Forms of Constraint

Book excerpt: Rigorously documented and generously illustrated, Forms of constraint surveys prison architecture from earliest times to the present. Embedding his discussion of architectural detail in a history of social ideas about prisoners and imprisonment, criminologist Norman Johnston considers the architectural design and features of prisons in light of the purposes they were meant to serve. Johnston describes the preferred types of prison layout in various eras and locations. He assesses the success or failure of building elements in fulfilling goals such as prisoner isolation, segregation by gender or by severity of crime, adequate hygiene, rehabilitative activities, and surveillance of prisoners and guards. As goals and the consequent demands on the physical structure changed, new templates for the ideal prison emerged. Johnston traces the gradual rise of prison design as an architectural specialty and profiles the early figures and organizations devoted to the field, including William Blackburn, the first architect to specialize in prison design; John Haviland, architect of the influential Pennsylvania prison style; and Jeremy and Samuel Bentham, who conceived the much-discussed but never built Panopticon. He describes changes in prison design as architecture and penal philosophy leadership passed from one country to another. He also provides broad coverage of penal methods and prison architecture around the world.