Learning from within a prison – An action research study

Abstract

This article is part of an action-research process and theoretical reflection on Concept X. A project between Café Exit, the Danish Prison and Probation Service, inmates, and other stakeholders with a focus on resocialization through co-creative educational and learning environments from within a prison context and out of crime. Our interest focuses empirically on Concept-X, in which participant-run workshops constitute a central learning element. We examine these learning milieus, what resources need mobilization and what is at stake for participants to succeed in co-creating learning. We apply an action research focus on participation, experimentation, and reflection to produce learning and knowledge. This complex learning perspective includes both an individual acquisition of specific ‘substance’ as well as human/social change processes in an organizational prison context. Our analysis shows that Concept X mobilizes the capacity of participants to learn and teach. This dual capacity constitutes a learning platform which facilitates less prison-internal polarization, greater societal understanding of inmates’ potential which enables a transformation of action patterns and mutual perceptions in benefit for the resocializing efforts. Where resocialization is continuous, we hope this article contributes new knowledge to a ‘learning psychology of resocialization’.