A story of more than 40 years that comes to an end.
The Genepi (National Student Teaching Group for Prisoners), an association which has supported prisoners for more than four decades but which had already broken off for several years with the Prison Administration, announced its dissolution on Monday.
"We refuse to perpetuate an association that was not thought of as a tool in the fight against imprisonment and has never served the interests of prisoners," said Genepi in a statement, rejecting the legacy of the movement.
At the end of its "abolitionist" logic
The association, which had changed direction and now claimed to be a "feminist and anti-prison" association, explains having reached the end of its "abolitionist" logic.
"We refuse to be satisfied with a reformist criticism of jail and justice, the only possibility heard by the State and the dominant discourse formulated by the Genepi for more than 40 years", sinks the current direction of the association in this text.
In fact, the Prison Administration had severed its links with the association in 2018 by not renewing the three-year agreement which provided it with subsidies.
No more workshops or courses in prison since 2019
Since 2019, the Genepi, which had up to 850 volunteers in the early 2000s, had given up its historic activity of workshops or courses in prison.
Created by the public authorities following the violent riots which had shaken the prisons, in particular during the summer of 1974, the Genepi also animated "outside the prison" of numerous seminars and awareness campaigns around the prison question and the place of prison in society.
Justice
Prisons: "The conditions of detention have become appalling again in France", denounces the controller Dominique Simonnot
Justice
Prisons: Despite prison overcrowding, 15.7% increase in the number of inmates in one year
Association
Jail
Society
Prisoners
Prison overcrowding