In Search of Safety ─ Confronting Inequality in Women's Imprisonment

In Search of Safety takes a close look at the sources of gendered violence and conflict in women's prisons. The authors examine how intersectional inequalities and cumulative disadvantage are at the root of prison conflict and violence, reflecting the women's pathways to prison. Women must negotiate these inequities through developing forms of prison capital—social, human, cultural, emotional, and economic—to ensure their safety while inside. The authors also analyze how conflict and subsequent violence result from human rights violations inside the prison, occurring within the gendered context of substandard prison conditions, inequalities of all forms of capital among those imprisoned, and relationships with correctional staff. In Search of Safety suggests a way forward—the need for implementing international human rights standards for U.S. prisons.