Women’s Insertion Into the Private Security Area: Between Conquests and Maintenance

Abstract

This research was aimed at comprehending the movements of women’s insertion into the private security area in the Metropolitan Zone of Florianópolis. Using a qualitative method, the research’s main source of information were the interviews held with managers from security service enterprises and women who wished to operate in this area. It was observed that the social imaginary in the security area is still attached to the male image and that the women’s insertion in the area occurs in a tendentious, segmented, minor way and fraught with gender stereotypes and naturalizations. Women who sought professionalization in the security area, invested in a labor and life change, most of the times evading from precarious, underpaid, stressful, and socially female related jobs. They also wished to break cultural standards and achieve social status granted to the professional category. In spite of the mishaps, it was observed that the technological and organizational changes have actually opened space for women to enter the private security area.