Theses defended
The Prison Door: A History of Penal Security and Coercion Measures in the Perspective of the Portuguese Prison guards
January 10, 2018
Languages and Heterodoxies: History, Poetics and Social Practices
José Manuel Mendes
e
Rui Bebiano
This doctoral thesis presents a research on the subjectivities of prison professionals in their relation to penal security and coercion measures, considering how they are inscribed into the law since the end of the Estado Novo and the establishment of democracy, up to our time. Focusing on an exploration of the absences that develop in social theory, this study identifies a significant lack of historical knowledge about these professionals, and particularly about the prison guard. Fighting this paucity of information and this silencing, this research is a contribute towards a deeper analysis of some of their social and institutional consequences. This study gives particular attention to the penal reforms undertaken since the Revolution, trying to understand their impact in the application of penal security and coercion measures, as well as in the reconfigurations of the profession of the Portuguese prison guard.
An interdisciplinary exercise - of historic and sociologic interpretation - this research produces a perspective on the Portuguese penal system. This perspective is based on the analysis of the testimonials collected among the professionals of three Portuguese prisons, confronting them with the documentation available at the Arquivo Histórico da Direção Geral da Reinserção e Serviços Prisionais. Focusing on the subjectivities of the prison guards in their relation to penal security and coercive measures, the research also includes a broader perspective, looking beyond this particular domain and exploring other punitive devices of incarceration, as well as the significations of several dimensions of the lives of these professionals. The thesis was born from the hypothesis that prison guards have been experiencing some level of disagreement with the official penal security and coercive measures, in the context of a cultural model of punishment built upon the idea of deprivation. The study analysis the history of these measures and interprets the perceptions of these professionals concerning the evolution of their main roles and functions.
The thesis also reflects upon the role social sciences have had in reinforcing, by omission, the silencing of a professional conflict that has been reproducing an institutional tension, which has been crystalized into the penal system since the implementation of the penitentiary system and the consolidation of prison time as the preferred sentence. Finally, the debate is articulated with fields that are exterior to the prison, such as the emergence of special security forces within the prison guard professional group (forces valued by their specialization in a certain exteriority to institutional dynamics), the impact of incarceration in the personal and family lives of the professionals that uphold it, and how it affects and stigmatizes these populations, impacting their health, and even their intimacy.
Keywords: prison guard; oral history; social history; penal security and coercive measures; public policies, prison.
Public Defence date
Doctoral Programme
Supervision
Abstract
An interdisciplinary exercise - of historic and sociologic interpretation - this research produces a perspective on the Portuguese penal system. This perspective is based on the analysis of the testimonials collected among the professionals of three Portuguese prisons, confronting them with the documentation available at the Arquivo Histórico da Direção Geral da Reinserção e Serviços Prisionais. Focusing on the subjectivities of the prison guards in their relation to penal security and coercive measures, the research also includes a broader perspective, looking beyond this particular domain and exploring other punitive devices of incarceration, as well as the significations of several dimensions of the lives of these professionals. The thesis was born from the hypothesis that prison guards have been experiencing some level of disagreement with the official penal security and coercive measures, in the context of a cultural model of punishment built upon the idea of deprivation. The study analysis the history of these measures and interprets the perceptions of these professionals concerning the evolution of their main roles and functions.
The thesis also reflects upon the role social sciences have had in reinforcing, by omission, the silencing of a professional conflict that has been reproducing an institutional tension, which has been crystalized into the penal system since the implementation of the penitentiary system and the consolidation of prison time as the preferred sentence. Finally, the debate is articulated with fields that are exterior to the prison, such as the emergence of special security forces within the prison guard professional group (forces valued by their specialization in a certain exteriority to institutional dynamics), the impact of incarceration in the personal and family lives of the professionals that uphold it, and how it affects and stigmatizes these populations, impacting their health, and even their intimacy.
Keywords: prison guard; oral history; social history; penal security and coercive measures; public policies, prison.