Vincent Shing Cheng (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- September 2018
- ISBN:
- 9789888208661
- eISBN:
- 9789888455119
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789888208661.003.0005
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
Vincent Shing Cheng’s chapter is based on interviews with Chinese former incarcerated drug users, documenting the painful experience of inmates in the laojiao, or ‘reform through education’, ...
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Vincent Shing Cheng’s chapter is based on interviews with Chinese former incarcerated drug users, documenting the painful experience of inmates in the laojiao, or ‘reform through education’, detention centres. Instead of ‘rehabilitation’, the detention centre’s brutal treatment seems to echo a general experience of pain and humiliation aimed at socializing and ‘prisonizing’ the new inmates. This combination of informal and formal violence represents a double-edged sword of pain with its own specific rationality in a Chinese philosophy of pain and control. While criminologists suggest that ‘pain’ is counterproductive to offender rehabilitation, the Chinese prison authority has actively used ‘pain to train’ new inmates for the purpose of control. These experiences stand in stark contrast to the official narratives of education. This contradiction has created a system of hypocrisy as counterproductive for the inmates as the ‘pain’ involved in it.Less
Vincent Shing Cheng’s chapter is based on interviews with Chinese former incarcerated drug users, documenting the painful experience of inmates in the laojiao, or ‘reform through education’, detention centres. Instead of ‘rehabilitation’, the detention centre’s brutal treatment seems to echo a general experience of pain and humiliation aimed at socializing and ‘prisonizing’ the new inmates. This combination of informal and formal violence represents a double-edged sword of pain with its own specific rationality in a Chinese philosophy of pain and control. While criminologists suggest that ‘pain’ is counterproductive to offender rehabilitation, the Chinese prison authority has actively used ‘pain to train’ new inmates for the purpose of control. These experiences stand in stark contrast to the official narratives of education. This contradiction has created a system of hypocrisy as counterproductive for the inmates as the ‘pain’ involved in it.
Peter Zinoman
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520224124
- eISBN:
- 9780520925175
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520224124.003.0009
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
This chapter examines the relation between colonial prisons and the press in French Indochina during the period from 1934 to 1939. During this period, newspapers featured thousands of stories about ...
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This chapter examines the relation between colonial prisons and the press in French Indochina during the period from 1934 to 1939. During this period, newspapers featured thousands of stories about overcrowded dormitories, wretched food, filthy living conditions, and the physical brutalization of prison inmates. This vast proliferation of prison coverage provoked public outrage at the colonial administration but it checked the power of prison officials and provided a measure of protection for the inmate population. This chapter suggests that the media coverage of the prison system may be seen as among the earliest and most significant manifestations of civil society in colonial Indochina.Less
This chapter examines the relation between colonial prisons and the press in French Indochina during the period from 1934 to 1939. During this period, newspapers featured thousands of stories about overcrowded dormitories, wretched food, filthy living conditions, and the physical brutalization of prison inmates. This vast proliferation of prison coverage provoked public outrage at the colonial administration but it checked the power of prison officials and provided a measure of protection for the inmate population. This chapter suggests that the media coverage of the prison system may be seen as among the earliest and most significant manifestations of civil society in colonial Indochina.
