Female incarceration in the Amazon Region of Para

expansion of the prison system and institutional gender violence

Abstract

This text stems from part of our studies on historical and educational processes in prison institutions located in the Amazon region of Pará and problematizes the expansion of the prison system in that state, with an emphasis on the increase in female incarceration. Despite the significant growth of this population, state negligence regarding its specific needs is observed, reflected in the insufficient number of units for women and the asymmetrical conditions of care. This is a bibliographic and documentary research, based on data from the National Penal Information System (SISDEPPEN) and the Seap em Números portal (2022), engaging with authors such as Foucault (2003), Wacquant (2003), Davis (2016), Assunção (2021), and Nascimento et al. (2023). The results indicate that, since the 1980s, the expansion of the prison network in Pará has accompanied the weakening of social policies, configuring a process of containment and punishment that reinforces structural inequalities. We acknowledge the unequal treatment of incarcerated women compared to men, highlighting the presence of institutional gender-based violence that particularly affects these women. This demonstrates the persistence of institutional gender-based violence, expressed in the precarious living conditions and the double process of exclusion that affects incarcerated women—often mothers—through the rupture of family and social ties. It is concluded that gender-based violence, in its structural dimension, is socially constructed and perpetuated within prisons, revealing the historical reproduction of inequalities and the urgent need for specific public policies aimed at realizing women's rights and dignity.