From the production of academic knowledge to the management of progressive penitentiary politics. The experience of Santa Fe Province between 2008 and 2011.

Abstract

The core idea of this article concerns the political process that took place between 2008 and 2011 in the Penitentiary Service of the province of Santa Fe, in Argentina, called “The New Penitentiary Policy” of the Frente Progresista Cívico y Social (FPCyS). Analyzing this process from a field perspective, precisely, as a prison field, we describe the trajectories, decisions and development of the people involved in academic and political areas that created and implemented the progressive project. Simultaneously, we display the ambivalent games of legitimations and resistances that occurred within the local power fields— prisons — particularly with the areas of agents belonging to the General Corps and professionals. The tension between potentialities, limitations and safeguards are to be considered in the interrelation between academic research and public policy management.