Colonial Systems of Control: Criminal Justice in Nigeria

by Viviane Saleh-Hanna (Editor), Chris Affor (Contributor), Uju Agomoh (Contributor)

A pioneering book on prisons in West Africa, Colonial Systems of Criminal Justice in Nigeria is the first comprehensive presentation of life inside a West African prison. Chapters by prisoners inside Kirikiri maximum security prison in Lagos, Nigeria are published alongside chapters by scholars and activists. While prisoners document the daily realities and struggles of life inside a Nigerian prison, scholar and human rights activist Viviane Saleh-Hanna provides historical, political, and academic contexts and analyses of the penal system in Nigeria. The European penal models and institutions imported to Nigeria during colonialism are exposed as intrinsically incoherent with the community-based conflict-resolution principles of most African social structures and justice models. This book presents the realities of imprisonment in Nigeria while contextualizing the colonial legacies that have resulted in the inhumane brutalities that are endured on a daily basis. Nigeria, West Africa, penal system, maximum-security prison. Published in English.

617 pages, Kindle Edition

First published April 18, 2008

About the author

Viviane Saleh-Hanna is a professor and chairperson at the Department of Crime and Justice Studies, University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth.

Reviews

[Nokuzola · Rating 5 out of 5]

An absolutely brilliant read. A much-needed case for the global abolition of the police and the carceral state.