In the under-resourced and overcrowded prison world, women are increasingly holding key positions. Meetings far from clichés.
It is the most misunderstood and undoubtedly the most criticized of all French institutions; The penitentiary, as its 43,843 agents call it. “It is also the facility that has been modernized the most in the last twenty years,” assures Laurent Riedel, 62, director of prison services, which covers 187 prisons. This modernization was accompanied by the feminization of all services, particularly management positions. More than one in two prison managers are women, while 76% of “integration and probation counselors” (particularly those responsible for release from prison) are women. Gone are the days, not so long ago, the 1980s, when the only women tolerated in prison were nurses and social workers. Among supervisors, they now make up 21% (up from 6.8% in 1991).
Recent promotions at the National School of Prison Management even include 31 to 50% women. “We have to…
Source: Le Figaro
