State Violence in Brazil and Its Impacts on SDG 16

In the current era in which the discussion on the 2030 Agenda and its objectives are at the center of debate on development and peace, it is key to discuss the extent to which a violent state affects the fulfillment of the global goals of the SDG 16. While usually the state is a central actor to promote the SDG, there are also cases in which the state serves as a blockage to peace, as shown by a recent literature. Institutions and its process not only serve as peacebuilders, but also as a blockage that works as a counter-peace, which seems the case of the Brazilian state. This chapter aims to observe the compliance of the SDG 16 goal in Brazil as well as point out more directly the state actions related to it. To do so, we triangulate data provided by the IPEA (Institute of Applied Economic Research, Brazil), Brazilian Public Security Forum (FBSP), and UNODC, combined with analysis of current news on the issue. Our argument here is that the historical background normalizes the state violence, which makes the implementation of the 16th Goal more difficult in Brazil.