Carceral urbanism: Reconstructing the architecture of punitive space in post-genocide Rwanda

Abstract

In this article I make the argument that the prison in post-genocide Rwanda is an architectural artefact and a problem-space around which to examine the transitional dilemmas of the post-genocide period. I examine the changing punitive architecture of incarceration in Rwanda’s capital and in secondary urban areas. Looking at the space of the prison in relation to the changing city, I posit that through the penal production of space, the state reconfigures logics of punitive practices and urban governmentality. Changing logics of incarceration are evident in Rwanda today in the deconcentration of the capital, Kigali, to make way for an urban masterplanned order. In analyzing this shift in the visibility of the penal order in Rwanda over time, I contend that the prison constructs the city through its punitive and surveillance-based logic, as much as the city constitutes the prison as a spatially segregated edifice. I examine two sets of governmental spaces and practices that have run through different eras of Rwanda’s colonial, post-independence and post-genocide periods: (a) the prison and punishment, and (b) the reordering of the capital city and urban planning.