The contributions of the writers attest to the immediacy of the many questions that have arisen concerning "political prisoners and detainees," across the globe. The insecurity narratives of the neo-conservative politics and state institutions of control that grip much of the West, would have us believe that the attacks of September 11, 2001, constitute a breach with the past that has moved us to a new reality, exemplified by the need for a war on terror. Indeed in U.S.A., with its global imperialist entanglements, the public and private narratives appear to assume that a new world order has emerged. The benefits of this conclusion for established criminal justice and carceral industries are considerable. Roll backs of human and civil rights, the suspension of the rule of law, abrogation of the United Nations' Minimum Rules of Imprisonment, career advancement, and profit for industrial players, all serve established interests of the prison-industrial complex.

For 25 years, the Journal of Prisoners on Prisons (JPP) has been a prisoner written, academically oriented and peer reviewed, non-profit journal, based on the tradition of the penal press. It brings the knowledge produced by prison writers together with academic arguments to enlighten public discourse about the current state of carceral institutions.