Introduction

The purpose of this study is to recreate an area of social reality that is often described as the “hidden life” of a prison—some investigators call it the “informal organization”—and to confront this reality with what heretofore were only theses about the sociology of the penitentiary.

The investigations in which I gathered material were not conducted in any conventional way. On many occasions I had opportunities to make close contact with prison reality and realized that my research could not be carried out using standard sociological techniques. I was compelled to work out my own methods to obtain data and to draw conclusions therefrom. As a result, I was faced with the necessity first of all of explaining the specific feature embedded in the prison organization that made it impossible to examine in a standard manner and then to show how this task could be effectively performed.

The first part of this book characterizes the nature of the protective wall that surrounds prisons and describes my methods of examination. This part, especially chapters 1, 2, and 3, is based on prison visits that I made before actually commencing my research. These experiences were gained at ten penal institutions (three for women, two for juvenile offenders, two for first offenders, three for recidivists) and at three boys’ reformatories— all of which I stayed in during the 1970s and early 1980s.¹

My actual research, the course of which was dictated by my earlier experiences, is described in chapter 4. It was conducted in three prisons: a closed penal institution for juveniles (institution A), a closed penal institution for recidivists (institution B), and a semi-open institution for first offenders (institution C).

The hidden life of a prison is generated by three groups of relations: those among prisoners, those among prison staff members, and those between prisoners and staff. The second part of this book describes all these groups of relations on the basis of my investigations at the three penitentiaries. Thus chapter 6 contains a description of relations prevalent among the prisoners in the three types of institutions and presents some ideas about the origins and functions of the informal structure of the prisoners’ community. In chapter 7 I portray relations between the prisons staffs and the prisoners in the same three institutions. I also analyze these relations within the context of a formulated concept of relations among inmates. Similarly, chapter 8 provides a description of personal relations within the staff community. Chapter 9, finally, highlights my basic thesis, that the differentiation of social relations in the hidden life of Polish prisons is a derivative of their economic organization.