Arquitetura penal e o princípio da dignidade humana na concepção dos espaços

Abstract

The penal institution is a tool which the State uses to exercise the control and the punishment power towards individuals who infringe the law, as a try to preserve the social coexistence through the order, having in mind either the penalty or the crime types change according to time and space, and so do the prison architectural typologies. The Brazilian prison system (with the fourth biggest inmate population) has become an issue due to the over capacity as a consequence of the mass imprisonment, to unhealthy conditions and to the concentration of violence – and our country is not the only one. Even though there has been a remarkable progress in penal treatment and in prison spaces, there is still some punishment and segregation conception, such as an everlasting surveillance machine. A few opponent movements of this kind of practice (which struggle for more humanitarian sentences) have taken alternative measures successfully, based on true facts and on the excessively inferior recidivism, which brings benefits to the State and also to intra/extra prison populations. First of all, the current article traces a historical evolution of penal architectural typologies world and nationwide, mooting the gender issues and the violation of freedom deprived women. The historical understanding of the spatial conception served as parameters to draw a few topics with the goal of altering penal architecture to something less oppressive, starting with the resocialization of in mates, evidencing this architecture impasse, which is so controversial.