2: Kropotkin and the Anarchist Case for Prison Abolition

Author:
Ruth Kinna
Publication Date:
19 Mar 2025
Pages:
25–42
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.51952/9781529224061.ch002
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This chapter examines the anarchist case for abolition by analysing Peter Kropotkin’s In Russian and French Prisons (1887), a well-known text that has escaped systematic study. Using themes of environment, culture and social relationships, I discuss his account, explain his scepticism about reform and explain why he concluded that the only sensible answer to the question ‘are prisons necessary?’ was ‘no’. The final section follows the two lines of Kropotkin’s abolitionist thesis in anarchist thought: the first ‘environmental’ strand focuses on the systemic injustices that incentivize wrongdoing and the second ‘ethical’ thread emphasizes the faultiness of the concept of crime. The argument is that the anarchist case for abolition rests on their interconnection.

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