Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Humanities
Institute of Anthropology
University of Neuchâtel

During the first half of the 20th century, rehabilitation served as the main paradigm for criminal policy
in Switzerland, as in most so-called Western countries. However, changing demands for security and
public pressure over the past decades have led to a shift towards a more punitive and hard-line
approach to crime. This ‘punitive turn’ in criminal policy has produced more investment in security,
repression, and control. As a consequence, in Switzerland there are now more people serving longer
sentences or sentenced to in-patient therapeutic ‘treatment of mental disorders’ (Art. 59 Swiss
Criminal Code [SCC]) for an undetermined duration. Those sentenced to ‘indefinite incarceration’ (Art.
64 SCC) are rarely released. Although the number of long-term inmates is increasing, what we currently
know about indefinite imprisonment – what it is and what it does – mainly derives from legal experts
or undifferentiated media coverage, and rarely includes the point of view of prisoners or staff. In the
social sciences since the 1980s, ethnographic research that is able to reveal the individual experiences
of imprisonment has declined in most so-called Western countries. Despite a recent revival of prison
ethnography, contemporary prison studies mainly have a quantitative focus, often using official
sources and data.
Based on ethnographic data generated in two secure prisons housing male offenders, this thesis
provides insights into the overlooked everyday lives of long-term prisoners in Switzerland, who are
labelled as ‘dangerous’ and categorized as posing an ‘undue risk’ to society and therefore held in
(probably) lifelong detention. Through a phenomenological and pragmatist approach, it explores
prisoners’ subjective, emplaced, and embodied perceptions of the prison’s various everyday contexts
(in the cell, at work, during leisure time), and the forms of agency they express through their multiple
methods of dealing with space and time, thereby uncovering prisoners’ manifold ways of inhabiting
the prison. It also takes into consideration the functioning of the institution by providing knowledge of
current penal policies, institutional rules, and norms and practices developed and followed by prison
authorities and staff.