Estado y Violencia en Honduras: Las Maras desde una Perspectiva Crítica

Abstract

The idea of launching a challenge to law and anthropology, was born as a need to reorient state labor on public policy, essentially criminal. While it is assumed that the sovereign has studied and consulted various experts when creating a country's security plan, whether they are sociologists, criminologists or other professionals of the social sciences, this can be perfectly questioned based on the results obtained, that security policy responds to different factors that are unrelated to the reality of Honduras. Crime is seen as an enemy that must be confronted and not as a social problem that has to be solved and that is born as a product of economic inequality. Gangs emerge as a new type of crime organization, assuming the role that corresponds to the state in many areas where they dominate and exert "criminal sovereignty", where quality education, employment and other services that would allow youth to get an alternative, are limited and outweighed by this group branded as "enemies" of Honduras; although the various crimes that are committed daily cannot be hidden, nor it is it intended to exonerate them, the state can't ignore its responsibility to respond to social problems with an inclusive and not only repressive policy. Therefore, when creating public policy, it is necessary to include sciences like anthropology that offer a different and more suited look to the reality of life in Honduras.