Prison

Today we did a site visit to one of Denmark's open prisions. It was unbelievable. The whole philosophy surrounding imprisonment is completely opposed to the US ideology of punitive sentencing... The prisoners here could literally walk away from the prison if they chose to. They would just be caught and put in a closed prison - which is still much more humane than American prisons. One of the inmates (prison guests would be a direct translation of the Danish) gave us a tour along with a guide. When he walked into the room it was clear that he brought his identity and humanity with him. Prisoners here cook for themselves (yes, the get to use butcher knives), clean, work, and generally make their own lives go on. The Danes believe in "normalization" - keeping life in the prison as close to life outside as possible so that when inmates go back into society they are able to function successfully. the idea is to restrict a prisoner's liberty but only to the extent absolutely necessary. There are no minimum sentencing laws. No private prisons.

It made me think - why do we lock people up? to restrict their liberty? To punish? To prevent them from offending again? So what are the most effective ways of doing this? Are we doing it for the good of society, for the satifaction of the victim, for the betterment of the victim?

In the afternoon we had lectures abotu the history of prisons in Europe briefly and Denmark more extensively as well as on torture - the politics and rhetoric of torture, post 9/11 climate for torture, etc.

Tomorrow we are visiting a refugee camp for asylum seekers! It should be a fascinating day as well. It is rare that outsiders are allowed into the camp.

Outside of the official HiA events I have been having a blast with all the fellows. Yesterday I wandered aroudn Christiania (look it up if you don't know about it... it is a free area established by hippies 30 years ago) and then met up with a Danish friend and he showed me a neighborhood I hadn't been to - Norrebro. Today a bunch of us sat by the canal and talked for ages - about politics, yes, but other things as well! We struggle to get off the human rights/international relations/Danish politics vein of conversation at times... :)

Ok. I am going to go make dinner for my host family. They are wonderful people - I feel very fortunate to live with them!

Love.