“Disincarcerating incarcerated emotions”: The influence of emotional dynamics behind and beyond bars on desistance from crime

Abstract

This article is based on 50 interviews and six written testimonies of 24 individuals convicted, incarcerated, and then released from penitentiaries in Switzerland. Focusing on emotional mechanisms inside and outside prison in a longitudinal perspective, this study explores their influence on desistance pathways. The incarceration experience shapes affective mechanisms, which are identified as delimited, dissimulated, and discredited. Upon release, it turns out that shifting from dynamics of emotional closure to dynamics of emotional (re)opening is critical in light of structural, relational, and emotional barriers to change.