Many people think prisons are all the same-rows of cells filled with violent men who officials rule with an iron fist. Yet, life behind bars varies in incredible ways. In some facilities, prison officials govern with care and attention to prisoners' needs. In others, officials have remarkably little influence on the everyday life of prisoners, sometimes not even providing necessities like food and clean water. Why does prison social order around the world look so remarkably different? In The Puzzle of Prison Order, David Skarbek develops a theory of why prisons and prison life vary so much. He finds that how they're governed-sometimes by the state, and sometimes by the prisoners-matters the most. He investigates life in a wide array of prisons-in Brazil, Bolivia, Norway, a prisoner of war camp, England and Wales, women's prisons in California, and a gay and transgender housing unit in the Los Angeles County Jail-to understand the hierarchy of life on the inside. Drawing on economics and a vast empirical literature on legal systems, Skarbek offers a framework to not only understand why life on the inside varies in such fascinating and novel ways, but also how social order evolves and takes root behind bars.

About the Author
David Skarbek is Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science and the Political Theory Project at Brown University. He is the author of The Social Order of the Underworld (Oxford, 2014), which won the APSA's William Riker Award for best book in political economy and the Outstanding Book Award from International Association for the Study of Organized Crime.

Reviews
The Puzzle of Prison Order provides a rich foundation for future research... Examining the variation in governance institutions using Skarbek's theory may help researchers explain and address that variation in violence. * Kaitlyn Woltz, The Review of Austrian Economics *
...this book is a wonderful example of how brilliant scholarship can be produced by relying on secondary data sources, without collecting any "original" data. * Malcolm M. Feeley, Public Choice *
This book will likely have a wide appeal and be a useful resource to criminologists, sociologists, political scientists, and anthropologists alike, as well as to individuals working within the criminal justice system who wish to understand more about the underlying mechanisms of social order within prisons. * Rose Elisabeth Boyle, Pernille Nyvoll, and Thomas Ugelvik, Criminal Law and Criminal Justice Books *
Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates. Graduate students and faculty. * R. D. McCrie, CHOICE *
An illuminating work of much interest to students of crime and punishment. * Kirkus *


Awards
Winner of Winner of the Best Book Award in International Criminology from the American Society for Criminology.



Book Information
ISBN 9780190672508
Author David Skarbek
Format Paperback
Page Count 192
Imprint Oxford University Press Inc
Publisher Oxford University Press Inc
Weight(grams) 340g
Dimensions(mm) 234mm * 155mm * 17mm