Women in Prison and Work

Buck, Marilyn

doi:10.2307/20458974

Cited by 8 publications

(3 citation statements)

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“…In addition, how women experience and evaluate available programs depends on their opportunities and access to similar programs in the community (Bucerius, Haggerty, and Dunford 2021;Schneider 2021). Women work in prison for several reasons: being required to-for example, in Germany, where prison work is mandatory, to learn a work ethic in an environment in which idleness is disparaged, to forget about prison life, or to make money (Buck 2004). Women prisoners work…”

Section: Programmingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Women in Prisons

Bucerius¹,

Sandberg²

2022

Crime and Justice

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Before being locked up, incarcerated women are more marginalized, have higher rates of mental illness and substance misuse, and have more often experienced physical or sexual victimization than incarcerated men. Women experience prison differently. However, much of what we know about women's experiences comes from research in the U.S. and the U.K., providing little insight into women prisoners' experiences elsewhere. This is unfortunate for many reasons; policy makers wishing to develop evidence-based initiatives, for example, cannot know whether what seems to work in one place is appropriate in another. Case studies from Canada, Norway, and Mexico reveal similarities and substantial differences in women's experiences. Incarcerated women in all three places have histories of victimization and identify their children as their primary motivator to desist from crime and drug use. However, how they relate to programming, prison work, accommodation, and prison food varies greatly. How women in these three different countries experience imprisonment is related to conditions of their lives outside of prison and to the nature, extent, and quality of available social welfare services. Researchers need to pay much closer attention to geographical and contextual differences when assessing the conditions, challenges, and prospects of women in prisons. * * *Scholars have mostly studied men's prisons and male prisoners (e.g., Sykes 1958;Irwin and Cressey 1962;Jacobs 1977). This is not surprising. Men's prisons far outnumber those for women, and men make up 90-95 percent of prisoners in most countries. Rises in female incarceration rates and increases in female fractions among prison populations in many countries in recent years have fueled interest in understanding more about women's incarceration, the challenges women prisoners face, and the effects of incarceration on them and their families and loved ones (e.g.,

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Section: Programmingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Women in Prisons

Bucerius¹,

Sandberg²

2022

Crime and Justice

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“…[10] A historical and structural perspective helps understand prison labor as exploitation of Black and other incarcerated people of color as this institution operates on a "transformation of imprisoned bodies -and they are in their majority bodies of color -into sources of profit" (Browne 2007;Buck 2004;Goodwin 2019 ;Halladay 2018;Thompson 2012 ;A. Y. Davis 2003, 88).…”

Section: Critical Perspectives On Prison Labormentioning

confidence: 99%

“…[12] History also helps understand labor in women's prisons as gendered exploitation. Buck (2004) argues that most women's labor could be construed as alienating and underpaid, even more so in prison. In prison, women's rehabilitation was historically achieved through domesticity training aiming to refeminize unruly women according to middle-class, white standards (A. Y.…”

Section: Critical Perspectives On Prison Labormentioning

confidence: 99%

Reform to Abolish: A Pragmatic Analysis of Prison Labor & Strip Searches in Quebec Correctional Law

Rouleau¹

2021

Preprint

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In the past year, abolitionist themes have been at the forefront of mobilizations such as #BlackLivesMatter, #MeToo, and #FreeThemAll. This paper relies on socio-legal feminist methodology and proposes a pragmatic abolitionist analysis of correctional law, the Loi sur le système correctionnel du Québec (LSCQ). I emphasize two issues reflective of ongoing structural harms within women’s jails – prison labor and strip searches – and argue that both practices instill everyday bodily harms due to their framing in the LSCQ. Although prison labor is presented as favoring social reinsertion, per the LSCQ incarcerated women receive inadequate wages relative to the cost of living in prison thus limiting their access to menstrual products and potentially leading to dangerous alternatives. As for strip searches, they are presented as means to ensure the safety of the institution yet are experienced as unsafe and as state-inflicted sexual assault. Per the LSCQ, strip searches can be conducted in a range of circumstances leaving much to correctional officers’ discretion, thus allowing for discriminatory rule enforcement and exposing incarcerated women of color to further violence. I conclude by presenting short-term abolitionist reforms which could reduce these everyday bodily harms. I also call for increased solidarity with incarcerated people within social mobilizing and organizing.

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Prison Work

Dhami¹

2013

The Encyclopedia of Criminology and Criminal Justice

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In many jurisdictions, those sentenced to prison may be required to work while in prison. The type of work ranges from menial work, such as cleaning the institution, to private and/or public industrial work, vocational training, and work‐release programs. Assumed benefits of prison work include increasing prisoners' employment opportunities upon release and reducing recidivism. Some empirical evidence supports these assumptions, although much of the research is methodologically flawed; for example, many are characterized by sample‐selection bias. Despite potential benefits, prison work has been criticized for exploiting prisoners, not always being a productive use of inmates' time, and lacking rehabilitative value.

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Women in Prison and Work

Cited by 8 publications

References 1 publication

Women in Prisons

Women in Prisons

Reform to Abolish: A Pragmatic Analysis of Prison Labor & Strip Searches in Quebec Correctional Law

Prison Work

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Women in Prison and Work

Cited by 8 publications

References 1 publication

Women in Prisons

Women in Prisons

Reform to Abolish: A Pragmatic Analysis of Prison Labor &amp; Strip Searches in Quebec Correctional Law

Prison Work

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Reform to Abolish: A Pragmatic Analysis of Prison Labor & Strip Searches in Quebec Correctional Law