From confinement to monitoring The carceral as management of the transitory

In a previous contribution , we argued that the carceral should no longer be considered as consubstantial with prison and the immobilization and confinement it implies. The common identification between (physical) mobility and freedom is no longer so self- evident. These elements also imply that we should abandon the idea of a continuum between carceral immobilization and free mobility. We therefore proposed a concept of carceral based on mobility monitoring in a multi-layered spatial positioning of individuals. We then focused on considerations about the social representations of space, without having much opportunity to consider the question of time. This was a shortcoming because, as we will see, the current switch of the carceral from confinement towards mobility monitoring is the result of a change in the relationship with space, but also with time. It is thus a change of perspective regarding space-time that is at stake. In our presentation, we will show how we are evolving from time seen as a succession of stasis and ruptures toward the vision of a constant flow, and how it results in a shift from long-term confinement towards constant renegotiation of the relation with the carceral and mobilization of the inmates and the institutions. We will show that carceral is less and less a location process (in a prison), but increasingly a journey, a trajectory. Controlling this trajectory is the new goal of a carceral system that aims to inflect trajectories, rather than relocate people back to their due place in society