‘It's an awful thing, but it's better than being dead’: Exploring the emotional circuitry of failed segregation reforms in Canadian prisons

Prison authorities around the world are increasingly adopting more politically palatable alternatives to segregation – often referred to as solitary confinement. In 2019, the Canadian government enacted Bill C-83, legally abolishing segregation in federal prisons – at least, on paper – and established Structured Intervention Units (SIUs) as a supposedly less harmful alternative. Critics have problematized the Correctional Service of Canada's implementation of the SIU model as maintaining previous segregation practices under the rhetoric of ‘reform’. Building upon these criticisms, this article challenges the common refrain that segregation spaces are prisons within prisons, spaces that are somehow different – extraordinary even – in terms of their material conditions and administration. While segregation or SIUs reflect the most austere and punitive form of isolation, they do not exist apart from the wider carceral environment. Developing the notion of emotional circuitry, we examine formerly incarcerated people's (n = 57) experiences of moving between general population, SIUs, and other segregation-like spaces. We highlight the falsity of distinguishing SIUs as a distinct carceral space, and the importance of understanding its spatial, material, and emotional effects as born from the violence of the broader incarceration experience that no degree of segregation-specific reforms can ameliorate.