This edited collection brings together academics, lawyers, civil servants, and researchers working in the human rights NGO sector, to explore the work and role of prison officers around the world. Each chapter offers a distinctive perspective on the work of prison officers within localised socio-economic and criminal justice contexts, to provide a unique overview and insight into the realities and complexities of the role through accessible scholarly interpretations of their work. The aim of the book is to advance knowledge and understanding of the crucial role that prison officers occupy within carceral systems. The collection has widespread applicability with relevance beyond academia into criminal justice practice and policy internationally. Chapter 3 is available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com.

In this posthumous collection of writings, Cornelius Castoriadis (1922-1997) pursues his incisive analysis of modern society, the philosophical basis of our ability to change it, and the points of intersection between his many approaches to this theme. His main philosophical postulate, that the human subject and society are not predetermined, asserts the primacy of creation and the possibility of creative, autonomous activity in every domain. This argument is combined with penetrating political and social criticism, opening numerous avenues of critical thought and action.
The book's wide-ranging topics include the core worldview of ancient Athens, where the idea of self-creation and self-limitation made democracy possible; the wealth of poetic resources; a deconstruction of the so-called rationality of capitalism and of the current conception of democracy, along with a discussion of what a radical, revolutionary project means today; the role of what he calls the radical imagination in the creation of both societal institutions and history; the roots of hate; a psychoanalytic view of human development torn between heteronomy and autonomy; the role of education in forming autonomous individuals; and notions of chaos, space, and number.

In this posthumous collection of writings, Cornelius Castoriadis (1922-1997) pursues his incisive analysis of modern society, the philosophical basis of our ability to change it, and the points of intersection between his many approaches to this theme. His main philosophical postulate, that the human subject and society are not predetermined, asserts the primacy of creation and the possibility of creative, autonomous activity in every domain. This argument is combined with penetrating political and social criticism, opening numerous avenues of critical thought and action.
The book's wide-ranging topics include the core worldview of ancient Athens, where the idea of self-creation and self-limitation made democracy possible; the wealth of poetic resources; a deconstruction of the so-called rationality of capitalism and of the current conception of democracy, along with a discussion of what a radical, revolutionary project means today; the role of what he calls the radical imagination in the creation of both societal institutions and history; the roots of hate; a psychoanalytic view of human development torn between heteronomy and autonomy; the role of education in forming autonomous individuals; and notions of chaos, space, and number.

This posthumous collection of interviews and occasional papers given by Castoriadis between 1974 and 1997 is a lively, direct introduction to the thinking of a writer who never abandoned his radically critical stance. It provides a clear, handy resume of his political ideas, in advance of their times and profoundly relevant to today's world. For this political thinker and longtime militant (co-founder with Claude Lefort of the revolutionary group "Socialisme ou Barbarie"), economist, psychoanalyst, and philosopher, two endless interrogations-how to understand the world and life in society-were intertwined with his own life and combats. An important chapter discusses the history of "Socialisme ou Barbarie" (1949-1967); in it, Castoriadis presents the views he defended, in that group, on a number of subjects: a critique of Marxism and of the Soviet Union, the bureaucratization of society and of the workers' movement, and the primacy of individual and collective autonomy. Another chapter presents the concept, central to his thinking, of "imaginary significations" as what make a society "cohere." Castoriadis constantly returns to the question of democracy as the never-finished, deliberate creation by the people of societal institutions, analyzing its past and its future in the Western world. He scathingly criticizes "representative" democracy and develops a conception of direct democracy extending to all spheres of social life. He wonders about the chances of achieving freedom and autonomy-those requisites of true democracy-in a world of endless, meaningless accumulation of material goods, where the mechanisms for governing society have disintegrated, the relationship with nature is reduced to one of destructive domination, and, above all, the population has withdrawn from the public sphere: a world dominated by hobbies and lobbies-"a society adrift."

This posthumous collection of interviews and occasional papers given by Castoriadis between 1974 and 1997 is a lively, direct introduction to the thinking of a writer who never abandoned his radically critical stance. It provides a clear, handy résumé of his political ideas, in advance of their times and profoundly relevant to today’s world. For this political thinker and longtime militant (co-founder with Claude Lefort of the revolutionary group “Socialisme ou Barbarie�), economist, psychoanalyst, and philosopher, two endless interrogations—how to understand the world and life in society—were intertwined with his own life and combats. An important chapter discusses the history of “Socialisme ou Barbarie� (1949—1967); in it, Castoriadis presents the views he defended, in that group, on a number of subjects: a critique of Marxism and of the Soviet Union, the bureaucratization of society and of the workers’ movement, and the primacy of individual and collective autonomy. Another chapter presents the concept, central to his thinking, of “imaginary significations� as what make a society “cohere.� Castoriadis constantly returns to the question of democracy as the never-finished, deliberate creation by the people of societal institutions, analyzing its past and its future in the Western world. He scathingly criticizes “representative� democracy and develops a conception of direct democracy extending to all spheres of social life. He wonders about the chances of achieving freedom and autonomy—those requisites of true democracy—in a world of endless, meaningless accumulation of material goods, where the mechanisms for governing society have disintegrated, the relationship with nature is reduced to one of destructive domination, and, above all, the population has withdrawn from the public sphere: a world dominated by hobbies and lobbies—�a society adrift.�

This book constitutes a critical case study of the modern search for public sector reform. It includes a detailed account of a study aimed at developing a meaningful way of evaluating difficult-to-measure moral dimensions of the quality of prisons. Penal practices, values, and sensibilities have undergone important transformations over the period 1990-2003. Part of this transformation included a serious flirtation with a liberal penal project that went wrong. A significant factor in this unfortunate turn of events was a lack of clarity, by those working in and managing prisons, about important terms such as 'justice', 'liberal', and 'care', and how they might apply to daily penal life. Official measures of the prison seem to lack relevance to many who live and work in prison and to their critics. The author proposes that a truer test of the quality of prison life is what staff and prisoners have to say about those aspects of prison life that 'matter most': relationships, fairness, order, and the quality of their treatment. The book attempts a detailed analysis and measurement of these dimensions in five prisons. It finds significant differences between establishments in these areas of prison life, and some departures from the official vision of the prison supported by the performance framework. The information revolution has generated unprecedented levels of knowledge about individual prisons, as well as providing a management reach into establishments from a distance, and a capacity for 'chronic revision', that was unimaginable fifty years ago. Another major transformation - the modernisation project - brought with it a new, but flawed, 'craft' of performance monitoring and measurement aimed at solving some of the problems of prison management. This book explores the arrival and the impact of this concept of performance and the links apparently forged between managerialism and moral values.

This book constitutes a critical case study of the modern search for public sector reform. It includes a detailed account of a study aimed at developing a meaningful way of evaluating difficult-to-measure moral dimensions of the quality of prisons. Penal practices, values, and sensibilities have undergone important transformations over the period 1990-2003. Part of this transformation included a serious flirtation with a liberal penal project that went wrong. A significant contributory factor in this unfortunate turn of events was a lack of clarity, by those working in and managing prisons, about important terms such as 'justice', 'liberal', and 'care', and how they might apply to daily penal life. Official measures of the prison service seem to lack relevance to many who live and work in prison and to their critics. The author proposes that a truer test of the quality of prison life is what staff and prisoners have to say about those aspects of prison life that 'matter most': relationships, fairness, order, and the quality of their treatment by those above them. The book attempts a detailed analysis and measurement of these dimensions in five prisons. It finds significant differences between establishments in these areas of prison life, and some departures from the official vision of the prison supported by the performance framework. The information revolution has generated unprecedented levels of knowledge about individual prisons, as well as providing a management reach into establishments from a distance, and a capacity for 'chronic revision', that was unimaginable fifty years ago. Another major transformation - the modernisation project - brought with it a new, but flawed, 'craft' of performance monitoring and measurement aimed at solving some of the problems of prison management. This book explores the arrival and the impact of this concept of performance and the links apparently forged between managerialism and moral values.