Abstract

The paper examines the meanings of the notion of reform. Is reform an act or a process; what is an object of reform and how is it performed; is the scope of its performance limited or does it permeate deeper social structures? The approach to reform in this paper is genealogical, through the analysis of the processes of institutionalisation of the prison in Great Britain in 18th and 19th centuries. Although the elaboration of these processes revolves around a particular era and place, this micro-sample gives rise to conclusions that surpass historically conditioned analysis. The aim of this paper is to show that reform has to be understood as an expression and effect of a profound transformation of the political, as well as the complex, multilateral and dispersive process which penetrates into and alters extant social relations.