‘Coercive confinement’: An idea whose time has come?

Abstract

This article argues in favour of ‘coercive confinement’ as a useful addition to the criminological lexicon. It suggests that to properly understand a country’s level of punitiveness requires consideration of a range of institutions that fall outside the remit of the formal criminal justice system. It also requires a generous longitudinal focus. Using Ireland as a case study, such an approach reveals that since the foundation of the state, the prison has gradually become ascendant. This might be read to imply a punitive turn. But when a broader view is taken to include involuntary detention in psychiatric hospitals, confinement in Magdalen homes and mother and baby homes, and detention in industrial and reformatory schools, the trajectory is strongly downward. This might be read to imply a national programme of decarceration. (In recent years, asylum seekers have been held in congregate settings that are experienced as prison-like and they must be factored into the analysis.) While some of these institutions may have been used with peculiar enthusiasm in Ireland, none are Irish inventions. It would be profitable to extend the idea of ‘coercive confinement’ to other nations with a view to adding some necessary nuance to our understanding of the reach and grip of the carceral state.

Children in coercive care as ‘Responsibilized Becomings’: On rights and responsibilization in the Swedish welfare state

“…The legislation is thus viewed as protective, and as providing social rights to the most vulnerable children and youths under the age of 21, however, it is often perceived as a punishment by the children themselves (Stenström and Pettersson, 2021). Hence, the practice constitutes a form of coercive confinement (c.f., O’Donnell and O'Sullivan, 2020). Situating the coercive care of children within the framework of coercive confinement embraces the importance of considering institutions that, with the words of O’Donnell and O'Sullivan (2020:) ‘…fall outside the remit of the formal criminal justice system’, which is necessary if we are to fully grasp a society's penal culture.…”

“…Hence, the practice constitutes a form of coercive confinement (c.f., O’Donnell and O'Sullivan, 2020). Situating the coercive care of children within the framework of coercive confinement embraces the importance of considering institutions that, with the words of O’Donnell and O'Sullivan (2020:) ‘…fall outside the remit of the formal criminal justice system’, which is necessary if we are to fully grasp a society's penal culture.…”

“…In the first issue of this journal, O’Donnell and O'Sullivan (2020) pointed out the importance of zooming out on traditional penal practices and instead directing our attention to alternative forms of control. Following this call, this study has unveiled a story of how individual rights and the implementation of international conventions are recontextualized to fit a national agenda – that of the Swedish welfare state.…”