Social representations about adolescents in conflict with the law families: the law and its re-signification

Abstract

This paper aims at analyzing two different representational constructions about adolescents in conflict with the law families: one based on the Integral Protection Doctrine, which supports the Children and Adolescent Statute (Estatuto da Criança e do Adolescente, ECA); and another one detected in narratives of the socio-educational measures implementers, such as psychologists, social workers etc., who act on internment or probation measures. These representations should not be divergent, since the work of these employees is guided by ECA; however, during the interview stage of an ongoing research, there were some disagreement between the representations mobilized towards the two instances. This paper goal is to problematize these representations from the work of Lipsky (1983), who observes a re-signified dimension in which, even though the political frame mold the decision patterns, the discretion of the (street level) implementers can affect the quality of the benefits and its possible sanctions.