Ethnic diversity and inmate hierarchies in prison
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.22325/fes/res.2026.292Keywords:
inmate hierarchies, ethnic hierarchies, ethnic diversity, prison ethnography, prisonAbstract
International scholarship indicates that in many Western prison systems, increasing ethnic diversity has segmented prisoners’ informal hierarchies. These hierarchies help to control violence by channelling officers’ authority downwards and information about prisoners upwards. However, the degree to which such ethnic hierarchies are structured varies markedly across countries and institutions. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork in Ponent prison (Lleida) between 2021 and 2024, including more than 100 visits and interviews with 10 long-term prisoners, three correctional officers and two treatment professionals, this article examines whether similar segmentation is occurring in Catalonia. The findings show that traditional hierarchies, previously unified under the “kíes” (inmate leaders), have fragmented into multiple ethnic hierarchies with varying degrees of internal organisation. Some groups (Albanians) display clearly identifiable leadership and autonomous conflict resolution, whereas others (Maghrebi prisoners) are more atomised and require frequent institutional intervention. This pattern of partial and heterogeneous segmentation more closely resembles Western European models than racialised prison gangs in the United States, providing Spanish evidence for international debates on ethnic diversity and prison order.
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