Social Representation of Crack Cocaine in Brasilia's Media Press/Representacoes Sociais do Crack na Midia

Crack cocaine has been a recurrent topic in newspaper articles and in recent political speeches. This research aimed to identify how the local media represents the drug. Based on the Theory of Social Representations 76 articles published during 2009 in the Correio Braziliense newspaper were analyzed. The content of the articles was analyzed with the software ALCESTE, which generated six classes. Three social representations were highlighted: drug as a scourge of humanity, indistinct police actions against users and drug dealers and hospitalization as a solution of the problem. We observed that the social representations are consistent with a stigmatizing and repressive approach, which still consider drug users as criminal or sick persons, reinforcing the maintenance of their underground status and limiting the understanding of the phenomenon.