摘要：The classical conceptions define prison as a , where all aspects of every-day life are controlled by a repressive authority. Ethnographic work in a prison in Ecuador shows, however, that within the prisons there is a complex process of interchange and negotiation, like the refile, and the creation of administrative organisms promoted by the inmates themselves. The increasing number of inmates accused of drug offenses, the result of the anti-drug policies promoted by the United States, explains the way in which these types of self-management have become institutionalized and transformed into the basic organizational principle of prison life.
