Punitive adjustments at the Makala Central Prison in Kinshasa
Using Makala Central Prison in Kinshasa as an empirical reference point, this paper shows that punishment is interrupted, intensified, alleviated and avoided through interactions of actors living, working and visiting the carceral universe. It brings to the fore the multi and micro-dimensionality of...
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2026
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| In: |
Punishment & society
Year: 2026, Volume: 28, Issue: 1, Pages: 51-70 |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Keywords: |
| Summary: | Using Makala Central Prison in Kinshasa as an empirical reference point, this paper shows that punishment is interrupted, intensified, alleviated and avoided through interactions of actors living, working and visiting the carceral universe. It brings to the fore the multi and micro-dimensionality of punishment, analytically breaking down the objects, negotiations and decisions that make it adjustable on a daily basis. Two questions emerge from such an analysis. How and under what circumstances are punishments shaped inside and outside the walls of Makala Central Prison in Kinshasa? What actions, interactions, inactions, material and symbolic resources underpin the adjustability of a carceral punishment? To answer this twofold question, the paper underscores the intersubjective relationships through which subjective experiences of punishment are modified. In punitive adjustments, it's not just the boundaries between inside and outside the walls that are turned upside down. The demarcation lines between fulfilment and pain, humanistic action and violence, respect and humiliation, help and deprivation, are blurred, clarified, contradicted and sometimes erased by the death of a prisoner, whose fate no longer requires any adjustment. |
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| ISSN: | 1741-3095 |
| DOI: | 10.1177/14624745251375465 |
