O ser humano por trás da farda : análise do prazer e sofrimento no trabalho de policiais da Brigada Militar de um município da região do Vale do Rio Pardo.

Abstract

Every labor environment interferes in illness and health processes of workers, therefore impacting people’s quality of life. Such impact can be harder when it comes to law enforcement institutions due to their labor context, which is characterized by its strict hierarchy and day-to-day life-hazard situations as well as violence.The research in question was conducted according to the theoretical assumptions of Labor Psychodynamics, and aims at analyzing the relation between the Military Police officers’ labor organization of a city in the Vale do Rio Pardo and the health/illness process. The chosen research methodology is an adaptation from Labor Psychodynamics by means of semi structured interviews carried out with eight Military Police officers, one at a time. Here, the goal was a) to identify the ways by which the organization of Labor affects the health of Military Police officers, b) to analyze both the pleasure and the suffering present in their labor context and c) to investigate the presence of defense strategies to which police officers resort in their work environment. The use of defense strategies has been identified, such as insensitivity towards violence and difficulty to perceive occupational hazards, among others, which render impossible both expressing and acknowledging suffering, which makes way for alienation and the development of pathologies. One has also identified the lack of recognition and professional appreciation and, above all, the absence of a space for collective listening and verbalization in which such officers could express their suffering individually but with group solutions in mind. In order for change to take place in such labor context, one needs to rethink the feasibility of strategies and actions that would work toward preventing as well as promoting police officers’ mental health. Through such actions and strategies, it will be possible to (re)construct (together with those who work in that institution) viable improvements which generate pleasure and health.