the IRC is established, we will continue to expand our network of scholars and members across the continent, as non-LSA members from Argentina, Uruguay and Colombia have shown interest in this IRC as well.