Factions, rebellions, violence and imprisonment management in Ceará

Abstract

The prison system of Ceará has undergone several changes during the last decade, among them the rapid affiliation of the prisoners to the factions that dispute territory inside and outside the prison units. This article results from an ethnographic research and aims to present the rebellions of May 2016 as an event that gave visibility to the factions and caused changes in the management of the prison units of Ceará. I treat the rebellions of May 2016, which took place in various prisons in the Metropolitan Region of Fortaleza, as a time frame for the most significant changes in the management of imprisonment and which brought about the reunification of prisoners by prison units, affiliations of most of the detainees to the factions that settled in the prisons of Ceará. I approach life management and risk management the keys to understanding imprisonment, since the management of prison clusters has become the main measure of cost control and populations considered dangerous.