Prison Management

Abstract

Abstract Changes in Israel’s prison management strategies, combined with the effects of the Oslo Accords, dramatically shrank spaces for collective resistance. The chapter first explains how these changes in prison administration are part of global trends towards improving material comfort in prison while also making imprisonment ‘tighter’ or more constricting. Specific strategies of IPS that have made collective resistance more challenging are strategic isolation and geographic dispersal, increasing material comforts and punishments, and institutionalizing rules and specialized units to suppress resistance. This chapter also explains the prison canteen system that supplements inadequate prison food and provides other material goods and personal items. The canteen is run for profit by an Israeli company but is funded by the Palestinian Authority, Palestinian political factions, and prisoners’ own families. The chapter theorizes about how the canteen itself has dampened prisoners’ resistance.