This book expands the field of prison research by drawing on six months of unique, ethnographic research in Santa Monica prison, the largest women’s prison in Lima, Peru. Using feminist and decolonial perspectives, it explores power and the governance system and its implications on how the prison operates and the lived experiences of women prisoners and their interpersonal relationships. It reflects on the intersection of prison, imprisonment and gender from a Global South perspective and includes methodological reflections on how to research prisons in the Global South...

This handbook brings together expertise from a range of disciplinary perspectives and geographical contexts to address a key question facing prison policymakers, architects and designers – what kind of carceral environments foster wellbeing, i.e. deliver a rehabilitative, therapeutic environment, or other ‘positive’ outcomes?The Palgrave Handbook of Prison Designoffers insights into the construction of custodial facilities, alongside consideration of the critical questions any policymaker should ask in commissioning the building of a site for human containment. Chapters present...

This book uses empirical data gathered using ethnographic methods in two contrasting prisons to provide a rare insight into death and dying in prisons in the UK.  The majority of deaths in prison custody in England and Wales result from natural causes, yet the experiences of people dying in prison and the impact of these deaths on the wider prison are under-researched areas. It provides a novel insight into the impact of deaths from natural causes on the prison as an institution and  challenges existing work juxtaposing occupational philosophies of ‘care’ and ‘control’. It...

This book explores how prison life is normalized in different countries, with a critical and detailed look at ‘Scandinavian exceptionalism’ — the idea that Scandinavian prisons have exceptionally humane conditions — and compares these prisons to ones in Belgium. It provides a more nuanced, systematic and contextualized comparison of normalization in two countries. Through analyzing policy and legislative documents, participant observation and interviews, it seeks to understand how normalization is implemented differently in prison legislation, policies and practices and...