Hunger in Brazilian Prisons: social impacts and implications

• In Event: Global and Comparative Perspectives on Corrections

Abstract

The study investigates hunger in Brazilian prisons, analyzing how the lack of adequate food serves as an additional punishment for inmates and impacts their families. Through prison inspection reports and interviews with prisoners, former inmates, and relatives, the research reveals that food scarcity worsens the dehumanizing conditions of the prison system, intensifying human rights violations. Beyond harming physical health, food deprivation is used as a mechanism of control and oppression, extending its effects beyond the cells, as families often bear the responsibility of providing food.

The reports show that inmates perceive hunger as part of a punitive logic that denies basic needs. The research engages with the tradition of Brazilian social sciences in discussing hunger and its consequences in a country still marked by this issue. Furthermore, it highlights the role of Brazilian prisons as examples of the "prison-warehouse" model in the Global South, which, however, does not follow the traditional logic of incapacitation but rather degradation and control. The study underscores the urgency of rethinking the prison system, emphasizing the social impacts of hunger and the need to guarantee basic rights for inmates.

Author

• Patrick Cacicedo, University of São Paulo Law School