Behind bars: stories, old and new, of money in prison

Daniel Seabra Lopes

doi:10.3989/arbor.2025.813.2893

Autores/as

Daniel Seabra Lopes Instituto Superior de Economia e Gestão da Universidade de Lisboa https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8202-1355

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.3989/arbor.2025.813.2893

Palabras clave:

dinero, soportes monetarios, economía informal, regímenes de valor, prisiones

Resumen

Este artículo considera los soportes monetarios que prosperan en contextos carcelarios, que se prestan al desarrollo de intercambios informales y monedas paralelas. Basándose en una serie de entrevistas semiestructuradas realizadas en prisiones portuguesas de hombres y mujeres en 2023, considera las economías carcelarias formales e informales como fenómenos interrelacionados y en gran medida endógenos que se derivan de las características estructurales, organizativas e interaccionales del confinamiento. El artículo comienza con una descripción de las prisiones contemporáneas como entornos sin efectivo, con esquemas de asignación coercitivos. Continua con un análisis de los circuitos de intercambio paralelos de bienes lícitos e ilícitos, teniendo en cuenta las formas y funciones del dinero tras las rejas. Se destacan tres aspectos: 1) las categorizaciones utilizadas por los reclusos para describirse y valorarse mutuamente, que se enmarcan en una economía humana peculiar; 2) los tratos informales realizados tras las rejas; 3) la omnipresencia de ciertos derivados del efectivo, como el tabaco, junto con esquemas clandestinos basados en transferencias electrónicas de dinero.

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