The Santa Monica prison and illegal cocaine: a mutual relationship

This paper will demonstrate how women’s labor in the transnational cocaine commodity chain (TCCC) links together the Santa Monica women’s prison in Lima, Peru and the illicit cocaine market. Peru is one the fastest-growing economies in Latin America largely due to a neoliberal free market approach t...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Campos, Stephanie (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
Published: 2016
In: Crime, law and social change
Year: 2016, Volume: 65, Issue: 3, Pages: 251-268
Online Access: Presumably Free Access
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Keywords:
Cocaine
Drug Trade
Drug Trafficking
Incarcerate Woman
Informal Economy
Description
Summary:This paper will demonstrate how women’s labor in the transnational cocaine commodity chain (TCCC) links together the Santa Monica women’s prison in Lima, Peru and the illicit cocaine market. Peru is one the fastest-growing economies in Latin America largely due to a neoliberal free market approach to economic development. It has encouraged foreign investment and also has a growing middle class. But a significant portion of the country’s population has not benefitted. This has resulted in some women turning to drug smuggling or selling in order to generate an income. Due to war on drug strategies, many of them are caught and sentenced on drug trafficking charges. I argue that the prison and larger criminal justice apparatus benefit financially from the growing number of drug arrests due to the systemic blackmail of incarcerated women. The cocaine sector benefits from the internment of its ex-workers. It is able to recruit new low-level employees and maintain the protection of middle managers. It is in this way that this prison and the illegal drug market are enmeshed together through the labor of subordinate female smugglers and retailers. This study is based on ethnographic dissertation fieldwork conducted in 2008-2009 in the Santa Monica prison.
Item Description:Literaturverzeichnis: Seite 266-268
ISSN:1573-0751
DOI:10.1007/s10611-015-9577-3