The Concept of the Penal State

Session Submission Type: Complete Thematic Panel

Abstract/Description

Criminologists and “punishment and society” scholars regularly refer to something called “the penal state” (or “the carceral state”) but the meaning and referents of that term are unstable and implicitly contested. This intellectually diverse panel of scholars, each of whom has thought and written about the topic, aims to mount a discussion that will help clarify the issues at stake and identify the key areas of disagreement and contestation.

Sub Unit

• Area IX. Comparative & Historical Perspectives:  / 68. Cross-National Comparison of Crime & Justice

Individual Presentations

• Towards a concept of the penal state. - David Garland, New York University

• Predation and the Penal State - Josh Page, University of Minnesota; Joe Soss, University of Minnesota

• The Birth of the Penal State: Historicizing a Central Concept - Ashley T. Rubin, University of Hawai'i at Manoa

• Violence and the Carceral State - Lisa Miller, Rutgers University

Chair

• Dario Melossi, Bologna University

Organized by a Division or external group?

Organized by the editors of the journal, Punishment & Society