Description
The project aims at developing an advanced understanding of the process of reentry into society from the subjective perspective of prisoners themselves. The processes, interactions, meanings and conflicts involved in reentry will be examined from Roma and non-Roma prisoners’ point of view, with a particular concern for the situation of Roma prisoners. The ethnography of prisoners’ transition will deliver two types of contributions: a scientific one and one directed towards policy making.Our research project is designed to cater to two different target groups: inmates, inmates awaiting release, and ex-inmates as well as the authorities in charge of the administration of the penitentiary system. The research project is based on the collaboration between University of Bucharest, Faculty of Sociology and Social Assistance and University of Oslo, Faculty of Law, Department of Criminology and Sociology of Law.Bearing in mind that one of our objectives is to assess the impact of the cultural, political and social milieu for the reentry process, the empirical research is conducted in two places simultaneously–Bucharest and Oslo.The two researches deal with Romanian prisoners and have a similar design in what concern the way respondents are selected and data collected and analyzed. This research can benefit from the expertise in criminological research that Norwegian partners have (a valuable expertise in conducting ethnographic research in carceral environments). The partnership between the two universities can broaden the scope of this research and provide an in-depth understanding of reentry. Being able to compare findings on Romanian prisoners in Norway and Romania provides an innovative approach which can shed light on the impact that the social milieu and institutions have on the subjective actions of prisoners. At the same time, this collaboration will provide relevant evidence for the multiple ways in which immigration affects the states in Western Europe.
Summary of project results
The ethnography of prisoner's transition is a project appeared in the context of a large public discussion about the poor life conditions that Romanian prisons offered for the deprived persons of liberty, the prisons overcrowding and the fact that no public institution was interested of what happens with the prisoners after they finish their period of detention and return in the society. Both project objectives were achieved: at the scientific level, the project helped us identify new meanings of the re-entry process as the ex-prisoners personally lived. We proposed a theory of the five steps of re-entry, presented at several national and international conferences. At the policy development level, using the information took in the fieldwork, we made a list of policy recommendations and we presented it to the political and social factors of decision in Romania. A part of these recommendations were already taken in consideration, because they were discussed in the Romanian Parliament and some changes of social laws occurred. - the presence of The EPT team in several national and international conferences during the project; - articles published in several publications, from Romania and abroad; - work meetings between the two countries team, both in Romania and Norway; - round tables with the decisional factors in Romania; - an artistic film, based on 'true stories' identified during research, called '58 cents', now available on the project website and presented to the public on a national television, Antena 1, at an hour of high-audience, followed by an interesting debate. The main beneficiaries of this project are the deprived persons of liberty that are about to become free persons after the ending of detention period. In our study we couldn't provide real help for our participants, because we used as a research method the observation, in the idea that we tried to enter in the ex-prisoners world and observe what obstacles, interactions, conflicts and experiences they lived. The conclusions of our research will be helping other prisoners, those prisoners that will be released in the future. In the final of year 2017, a number of 1200 prisoners released faster than normally. In this way, the Romanian Parliament tried to solve overcrowding and to offer decent conditions of detentions for the prisoners that are still imprisoned.
Summary of bilateral results
The main achievements of working with our Norwegian partners were: the access to the scientific literature in the two countries and a good collaboration between specialists from the same field of expertise, but working and living in two different parts of Europe. These represent things that improved knowledge and a better understanding of different cultural perceptions of the same vulnerable group of research, the ex-prisoners. Our team was in a good communication during the entire project, we communicated frequently by email, we had meetings via Skype, we all wrote in the same research journal during the fieldwork and we had work visits in which we put questions, we found answers, we talked about the participants, we made strategies and we shared results. Yes, the bilateral founds contributed to strengthen bilateral relations in The Ethnography of prisoner's transition project, mostly in formal partnerships, but also in ad-hoc exchange and collaboration in this project. The bilateral partnership helped the Romanian part become more visible in the scientific community abroad; this project gave the opportunity for the Romanian researchers to participate to international conferences in criminology and prisons area and to present there parts of this study. It was important for us to see the impact of our work in the world academic community and to receive good recommendations and suggestions from other researchers from this domain.