Introduction: Special Issue on Prison Violence in the Americas

• Author: Gustavo Fondevila,Jennifer Peirce
• Date: 01 March 2020
• Published date: 01 March 2020
• DOI: 10.1177/1057567719896084
• Subject Matter: Guest Editorial

Guest Editorial

Introduction: Special Issue

on Prison Violence

in the Americas

Jennifer Peirce

1

and Gustavo Fondevila

2

In prison studies, research tends to be divided by lines of geography, language, and academic

discipline. This special issue aims to bring current research on prisons in Latin America to an

English-speaking audience and into conversation with prison scholars across regions of the world.

Prisons research in Latin America has largely been the domain of legal scholars, especially with a

focus on doctrine and legislation. Historians have documented the evolution of penal systems in

contexts of colonialism. Sociological and political science research has explored prisons in Latin

America as a space of marginalization and state abandonment. There is also a growing body of

empirical research, based on fieldwork and primary data, about prisons in the region. This special

issue brings together five new studies, from different disciplines, methods, and countries, to put a

spotlight on research conducted inside prisons in Latin America. The authors of these studies are all

participants in the Americas Prisons Research Network, established in 2016 to encourage collabora-

tion in this field throughout the Western Hemisphere.

Three of the studies are qualitative, rooted in ethnographic methods and based on extensive

fieldwork inside prisons and with people who have spent time incarcerated. Each provides a new

lens on key issues in prison studies: narratives of violence, prison gangs, and prison riots. From

Colombia, Ariza and Iturralde weave together the history of prisons during different eras in the

country’s armed conflict and in the context of rising incarceration for drug trafficking and common

crime. Blending stories, memories, visual images, and the rhythms of daily life, they reveal the ways

that prisoners and guards understand the place in which they are confined. On the U.S.-Mexico

border, Gundur traces the evolution of a prison gang, showing how the conditions and context of

prisons in Texas and Ciudad Ju´arez influence the characteristics and tactics of the group. This piece

is unique in that it draws on lengthy interviews with one of the founders of the group, who is now

deceased. Weegels, an anthropologist working in Nicaragua, delves beneath typical explanations of

prison riots. Drawing on direct accounts from prisoners who experienced two different riots in

Nicaraguan prisons, she shows how the riots, relatively rare, relate to prisoners’ efforts to negotiate

authority among themselves and with prison staff—all in a very fraught context of political tension.

1

John Jay College of Criminal Justice & CUNY Graduate Center, New York, NY, USA

2

Center for Economic Research and Teaching (CIDE), Mexico City, Mexico

Corresponding Author:

Jennifer Peirce, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, 524 W 59th St, New York, NY, USA.

Email: jpeirce@jjay.cuny.edu

International CriminalJustice Review

2020, Vol. 30(1) 8-9

ª2019 Georgia State University

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DOI: 10.1177/1057567719896084

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